The Eap Curriculum Issues Methods and Challenges
The Eap Curriculum Issues Methods and Challenges
The Eap Curriculum Issues Methods and Challenges
177
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178 The English for academic purposes curriculum
Needs analysis
There is a general consensus that needs analysis, the collection and
application of information on learners' needs, is a de®ning feature
of ESP and, within ESP, of EAP (e.g. T. Johns and Dudley-Evans,
1991; Robinson, 1991; Strevens, 1988a; Jordan, 1997). Needs
analysis is the necessary point of departure for designing a syllabus,
tasks and materials. With its concern to ®ne tune the curriculum to
the speci®c needs of the learner, needs analysis was a precursor to
subsequent interest in `learner centredness' (Nunan, 1988a; Tudor,
1996). Early examples of needs analysis were simple affairs that
sought to get a rough idea of the purposes for which learners would
need English after their course. A more systematic and very in¯uen-
tial model was that of Munby (1978), who provided a very detailed
multi-dimensional model for specifying the uses of language that
learners were likely to encounter in speci®c purpose situations.
Munby was criticised for only considering the target needs (re-
ferred to as Target Situation Analysis) of learners and neglecting
other requirements. Needs analysis should be more than just a
speci®cation of learners' target uses of the language, subsequent
curriculum specialists argued. It should also consider learners' lacks ±
that is, what they actually require, taking into account what they
already know ± and their wants ± what they themselves wish to learn
(Hutchison and Waters, 1987); target situation analysis may discover
that learners need to be able to read academic textbooks, but
learners, on the other hand, may feel that grammatical accuracy is
what they need, or want to improve their social English.
An approach to EAP needs analysis can be to ask ourselves why
the learners are doing an English course, in what situations they will
need or already need English, and what they must do in those
situations. Information can be gathered from people with responsi-
bility for the course, learners, and others in the learners' academic
department who are now using English. The information to be
collected can also include the learners' primary motivation in
learning English, their learning background, ESL pro®ciency (four
skills) and an idea of how much they now use English outside the
classroom ± that is, their opportunities for reading, writing, listening
and speaking English.
A further dimension of needs analysis is concerned with ®nding
out about learners' language learning strategies (Oxford, 1990),
de®ned by Oxford as conscious or unconscious methods of helping
or accelerating learning. Strategy analysis is particularly important in
EAP contexts where learners and teachers come from different
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The EAP curriculum: Issues, methods, and challenges 179
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180 The English for academic purposes curriculum
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The EAP curriculum: Issues, methods, and challenges 181
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182 The English for academic purposes curriculum
Teaching materials
Once a syllabus has been established, teaching materials need to be
selected. A dif®cult choice for many EAP course designers and
teachers is between published materials and materials made speci®-
cally for the target EAP course. Kuo (1993), however, recommends
that we `need not take an all-or-nothing approach . . . (EAP) text-
books may serve as a kind of data bank', allowing teachers to choose
the materials that are most appropriate for any one class among
those in a small collection.
Another choice is between authentic and non-authentic materials.
Three common arguments in favour of authentic texts are that non-
authentic texts cannot represent real-world language use, that
simpli®ed materials often lose some meaning with simpli®cation and
that the real-world situations learners will face or are already facing
are best prepared for with authentic texts. Among the arguments
against the use of authentic texts are that any one authentic text
may not be authentic for a speci®c class, the fact that just because a
text is authentic does not mean it is relevant (the distinction
between authenticity of text and authenticity of purpose) and the
obvious point that authentic texts are frequently too dif®cult
linguistically, and for classes of students from various disciplines
may require too high a level of specialised knowledge. Kuo (1993)
concludes on the question of authenticity that it is almost impossible
for authentic texts to be always appropriate, and that the important
point with any text is appropriate selection and use. Certainly the
choice of any language teaching materials must be made with the
proper context in which the materials will be used kept ®rmly in
mind. It must also be remembered that each EAP discipline has its
own specialised style of language use (discourse), and that this style
should ± if possible ± be incorporated into the teaching materials
selected (see Widdowson, 1983; Hutchinson and Waters, 1987;
Phillips and Shettlesworth, 1978, on the debate surrounding authen-
ticity).
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The EAP curriculum: Issues, methods, and challenges 183
EAP methodology
EAP/ESP is generally claimed not to have a single speci®c method-
ology (Strevens, 1988b). On the other hand, methodology employed
in speci®c ESP/EAP settings is quite often innovative or specialised
(Bloor and Bloor, 1986; T. Johns and Dudley-Evans, 1991). Most
consistently running through these innovative approaches to ESP/
EAP methodology is the notion of purposeful and authentic learning
activity. EAP practitioners are concerned that the learning goals and
activities that their learners engage in are meaningful in relation to
the speci®c purpose of their target discipline. This has resulted in an
emphasis on various types of task-based learning and the use of
authentic materials. Space allows us to describe brie¯y only a few
examples of such approaches.
A pioneering effort was developed by Herbolich (1979) at the
University of Kuwait in the late seventies. In order to teach his
students to read and write technical manuals, Herbolich set them the
task of designing and building box-kites and writing the accompany-
ing manual to go with them.
Working also in the Middle East (King Abdulaziz University, Saudi
Arabia) at about the same time as Herbolich, and also concerned
with the relationship between authentic task and language learning
activity, Phillips (1981) developed an approach to ESP methodology
based upon the following two precepts: (1) the structure of LSP tasks
must be determined by the structure of the behavioural objectives of
the learner's special purpose, and (2) this structure must be at the
highest practicable level of focus. From this position Phillips devel-
oped four principles, as follows:
the principal of reality control: control of task dif®culty should be
determined by simplifying the task in terms of the speci®c
purpose and not just by simplifying the language.
the principle of non-triviality: the learning tasks must be perceived by
the learner as meaningfully generated by the special purpose.
the principle of authenticity: the language acquired must be authentic
to the speci®c purpose
the principle of the tolerance of error: errors should be treated as
unacceptable only if they compromise communicative adequacy.
Emphasising methodology over content, Hall and Kenny (1988)
described a pre-sessional EAP course in a Thai university in which
`Our syllabus is speci®ed in terms of its methodology rather than in
terms of linguistic items or skills' (p. 20). Concerned that the course
should prepare learners for the sort of activities that they will be
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184 The English for academic purposes curriculum
Reading
Reading, as a skill for EAP students, is often linked to writing
because the former often precedes the latter within the target
disciplines. Students read textbooks and journal articles with the goal
of extracting relevant information and ideas for writing up assign-
ments, examinations and dissertations, etc. For this reason, reading
teachers often focus on reading skills they believe will be useful when
students write extensively (see Bloor and St John, 1988). Examples
are distinguishing relevant from irrelevant information, note-taking
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The EAP curriculum: Issues, methods, and challenges 185
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186 The English for academic purposes curriculum
Writing
Writing as a skill for EAP has been described in idealised terms by
Johnson, Shek, and Law (199: 86) as `the most deliberative act of
communication that we engage in . . . writers have an array of
strategies to use at each stage of the writing process'. The reality,
though, is different: ®rst-year EAP students are normally set a
number of writing assignments, often relatively simple, yet they often
end up being accused ± justi®ably ± of plagiarism. Students are often
unaware of the range of genres among different disciplines and also
unable to reprocess information, perhaps because they have not been
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The EAP curriculum: Issues, methods, and challenges 187
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188 The English for academic purposes curriculum
Speaking
There is a general consensus among ESL educators that oral language
is very important, yet speaking in EAP remains a relatively neglected
skill. This is unfortunate because apart from the speci®c speaking
needs learners may have, con®dence and ability in speaking tends to
carry over to the other skills. In addition, language pro®ciency of
non-native speakers is often informally evaluated on the basis of
spoken language. Subject teachers, for example, tend to judge NNS
students by how they express themselves orally and this judgement
can lead to teacher expectations that can strongly in¯uence academic
success.
Jordan (1997) describes typical EAP speaking skills as asking
questions during lectures and tutorials, participating in seminars and
discussions, giving presentations, interacting in laboratory and work-
shop settings and describing data (see also Chirnside, 1986). Com-
pared with the research article, which is the most researched
academic genre, little work has been done to describe the spoken
academic genres.
An important area of EAP speaking instruction is directed towards
seminar participation. There is some literature on the discourse of
seminars. The ®ndings indicate a wide range of seminar types,
ranging from a monologue by the seminar leader to a free for all
discussion. Johns and Johns (1977) note that this variation tends to
depend upon the different disciplines. More discussion is traditional
in the humanities, with more teacher dominance in the natural
sciences. However, there are also cultural differences; Asian cultures,
for example, tend to encourage less student participation, with more
deference accorded to the teacher (Flowerdew and Miller, 1995,
1996).
Lynch and Anderson (cited in Jordan, 1997: 197) list a range of
problems in seminar speaking:
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The EAP curriculum: Issues, methods, and challenges 189
Listening
Most of the work in academic listening research has focused on
lectures (see, e.g., the papers in Flowerdew [1994a]), although
seminar participation is another language event where listening skills
are needed. Interactive, or conversational listening, however, is
usually dealt with along with speaking.
The key issues in lecture listening research revolve around the
question of authenticity and the goal of preparing learners to
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190 The English for academic purposes curriculum
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The EAP curriculum: Issues, methods, and challenges 191
ahs) or discourse markers (now, so, OK, and, etc.) and have a more
tightly structured grammar (Halliday, 1989). In many ways, listening
to a recording of a written text is a more dif®cult challenge than
listening to a spontaneous lecture. In a comparison of one authentic
lecture with materials used in second language textbooks, Flowerdew
and Miller (1997) highlighted a range of salient features in the
authentic lecture which they believed to be important for learners to
comprehend, but which were absent from the textbooks. In addition
to the linguistic characteristics of authentic lectures mentioned
above, Flowerdew and Miller (1997) noted the importance of the
body language of the lecturer, a range of interpersonal strategies used
by the lecturer to empathise with the audience and check on
comprehension, the use of `macro-markers' to refer backwards or
forwards in the lecture or to other lectures in the course, the use of
rhetorical questions, and the integration of the spoken monologue
with visual aids, written handouts, pre- and post-lecturer reading and
tutorial discussion. Arguing that such distinctive features are not
conducive to treatment in a textbook, Flowerdew and Miller suggest
that textbook materials should be supplemented by authentic lectures
which would allow learners to develop top-down strategies and
integrate listening with the other associated skills.
Flowerdew (1994c) suggests that a lot could be done to train
lecturers who teach NNSs and that such training might indeed be
more cost effective than investing yet more resources in improving
the pro®ciency level of their students. Indeed, in North America,
there is quite a literature on the training of international teaching
assistants (TAs), but there are few accounts of such lecturer training
outside North America (although see Lynch, 1994). Tauroza and
Allison (1994) suggest ways in which lecturers could improve their
delivery, including repetition, moderating speed, emphasising main
points, summarising, and speaking loudly and clearly. One area of
training which would be particularly bene®cial, Flowerdew and
Miller (1995, 1996) argue, is at the cultural level. In ethnographic
research conducted in Hong Kong, these researchers identi®ed a
whole range of features where there were potential mismatches
between the culture of the Hong Kong Chinese students and their
Western lecturers. These cross-cultural mismatches relate to ethnic
culture, local culture, academic culture and disciplinary culture.
Study skills
Because EAP is concerned with helping students use English to
learn, EAP teaching has always been associated with the various
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192 The English for academic purposes curriculum
study skills in which the language they teach their students is used.
Study skills encompass a wide range of activities. They include
listening and note-taking, reading skills such as skimming, scanning,
guessing meanings from context and using the dictionary, seminar
discussion, oral presentation, essay/thesis/laboratory report writing,
using the library, using computers in their various applications
(word-processing, the Internet, etc.), and even avoiding plagiarism
(see Jordan [1997: 7±8] for a more extensive list). Given the very
wide range of study skills needed in EAP, Waters and Waters argue
that developing students study skill competence is more important
than teaching the speci®c individual skills.
As technology comes to be used more in academic study, the
student's repertoire of required study skills is rapidly expanding. One
area worth special mention, because it is a language learning strategy
skill rather than a study skill to be applied to the content subject, is
the use of corpora and concordancing packages as a learning tool.
There is a lot of interest currently in devising effective ways of
helping students access the wealth of linguistic information available
in specialist corpora by the use of concordancers and related com-
puter software (Johns, 1988; Stevens, 1991a). Use of the internet has
so far not ®gured in the EAP literature, but doubtless this important
study aid will soon be researched.
Assessment
Student assessment for EAP is the measuring of students' language
ability and can be undertaken at different stages in their study
careers, by different means, and with different purposes. The main
aim of a test is not to say how appropriate or successful a course is,
but to measure the individual abilities of individual students so that a
comparison ± or ranking ± between students and of any one student
can be made. It is generally agreed that three different kinds of tests
are relevant to EAP: placement tests, which measure abilities at the
start of a course so that students can be placed in the right EAP class,
achievement tests, which test to what extent students have learned
the skills and items on a course, and pro®ciency tests, which do not
refer to any one course, but are normally used to assess and describe
students' linguistic abilities before enrolling on a course of study
(examples are TOEFL and IELTS). Assessment is a key issue in EAP,
given its important gate-keeping function within the institution or
nationally or internationally. Minimum scores on the international
pro®ciency tests are used by many universities as a guide to accep-
tance of students. Similarly, within the individual institution, pro®-
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The EAP curriculum: Issues, methods, and challenges 193
Programme evaluation
Programme evaluation for EAP means evaluating or re-evaluating the
course design ± the syllabus, materials, tasks and methods as they
were originally planned ± to see if the course is meeting its stated
objectives. Evaluation may be either formative ± i.e., on-going, as the
course progresses ± or summative ± i.e., at the end of the course.
Course evaluation should involve as many participants as possible
and this may mean students, teachers, subject teachers, the institution
and administrators. The broad range of views that these interested
parties can contribute will mean that a balanced and comprehensive
view of the course and its achievements may be obtained. The aim of
EAP course evaluation should be to measure the effectiveness of the
EAP course, and perhaps to make suggestions for change. Mechan-
isms for course evaluation include learner and teacher questionnaires
and interviews, learner diaries and teacher notes, materials evalua-
tion, test and other assessment results, and classroom observation.
This triangulated view may be comprehensive enough to act as an
appropriate basis for recommendations for course improvement. The
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194 The English for academic purposes curriculum
Conclusion
As stated in the introduction, this chapter has provided an overview
of the key aspects of the EAP curriculum, from the initial analysis of
needs through to the ®nal programme evaluation. It is important to
bear in mind that the issues identi®ed as components of the EAP
curriculum should not be seen as a rigid series of procedures, but
rather as a cycle with a central focus, or axis, which inter-relates each
of the stages. Needs analysis cannot be undertaken without an initial
consideration of what sort of syllabus might be appropriate in a
given situation. Methodology cannot be formulated without consid-
eration of the roles of teachers and learners. Programme evaluation,
whilst considered the last stage in the curriculum process, should
nevertheless be considered at the outset, as parts of the needs
analysis. We hope that readers will bear this in mind as they read the
individual chapters of the collection, each of which focuses on one
particular dimension, but which cannot function in isolation from
the others.
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