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Output file HANOI national university university of languages and International STUDIES Department of Post graduate studies VƢƠNG THỊ KIM MINH DEVELOPING TEACHING MATERIALS OF ENGLISH FOR TOURGUIDING[.]
HANOI national university university of languages and International STUDIES Department of Post-graduate studies VƢƠNG THỊ KIM MINH DEVELOPING TEACHING MATERIALS OF ENGLISH FOR TOURGUIDING PROGRAM AT HA LONG COLLEGE OF ART, CULTURE AND TOURISM XÂY DỰNG GIÁO TRÌNH TIẾNG ANH CHUYÊN NGÀNH DU LỊCH CHO KHOA DU LỊCH, TRƢỜNG CAO ĐẲNG VĂN HÓA NGHỆ THUẬT VÀ DU LỊCH HẠ LONG M.A MINOR THESIS Field: Methodology Code: 60 14 10 Hanoi, 2009 HANOI national university university of languages and International STUDIES Department of Post-graduate studies VƢƠNG THỊ KIM MINH DEVELOPING TEACHING MATERIALS OF ENGLISH FOR TOURGUIDING PROGRAM AT HA LONG COLLEGE OF ART, CULTURE AND TOURISM XÂY DỰNG GIÁO TRÌNH TIẾNG ANH CHUYÊN NGÀNH DU LỊCH CHO KHOA DU LỊCH, TRƢỜNG CAO ĐẲNG VĂN HÓA NGHỆ THUẬT VÀ DU LỊCH HẠ LONG M.A MINOR THESIS Field: Methodology Code: 60 14 10 Supervisor: T ô Thị Thu Hƣơng, PhD Hanoi, 2009 iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS i ABSTRACT ii TABLE OF CONTENTS iii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS v LIST OF TABLES v INTRODUCTION 1 Rationale Aims of the study Research questions Methodology Scope of the study .3 Design of the study CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 An overview on ESP 1.2 An overview on meterial development 1.2.1 Notion on material 1.2.2 Types of materials 1.2.3 Basic principles for the material development 1.3 Framework for materials development 1.3.1 Material design model 1.3.2 Process of materials writing CHAPTER 2: NEED ANALYSIS 10 Introduction 10 2.1 Situation analysis 10 2.1.1 Training situation 10 v 2.1.2 Teaching staff and methodology 11 2.1.3 Facilities 11 2.1.4 Existing curriculum and syllabuses 11 2.1.5 Students 12 2.2 Analysis on Tour guides’ opinion 12 2.2.1 The survey 12 2.2.2 Tour guides' opinions on the topics 13 2.2.3 Tour guides’ opinions about the task in a city tour 14 2.3 Analysis on teachers and students’ opinion 16 2.3.1 The survey 16 2.3.2 Opinions on skills which need improvement 17 2.3.3 Opinions on ways of skill practice 18 CHAPTER 3: COURSE BOOK CONTENT 21 3.1 General content 21 3.1.1 Topics 21 3.1.2 Tasks 22 3.1.3 Activities 22 3.2 The detail syllabus 23 3.3 A sample unit 30 CONCLUSION 38 REFERENCES APPENDIXES vi LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ESP: English for Specific Purposes EFL: English as Foreign Language EGP: English for General Purposes FOT: Faculty of Tourism HLC: Ha Long College of Art, Culture and Tourism LIST IF FIGURES AND TABLES Table 1.1: A materials design model Table 1.2: The process of materials writing Table 2.2: Favorable topics 13 Table 2.2: Tasks needed improvement 15 Table 2.3: Favorable information 15 Table 2.4: Places for lunch 16 Table 2.5: Teacher participants 17 Table 2.6: Student participants 17 Table 2.7: Skills needed improvement 17 Table 2.8: Teacher participants – skill practices 18 Table 2.9: Student participants – skill practices 19 Table 2.10: Practices of the task 20 Table 3.1: Material Topics 21 Table 3.2: Material Activities 22 INTRODUCTION Significance of the study Ha Long City appeals thousands of tourists, each year, to explore the typical and unique features of the Bay and some other landscapes with a rich cultural life and diverse tropical elements Ha Long, Quang Ninh is becoming a must-choose destination among lots of interesting locations in Vietnam because it promises a remarkebale tour with true experience of simple daily life of friendly local people Many strategic policies and planning have been developed to tap its tourism potential, as a result, tourism in Quang Ninh province is blooming to become an important national economic branch with the appearance of a wide range of hotels, resorts, types of entertainment and transportation Tourism facilities have been upgraded with a wide range of services including tour guiding, catering and accommodation services Developing at such a rapid speed, the tourism industry in the region requires a good working staff which is not only professional but also fluent in foreign language skills, especially English As an international language, English is becoming more and more popular and communicative in the world In the global integration, English is essential for all fields of economy, including tourism Tourism training is also paid much attention to English so as to provide an abundant resource of skilled, professional and well-English-speaking tourismrelated staff, especially tour guides Students of tourism faculties in all colleges and universities have to take English in their graduation exams However, the Ministry of Education and Training and Vietnam Administration of Tourism have not had a common curriculum of English for Tour Guiding to apply in all colleges and universities nationwide Some existing English curriculums for tourism are too general and not suitable for the tourism environment in Quang Ninth and the English level of students in Ha Long College of Arts, Culture and Tourism The Tourism Faculty of the College was established two years ago and had 20 students in the first year and 23 in the second year In order to enlarge the training scale and to meet the demand of the province, the Faculty of Tourism of Ha Long College of Arts, Culture and Tourism, sooner or later, must design an appropriate ESP curriculum for the college’s tourism students with some distinctive features to meet the needs of the province At present, students in Tourism faculty of Ha Long College are required to learn 150 periods (45-minute/period) of English at intermediate level in the first year Then they take three courses of professional English for Tourism (ET) 1, and The syllabuses/materials for ET1 and ET2 have been written and in the process of evaluation These ET1 and ET2 are conducted in 300 periods and focus on tour guiding and tourism potentials in history, culture, regions, education and socio-economy of Vietnam and Quang Ninh However, to date, no research has been carried out to develop the syllabus/ materials for the ET3 course which is expected to last 100 periods and to contain necessary information on most popular sites in Ha Long city and its surroundings with suitable tasks to improve students’ skill in tour guiding It is really an urgent need to a research to put these ET3 ideas into practice Aims of the study The study aims at: investigating and analyzing the Faculty of Tourism students' needs for the course ET3; providing criteria and principles for the course design and material development; designing an appropriate framework for developing materials for the course CT3 and developing a sample unit with appropriate materials Research questions The study answers two questions: How to design ESP materials for the course ET3? What should be the ESP materials for the course ET3? In order to answer these questions, the study deals with the following sub-questions: For Research Question 1: What is the framework for ET3 material design? What are fundamental steps to follow? For Research Question 2: What is the situation of English teaching and learning at the Faculty of Tourism (FT)? What are the needs and the learning strategies of FT learners? What are the topics on which the materials should focus? What are suitable practice activities attached to the topics? Methodology The study used mixed methods Both quantitative and qualitative methods are used in this study This includes questionnaire survey, interviews, observation, and document analysis A questionnaire survey was carried out to obtain ideas on knowledge areas needed for tour guides from students, teachers and some local travel agencies of good reputation Interviews were used during break times, in or after the lessons to obtain various useful suggestions on how to effectively design the syllabus Observations were made to find out the real current situation of teaching and learning English for Tourism at Ha Long College of Art, Culture and Tourism Analysis of related documents was done to verify the obtained information Scope of the study Due to the limitation of time and resources, the study is limited to design a new syllabus and the development of materials for the course ET3 which concentrates on "a city tour of Ha Long and its surroundings" This material is used specifically for the students of Tourism Faculty at Ha Long College of Arts, Culture and Tourism Design of the study The study includes an introduction, three chapters, a conclusion, a bibliography and appendices The Introduction part provides some general information about the study, consisting of the rationales, significance, aims, methodology, scope and structure of the study The three chapters present the main body of the study They are: Chapter 1, Literature Review provides an overview of ESP course design and material development Chapter 2, Need Analysis, deals with the current situation of ESP teaching and learning at HLC The needs of students are also analyzed Chapter 3, Material Development, discusses the design and content of the proposed materials for English for Tourism for the course ET3 The Conclusion summarizes the main points of the study and provides some pedagogical implications for development of materials for an ESP syllabus and offers some recommendations for further studies CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 AN OVERVIEW ON ESP ESP is a term standing for English for Special Purposes It is, however, not easy for most teachers and students of English to give out an appropriate definition of ESP Even great scholars of language field define ESP from various approaches Hutchison and Waters (1987:18-19): "English is not a particular kind of language or methodology, nor does it consist of a particular type of teaching material" They show that ESP is rooted from the need of learners identified in the question: "Why does the learner need to learn a foreign language?" Likewise, a learner will expose his "specific purpose " of his language learning, such as tourism, business, literature, As a result, ESP definition rises from the need analysis of the learner Robinson (1991:3) supports the idea that ESP is normally goal-directed and that English's courses develop from a need analysis, which aims to specify as closely as possible what exactly that students have to through the medium of English ESP should be put in comparison with GPE (General Purpose English) Widdowson (1983:6) highlights the distinction that "ESP has a training function which is aimed at the development of a "restricted competence", whereas GPE fulfils an educative function and is aimed at the development of "general capacity" This study will use these authors conception of ESP as they appropriately capture the essence of what it means in the specific context of English teaching and learning at Ha Long College 1.2 AN OVERVIEW ON DEVELOPMENT MATERIALS 1.2.1 Notions of material Brian Tomlison (1998:11) defines material in language learning as "anything which is used to help to teach language learners Material can be in the form of a textbook, a workbook, a cassette, a CD-ROM, a video, a photocopied handout, a newspaper, a paragraph written on the board: anything which presents or informs about the language being learned." In that vein, materials not conventionally limit to only textbooks and workbooks but they takes various types They can be printed or not, authentic or non-authentic, original or diversified, But in whatever form they are, the most important function of the materials is instructing language learners Tomlinson (1998:2) also suggests that material development "refers to anything which is done by writers, teachers or learners to provide sources of language input and to exploit those sources in ways which maximize the likelihood of intake: in other words the supplying of information about and/or experience of the language in ways designed to promote language learning" In detail, material developers can such things as writing textbooks, telling stories, creating a handout or imitating an advertisements, ect which provide comprehensible input for an effective language acquisition 2 Criteria for good written materials Tom Hutchinson (1989:107) concentrates on seven “musts” as criteria to evaluate whether some written materials are good or not, some of which should be paid much attention as follows: - Materials must stimulate students to learn: in other words, it is in students’ interest so that it can boost their motivation in learning - Materials must contribute to organize the teaching and learning process: It must consist of a coherent string of units, in which a huge amount of knowledge is arranged in a scientific system - Materials must function in widening the basis of teacher training by introduce teachers to new techniques - Materials must provide correct and appropriate language use 1.2.3 Basic principles for material development According to Brian Tomlinson (1998:7-21), there are many principles for developing materials, among which the most basic are: - Materials should achieve impact through: novelty, variety, attractive presentation and appealing content - Materials should help learners to feel at ease to stimulate the learners' studying spirit - What is being taught should be perceived by the learners as relevant and useful - Materials should expose learners to language in authentic use - Materials should not rely too much on controlled practice INPUT CONTENT LANGUAGE TASK Table 1.1: A materials design model 1.3.2 Process of materials writing The process of materials writing contains various steps which are inevitable to the success of the new proposed materials Jolly and Bolitho (1998:97) focus on a framework for developing materials which involves the following procedures illustrated in the form of a diagram: IDENTIFICATION EXPLORATION CONTEXTUAL REALISATION PEDAGOGICAL REALISATION PRODUCTION STUDENT USE EVALUATION Table 1.2: The process of materials writing The first step Identification is done by learners or teacher to find out a need to fulfill or a problem to solve by the creation of materials The next step is Exploration of the area of need or problem in terms of what language, what meanings, what functions, what skills Contextual realization engages in suitable ideas, contexts or texts with which to work Pedagogical realization of materials is to find proper exercises, activities and appropriate instructions with learners' interest and language level The four steps will decide the form of Production of materials: tape, workbook, textbook, handout However it is pointed out that if the diagram consists of only these steps, it really exposes itself to one-directional simplicity which may lead the materials to the lack of "the final touch to the teacher and students" Therefore, they also appreciate the importance of the student use of materials and the step of material evaluation against expected and unexpected objectives It is Evaluation step that turns the process into a dynamic one for it forces the materials developer to examine whether the materials meet and overcome objectives In summary, this chapter has discussed about the notion of ESP and the two aspects: material development and framework for material development This background knowledge will be very important bright light to lead the study on the right way to the next steps 10 CHAPTER 2: NEEDS ANALYSIS INTRODUCTION Needs analysis is a major step which decides the success of course/material development, including selecting/grading content as well as learning tasks It is supposed to obtain all needed reflective information from various stakeholders, who are, in this study, learners, teachers and tour guides from selected travel agencies The chapter discusses the learning and teaching situation at the HLC and the opinions of its teachers, students and tour guides on the course materials 2.1 SITUATION ANALYSIS 2.1.1 Training Situation Ha Long College of Arts, Culture and Tourism was established under Decision No 4384/QĐ of Ministry of Education and Training on the 3rd, August 2004, which operates in the system of provincial universities and colleges under the management of Provincial Office of Culture and Information It was upgraded from Quang Ninh Arts and Culture School which was established in 1971 As the name has suggested, the College has three main training aspects: Arts, Culture which have made a great contribution to many successful festivals and cultural events held in Quang Ninh, and Tourism Faculty of Tourism is one of the training faculties in HLC It, however, was newly born in 2004 when the College was upgraded from an Arts and Culture school; therefore it has faced many obstacles: lacking of experiences, financial difficulties… Nevertheless the faculty has also received great help and support from the college leaders For that reason, just after years of foundation, the faculty has earned a good reputation for its training quality Thousands of graduates are doing the jobs of their professional specialty such as hotel manager, receptionist, room attendant, hotel cashier, tour guide, waiter, and waitress or working staff in tourismrelated offices The faculty provides the tourism market mostly in Quang Ninh and surroundings with labors and cadres with broad and intensive knowledge in tour guiding, hotel management and travel organizations 11 2.1.2 Teaching staff and methodology There are currently 10 teachers in the English groups – a large number compared with this of other subjects However, due to a large number of students, the faculty is still looking for some new teachers to stop the current over-working situation for its lecturers Among those teachers, are on long-term contract and the remaining are official government servants out of 10 graduated from Hanoi University of Foreign Studies (Hanoi University now) and graduated from working training course The English group is very good at working in team They have just cooperatively written a book named “English for Tour Guiding” for ET1 and ET2 courses ET3 is still in the conception stage All teaching and learning activities are under the light of student-centered approach Every two weeks, the teachers of English have a meeting to discuss all emerged questions 2.1.3 Facilities As a newly founded faculty, FT has got poor facility There are radio cassettes which are used every day in almost every lesson It has a lab room with 25 computers which, however, are also used for the first year students to learn office computer science There is a video room used not only for English but also for Arts, Music and other subjects Both teachers and learners can access Internet with 20 computers and thousand of books including English ones in a small library Generally, poor facility is a barrier for FT lecturers to improve their teaching quality 2.1.4 The current curriculum and syllabuses At HLC, the English program for students can be divided into two components: general English and English for Tourism Since English is chosen as a subject in the entrance exam, teaching General English starts from Intermediate Lifeline which is supposed to focus on communication The textbook is assumed to be compatible to the target of consolidating the English foundation, enlarging the vocabulary and having students involved in communicative activities Special attention is paid to enhance students’ pronunciation by teaching “The sounds of English” – a small textbook in 20 periods of 45 minutes This textbook is being taught to the first-year students of English Faculty in Hanoi University and is introduced to the college by lecturer Nguyen Tam 12 2.1.5 Students English is one of the three compulsory subjects for the entrance exam, thus students in FT can meet some certain requirements of English, especially English grammar However, their speaking skill is really limited because this skill is not tested in the exam One more important reason is that, English training condition in areas like Quang Ninh province is not adequate Students can interpret a complex sentence from Vietnamese to English but they find it too hard to speak fluently because of their bad pronunciation and in bad confidence Their bad pronunciation is also resulted from the local accent If you know the difficulty of Nghe An, Ha Tinh students in speaking English at the beginning stage, you know the same happening to FT students from rural and mountainous areas such as Quang Ha, Tien Yen, Ba Che, Ha Nam… In the first year, students are taught Basic English including pronunciation They have chances to practice speaking before many people by giving short or medium-length presentation on a given topic In the second year, with the help of situation-based textbook, they are appointed to play role in dialogues Accordingly, students are required to imitate not only the sound and the sentence intonation but also gestures of people in the textbook The students are exposed to situation related to the target topics, e.g receiving a booking, dealing with a complaint, managing checking in and checking out… In the third year, students are provided information about some typical sights and landscapes nationwide and in Quang Ninh At the same time, they are asked to assignments, projects and small research to search information on their work which will improve their knowledge as well as help them become more confident and dynamic 2.2 ANALYSIS OF TOURGUIDES’ OPINIONS 2.2.1 The survey As a famous destination for domestic and international tourists, Ha Long city has got over twenty travel agencies such as Bai Tho Junks-Delux Cruises, Ha Long Cruises, Entity Tourist and Trading Company, Hong Gai Tourist and Services Company… where hundreds of tour guides are working to welcome over three million arrivals of tourists per year It is widely believed that nobody understands the easy and the hard parts of this job better than these tour guides, and nobody knows the common needs, likes and dislikes of tourists as clearly as they The survey, for that reason, was conducted in to have them recommended Topics, Tasks and Skills considered necessary for a tour guide The questionnaire which consists of 13 questions was piloted on 50 tour guides travel agencies and 40 completed ones were returned The data from the survey were collected, analyzed and described in the next part 2.2.2 Tour guides' opinions on the topics Stops No No No No No No No No No No 10 Ha Long Bay 40 0 0 0 0 26 10 0 0 0 65% 25% 10% 6 14 2 12.5% 2.5% 15% 15% 35% 7.5% 5% 2.5% 5% 17 3 0 20% 42.5% 12.5% 10% 7.5% 7.5% 0 12 12 2.5% 15% 5% 30% 30% 17.5% 15 10 7.5% 2.5% 5% 37.5% 25% 22.5% 0 100% International Resort of Tuan Chau Royal International Park Bai Chay Beach Relics on Bai Tho 0 mountain Cai Lan Port Trade Center of 0 0 Ha Long Cua Ong Temple Cat Ba resort Yen Tu Cultural and Historical relics 0 0 0 15 7.5% 37.5% 20% 17.5% 12.5% 0 13 12 7.5% 12.5% 7.5% 10% 32.5% 30% 5% 12 3 10% 15% 30% 7.5% 10% 12.5% 7.5% 7.5% 18 2.5% 12.5% 10% 7.5% 2.5% 45% 5% 2.5% 12.5% Table 2.1: Favorable Topics The first question in the questionnaire was about attractive stops to tourists Ten famous stops were listed from which seven are expected to be the topics for the supposed materials The tour guides were asked to rearrange the given stops in the order of their popularity to foreign tourists They were asked to optionally add more well-known topics if any However, only one stop named Van Don Island Resort was recommended by four tour guides, 14 accounting for 10% Due to this small proportion, this proposal was not typical, then, was paid not much attention All tour guides chose Ha Long Bay as the most irrefutably attractive destination to tourists International Resort of Tuan Chau Island and Bai Chay Beach definitely get a high rank Amazingly, Cultural and Historical Relics of Yen Tu was considered a gorgeous landscape Obviously, Buddhism and magnificent view of Truc Lam Yen Tu have been a magnet for foreign tourists This result has suggested stops for the topics of ET3 syllabus They are: Ha Long Bay, International Resort of Tuan Chau, Bai Chay Beach, Trade Center of Ha Long, Cat Ba resort, Royal International Park and Yen Tu Cultural and Historical relics The eighth topic is expected to be the favorable foods of Ha Long 2.2.3 Tour guides’ opinions about the task in a city tour The second question in the questionnaire asked tour guides about the ordinal tasks in a city tour Out of 40 tour guides, 32 (80%) were in agreement to this following occurrence order of tasks: Welcoming tourists Introducing (about the tour guide himself and the tour) Announcing ground rules Giving information Answering tourists’ questions Arranging lunch for tourists Solving problems The third question asked tour guides which task mostly and frequently caused difficulty or embarrassment for a tour guide, and their choices are as in table 2.2 The data recommended that information or understanding about the landscapes, which is originally very large, can cause predictable difficulties for tour guides if they are not well trained Therefore, information related to the topics chosen should be the focus of the materials under development Dealing with tourists’ questions also requires considerable attention Many tourists ask many unexpected questions, including both interesting and unintersting ones, fortunately the latter accounts for just a small proportion Anyway, a good answer requires 15 No Tasks Number/ Percentage of tour guide Welcoming tourists Introducing Announcing ground rules (5%) Giving information 17 (42.5%) Answering tourists’ questions 15 (37.5%) Arranging lunch for tourists Taking care of tourists’ security (15%) Table 2.2: Tasks needed improvement good listening skill, thus, good speaking skill and exact information should be the tasks of this training course Taking care of tourists’ security and announcing rules are mostly based on each tour guide’s experiences and agencies’ regulation The question number fourth aims to elicit which kind of information is commonly given to tourists or tourists are often interested in The result is displayed in the table below Ha Long Bay and Other places of Parks and Resorts Historical sites Famous islands Main sites Characters Activities Legends Construction Events Construction UNESCO recognition Entertainments Time Investment Bai Chay Beach interest Table 2.3: Favored information A city tour often includes a lunch for tourists arranged in advance by the travel agencies Question five made clear about the places where the tourists would have lunch so that the materials would be filled up with information, situations and questions related to the appointed places Six stops for lunch were suggested and four of them would be chosen and their relevant knowledge would be added in the parts of reading, listening or writing in each unit Table 2.4 shows that the most popular place for lunch in Ha Long city tour was food stalls on boats It is reasonable because most international tourists never skip a 5-hour trip to Ha Long Bay by boat, and what is more romantic than having meals on boat, seeing fantastic sight of ... What is the situation of English teaching and learning at the Faculty of Tourism (FT)? What are the needs and the learning strategies of FT learners? What are the topics on which the materials. .. situation of teaching and learning English for Tourism at Ha Long College of Art, Culture and Tourism Analysis of related documents was done to verify the obtained information Scope of the. .. to meet the demand of the province, the Faculty of Tourism of Ha Long College of Arts, Culture and Tourism, sooner or later, must design an appropriate ESP curriculum for the college? ??s tourism