Teachers’ beliefs and practices about ESP teaching a case study at hanoi university of industry

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY - HANOI UNIVERSTITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST- GRADUATE STUDIES -*** - ĐÀO THỊ MAI HƯƠNG TEACHERS’ BELIEFS AND PRACTICES ABOUT ESP TEACHING: A CASE STUDY AT HANOI UNIVERSITY OF INDUSTRY MỘT NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ QUAN NIỆM VÀ VIỆC GIẢNG DẠY TIẾNG ANH CHUYÊN NGÀNH CỦA GIÁO VIÊN TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC CÔNG NGHIỆP HÀ NỘI M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field : English Teaching Methodology Code : 60.140.111 HANOI - 2015 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY - HANOI UNIVERSTITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST- GRADUATE STUDIES -*** - ĐÀO THỊ MAI HƯƠNG TEACHERS’ BELIEFS AND PRACTICES ABOUT ESP TEACHING: A CASE STUDY AT HANOI UNIVERSITY OF INDUSTRY MỘT NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ QUAN NIỆM VÀ VIỆC GIẢNG DẠY TIẾNG ANH CHUYÊN NGÀNH CỦA GIÁO VIÊN TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC CÔNG NGHIỆP HÀ NỘI M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field Code Supervisor HANOI - 2015 CANDIDATE’S STATEMENT I certify my authorship of the thesis submitted today entitled: TEACHERS’ BELIEFS AND PRACTICES ABOUT ESP TEACHING: A CASE STUDY AT HANOI UNIVERSITY OF INDUSTRY is the result of my own work for the Degree of Master of Arts at University of Languages and International Studies, Hanoi National University The material in this thesis has not been submitted for assessment in any other courses of study Hanoi, March 2015 Signature Đào Thị Mai Hương i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First of all, I would like to present my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, Ms Mai Thi Loan, for her generous guidance, constant encouragement and precious advice which take important part in accomplishing the study I am most thankful to all the lecturers of the M.A course at ULIS-VNUH for providing me foundation knowledge through their invaluable lessons I would also like to send my sincere thanks to my colleagues at the English Department of Hanoi University of Industry who were enthusiastic about participating in my research and willing to share their experience Last but not least, I owe a big debt to my loved family who always stand by me as well as give me strength and encouragement during my three-year course and during the time I fulfilled the research ii ABSTRACT The study aimed at investigating teachers’ beliefs and practices about ESP teaching at Hanoi University of Industry The objectives were to investigate teachers’ beliefs about teaching strategies applied to ESP classes, to find out the most common ESP teaching strategies used by teachers and to explore the relationship between teachers’ beliefs and practices when teaching ESP Interviews and classroom observations were used as the instruments to collect the data The interviews were delivered to seek teachers’ beliefs about ESP teaching strategies and classroom observations were applied to explore their actual practices The findings revealed that the teachers’ actual practices did not always correspond to their beliefs iii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS EFL: English as a Foreign Language ELT: English Language Teaching ESL: English as a Second Language ESP: English for Specific Purposes HaUI: Hanoi University of Industry GPE: General Purpose English EAP: English for Academic Purposes EEP: English for Educational Purposes EOP: English for Occupational Purposes 10 EFL: English as a Foreign Language iv LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: ESP classification by experience Figure 2: ESP classification by professional area (Hutchison and Waters, 1987:6) LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Ten techniques applied to ESP lesson (Hutchinson and Waters, 1987:139142) Table 2: Strategies used to lead into the lesson Table 3: Teachers’ beliefs about strategies used to present problems Table 4: Teachers’ beliefs about strategies used in practice Table 5: Strategies used to lead into the lesson Table 6: Strategies used to present problems in ESP Table 7: Strategies used in practice part Table 8: Description of exercises used in actual practice v LIST O Excerpt 1[Data extracted from the class on 2014/5/22] Excerpt [Data extracted from the class on 2014/5/22] Excerpt [Data extracted from the cla Excerpt [Data extracted from the cl Excerpt [Data extracted from the cl Excerpt [Data extracted from the cl vi TABLE OF CONTENT CANDIDATE’S STATEMENT i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii ABSTRACT iii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS iv LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES v LIST OF EXCERPTS vi TABLE OF CONTENT vii PART I: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale 1.2 Aims and objectives of the study 1.3 Research questions Scope of the study 1.5 Methods of the study 1.6 Significance of the study 1.7 Design of the study CHAPTER ONE: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 Theory of ESP 1.1.1 Some basic concepts 1.1.2 Definition 1.2 Roles of ESP teacher 13 1.2.1 The ESP practitioner as a teacher 13 1.2.2 The ESP practitioner as a course designer and material provider .14 1.2.3 The ESP practitioner as a researcher 14 1.2.4 The ESP practitioner as a collaborator 14 1.2.5 The ESP practitioner as an evaluator 15 1.3 Teachers’ beliefs 15 1.4 Relationship between teachers’ beliefs and classroom practices 16 1.5 Review of previous related studies 17 1.6 Summary 18 2.1 Restatement of the research questions 19 2.2 Context of the study 19 2.2.1 The setting of the study 19 vii 2.2.2 Participants 20 2.3 Instruments 20 2.3.1 Pre- observation interviews 20 2.3.2 Classroom observations 21 2.3.3 Post-observation interviews 21 2.4 Data collection procedure 22 2.5 Data analysis procedure 22 2.6 Summary 22 3.1 Interview 23 3.1.1 Teachers’ beliefs about strategies used to lead into the lesson .23 3.1.2 Teachers’ beliefs about strategies used to present problems in ESP 25 3.1.3 Teachers’ beliefs about strategies used to help students practice 29 3.2 Classroom observation 30 3.2.2 Strategies used to present problems in ESP 31 3.2.3 Strategies used in practice part 34 Table 8: Description of exercises used in actual practice 36 3.3 Findings 37 3.3.1 Strategies used to lead into the lesson 37 3.3.2 Strategies used to present problems in ESP 37 3.3.3 Strategies used in practice part 38 3.4 Summary 38 PART III: CONCLUSION 39 1.1 Summary of the thesis 39 1.2 Implication from the study 40 1.3 Limitations and suggestions for further study 41 APPENDICES I viii APPENDICES APPENDIX A Semi-structured interview I Starter What activities you normally use to lead in your ESP lesson? Which ones you found effective? II Presentation Do you present the problem (vocabulary, reading text, writing tasks, speaking tasks, …) inductively or reductively? Which one is more effective? Then, what language you use? Is your lesson coherent (Is it logical? Does it have smooth transitions among stages)? In your opinion, is it necessary to have ESP lessons coherent? What you to involve students into your lesson? Do you think that students’ cooperation influences teaching quality in general and ESP class atmosphere in particular? If yes, what you to have their co-operation? What you to maintain enjoyment in your class? III Practice and production What kind of exercises, activities or tasks you believe that they can help students practice what they have learnt? Besides those, you prefer to use communicative activities like case studies and project work to help students produce their own language? I APPENDIX B Classroom Observation Checklist Teacher Observer _ Number of students present Date/time of observation Lesson topic Y (applied) I Starter Prediction Discussion Gathering information Brainstorming Checking homework Revising previous lesson II Presentation Inductive approach Reductive approach Using the first language 10 Coherence Involvement 11.1 A 11 11.2 M speech 11.3 C class, pair, individual, group 11.4 Learner roles: presenter, evaluator, receiver, thinker, negotiator 11.5 Exercise, activity or task 11.6 Skills: reading, listening, writing, speaking, graphic skills 11.7 Topic 11.8 Focus: accuracy, fluency; 12 Get students’ discourse, structure, pronunciation, etc 12.1 Waiting for the answer 12.2 Giving individual work 12.3 Marking students’ work 13.1 Game 13.2 Joke 13.3 Quiz III Practice and production 14.1 Information gaps 14.2 Media gaps 14 Gaps 14.3 Reasoning gaps 14.4 Memory gaps 14.5 Jigsaw gaps 14.6 Opinion gaps 14.7 Certainty gaps III 15 Matching 16 Writing a summary 17 Translation 18 Listening exercise 19 Reading comprehension 20 Communicative activities Overall comments: IV APPENDIX C Sample of semi-structured interview th Extracted from the interview on April 10 , 9a.m A: author T: teacher A: What activities you normally use to lead in your ESP lesson? Which ones you found effective? T: Before the main part of the lesson, normally there is an activity to help students be ready They will watch a video in which the situation is set and they will guess what is going to happen Or they will discuss a problem They help to activate students’ mind and motivate them to think Sometimes, if I had time, I would check their homework Studying in class is not enough, students need to homework I need to check whether they it well A: Do you present the problem (vocabulary, reading text, writing tasks, speaking tasks, …) inductively or reductively? Which one is more effective? Then, what language you use? T: I use both depending on the lesson content and students’ ability in each class but no matter what approach I used, I saw that problems were presented clearly I had to make it very clear ESP is much more difficult than general English so the lesson should be clear…uhm, well, I use both English and Vietnamese A: Is your lesson coherent (Is it logical? Does it have smooth transitions among stages)? In your opinion, is it necessary to have ESP lessons coherent? T: I think that yes, it is When we make lesson plan, we know that it is necessary to make it logical Students can understand the lecture easier if it has a right order A: What you to involve students into your lesson? B: I always want my students to keep thinking during the lesson They have to find the answer, I just lead them there I mean, in presentation, I give them questions and they V have to think about the answer, the problem Besides, if students get bored with my lesson, I cannot involve them into the lesson Therefore, they should be offered more practical tasks and activities such as role play, interview, presentation, discussion, pair work and group work A: Do you think that students’ cooperation influences teaching quality in general and ESP class atmosphere in particular? If yes, what you to have their co-operation? T: It directly influences the lesson A lesson can’t be successful if students don’t get on with the teacher I need to be very flexible, sometimes easy going but sometimes need to be strict For example, if they refuse to a task I give, I tell them I will give mark on that task A: What you to maintain enjoyment in your class? T: Well, young students are always eager to discover new things They start studying their major deeply in their third year when ESP is taught parallel I normally turn my lessons into quizzes how to say a terminology in English Games are also a good idea A: What kind of exercises, activities or tasks you believe that they can help students practice what they have learnt? T: I use exercises or tasks in text book Or I use exercises written by ESP group to help students to prepare for the final exam A: Besides those, you prefer to use communicative activities like case studies and project work to help students produce their own language? T: Yes, it’s necessary You know, interaction should be maintained in a language lesson If you teach your students a million of specific glossaries and terminology but you don’t teach how to use them in context, those words are only a dead language Normally, I usually let the students play roles VI APPENDIX D Extracts from classroom observations Excerpt 1[Data extracted from the class on 2014/5/22] (The topic of this class is about automobile and the teacher is explaining the word endurance.) Turn Transcript T: [the teacher shows a slide of a car race] Now look at the photo in slide and guess the meaning of “endurance” SS: [Silence….look at the photo and think for some seconds] T: Ok, there are some cars in a race Do you think how long the cars can work if they run extremely fast for a long time? [stop for several seconds and t What you think, SA? I think not a long time SA: T: Ok, so you’re talking about the endurance of the car So what does endurance mean, SA? Can you guess? I think it refers to a period of time in which th SA: Can you tell me a Vietnamese equivalence? T: [smile] uhm…uhm…thời gian chạy xe SA: Oh, almost correct Now, I have an example fo T: Car A was used for 10 years and car B was use on the board) I say car B’s endurance is longe endurance) So what does endurance mean? Ah, bền, độ bền SB: Yeah, sức bền, độ bền Well done, good try, SA VII T: another example for this word [stop for students thinking in a minute] Can you, SB? This machine has good endurance [Write the sentence on the board] Good Now, take note in your notebook the word and example, everyone Note: T = Teacher S (A, B) = Student (A, B) SS = All of the Students Excerpt [Data extracted from the class on 2014/5/22] (The teacher is leading in the main content of lesson “breaking points” She shows a slide and asks students to discuss in pairs.) Turn Transcript T: Now, let’s work in pairs and discus car races SS: [quiet] T: Do you understand, class? No What does endurance mean? SS: [the teacher shows a slide of a car r T: Now look at the photo in slide and SS: [Silence….look at the photo and th T: Ok, there are some cars in a race D they run extremely fast for a long ti [stop for several seconds and then c What you think, SA? SA: I think not a long time T: Ok, so you’re talking about the end VI mean, SA? Can you guess? SA: I think it refers to a period of time in wh T: Can you tell me a Vietnamese equivalence? SA: [smile] uhm…u T: Oh, almost correct Now, I have an example for you I have car A and car B Car A was used for 10 years and car B was used for 15 years (draw two cars on the board) I say car B’s endurance is longer than car A’s (underline endurance) So what does endurance mean? SB: T: Yeah, sức bền, độ bền Well done, good try, SA Ok, now, class, give me another exa [stop for st Can you, S SB: This mach T: [Write the sentence on the board] Good Now, take note in your notebook the word and example, everyone Ok, now let’s discuss You have minutes SS: [discuss and give their answers] T: [check the answers and present some new words] Ok, now turn to next page We have a listening exercise here Look at the questions and work in groups of three Try to understand the questions and in groups predict three possible answers for each question, please [translate into Vietnamese and write possible answers] Note: T = Teacher S (A, B) = Student (A, B) SS = All of the students IX Excerpt [Data extracted from the class on 2014/5/30] (The topic of this class is about automobile and the students are doing a matching exercise to review new words they have learnt Students need to match the words with their definitions in English.) Turn Transcript T: Who can give the answers, please? SS: [Silence….5 seconds] T: Ok, SA, please SA: T: Oh, why not? SA: T: You don’t understand what? SA: Uhm uhm…I know the words but I don’ T: Ah, It’s ok Now tell me what word is new each sentence SA: T: Now, come on SA: Rate, surface, aga T: Ok, who can help him with these words? SB, please SB: Rate means tỷ lệ, surface is bề mặt, against i means hư hại, steady, I think is dần dần, từ từ T: Ok, thank you, sit down please Now, SA, can you match? SA: T: Ok, speed is the rate at which a car runs Is it correct, class? Ss:Yes X T: Next SA: Two and…I don’t kno T: Ok, what you think Ss: Two and E T: Yeah Breaks are desig thiết kế để giảm about number – fric and A SA: Yes, well done, can yo T: Friction is an action o SA: Ok, thank you Sit dow T: Note: T = Teacher S (A) = Student (A) SS = All of the Stud Excerpt [Data extracted from the class on 2014/5/29] (The teacher is giving instruction to a multiple-choice listening exercise which is a short news story about airport delays.) Turn Transcript T: Now, let’s read the questions and choices, then underline key words, please You have three minutes SS: [Read and underline for three minutes] T:[go around the class and observe] Have you finished? XI SS: T: SS: T: SS: T: SS: T: [quiet] Now, class, have you finished? Yes or no? Yes Ok, some say yes Maybe you’ll have two more minutes [Read and underline for two more minute] Ok, now, can you answer me? [quiet] SS: T: SA: T: SA: Let’s check together First, tell me what the key words are in the questions and choices [quiet] Now come on SA, can you? Number and 2, please Number 1, I think is why, airport delays, cost billions, lost productivity Ok What about the choices? T: SA: T: SA: T: SS: T: SS: T: a quit buying ticket, b losing time at work, c lose their jobs, d airport employees, earn overtime pay Good job Now, you understand the question? …a little Can you translate it into Vietnamese? Vì sân bay tốn…uhm…sorry, what does productivity mean? Ok, it means suất Ah, sân bay tốn hàng tỉ đồng suất? Ok, almost correct Who can help him translate again? [quite] Ok, let’s see The subject here is airport delays not the airport So we can XII say việc trì hỗn chuyến bay ngành hàng khơng làm ngành khác suất trị giá hàng tỉ đồng? Although we don’t see any words refer to other fields, we have to read the choices to understand the question correctly Now you get it? Yeah SS: Ok, SA, translate the choices, please… T: Note: T = Teacher S (A) = Student (A) SS = All of the students Excerpt [Data extracted from the class on 2014/6/3] (The teacher is giving homework to the students before they leave) Turn Transcript T: Before you leave, I’d like you “update technology” and sum “update technology” and an E Oh, no… SS: It’s too difficult…where can SA: I’m out of money to buy a fo SB: Don’t worry Now just find o T: engineering.cornell.edu/maga on the board) I just need you summarize SS: (Take note) Note: T = Teacher XIII S (A,B) = Student (A, B) SS= All of the students Excerpt [Data extracted from the class on 2014/6/2] (The teacher asked students to read the new lesson which is about engineering materials at home and gave an oral report on it.) Turn Transcript T: Who can come to the front and talk SS: [quiet] T: No one? Ok, I’ll pick a name in the SA: Teacher, can I bring my paper there T: It’s ok SA: As I read, There are two kinds of m Uhm…uhm…They are metals and ferrous and non-ferrous metals Som iron and steel Non-ferrous metals a brass Non metals are classified into includes thermoplastics and thermo withstand high temperature T: Ok, well prepared But it will be cle SA: Yes [draw a diagram] Note: T = Teacher SA = Student A SS = All of the students XIV APPENDIX E Sample of post-observation interview st- Extracted from the interview on July ,2014 A: author T: teacher A: I saw that in the previous interview, you agreed with the importance of checking homework in leading into the lesson Why didn’t you apply it in your class? T: I had applied several times before but I realized that it was boring and my students seemed to be very nervous They did not feel excited about new lesson any more A: In while-teaching part, you said that using game was a good way to maintain enjoyable class atmosphere but you did not organize game in your actual class Why? T: You see, it is difficult to conduct a game to involve all 50 students in class Moreover, I not have enough time to cover all activities I want my class to focus on practice to prepare for the examination A: Ok, last question for you, why did you employ variety of classroom organization in your ESP class meanwhile you had not mentioned it in the previous interview? T: I think students still need to work in pairs and groups in ESP class ESP class still needs very communicative XV ... Three of them graduated from University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University of Hanoi and the other graduated from Hanoi University Half of them were awarded a Master’s... Supervisor HANOI - 2015 CANDIDATE’S STATEMENT I certify my authorship of the thesis submitted today entitled: TEACHERS’ BELIEFS AND PRACTICES ABOUT ESP TEACHING: A CASE STUDY AT HANOI UNIVERSITY OF INDUSTRY. ..VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY - HANOI UNIVERSTITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST- GRADUATE STUDIES -*** - ĐÀO THỊ MAI HƯƠNG TEACHERS’ BELIEFS AND PRACTICES ABOUT ESP TEACHING: