As presented in the previous section, this survey questionnaire was designed and administered to the teachers of the Faculty of English. These 14 teachers are young ones most of whom have been teaching English for over 3 years
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Section 1- To ask for the teachers’ opinion about the objectives of the syllabus.
In terms of the objectives of an ESP reading syllabus, the teachers were asked to evaluate and rank the five items in order of importance (from the most to the least important).
Table 1 shows teachers’ ranking of objectives relating to English. As can be seen from this table, 56% of the teachers consider Item 3-to read and understand written English materials and books relating to English to be the most important objective. From teachers’ points of view, reading skills and activities should be regularly given and practiced both inside and outside the class. The ESP designer must use reading lessons to develop students’ reading proficiency rather than improving linguistic competence. Item 1-to build up English terms of International Relations used in books, documents, and newspapers with the percentage of 45% receives the second priority. The third priority is given to Item 2-to read and understand concepts of English field (52%). The fourth priority is referred to Item 5-to translate books and newspapers (relating to English fields) from English to Vietnamese which accounts for 47%. Item 4-to consolidate basic grammar structures used in specific texts for English (49%) gets the fifth priority).
Obviously, the findings indicate that teachers of English concerned with development of reading skills as well as enriching vocabulary used in English texts. It is noticeable that these are also compatible with the objects of the syllabus design. Accordingly, they should be focused on in the proposed syllabus and more leaning tasks and activities with the aim of improving reading skills and vocabulary must be written.
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Table 1. Teachers’ ranking of objectives relating to English
* Section 2: Topics to be covered in the syllabus perceived by the teachers.
This section is designed to gather information about the topics that should be included in the reading course. Twelve topics relating to EIR have been pointed out. The selection of topics for the respondents’ assessment based on the curriculum. Table 2 shows teachers’
rating of the topics relevant to EIR. The data in Table 2 implies that all of the teachers agree that all topics are relevant and very relevant. The appropriateness of the topics can be seen in the high percentage of positive responses ranging from 56% to 80%. Besides topics 3, 4, 9, ( New Word Order, Relations Among Powers, Vietnam’s Foreign Policy) are supported to be very necessary. As far as content is concerned, other topic items are also though to be quite essential and appealing to the teachers. These findings are of great significance in making the proposed syllabus more logical and appropriate.
No Objectives 1st
(%) 2nd (%)
3rd (%)
4th (%)
5th (%) 1 To build up English terms of International Relations
used in books, documents, and newspapers
27 45 16 12 0 2 To read and understand concepts of English field 34 9 52 0 5 3 To read and understand written English materials and
books relating to English
56 10 25 4 5 4 To consolidate basic grammar structures used in
specific texts for English
2 15 7 27 49
5 To translate books and newspapers (relating to English fields) from English to Vietnamese
0 22 31 47 0
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Table 2. Teachers’ rating of the topics relevant to EIR
* Section 3: Language and reading exercises types to be covered in the syllabus as perceived by the teachers.
This section asked the teachers of English to evaluate. Three items of reading exercises have been pointed out.
The analysis and interpreting attitudes of teachers towards reading activities was based on the learning-centered and process-oriented approach to ESP teaching proposed by Tom Hutchinson and Alan Waters (1996).
Information from Table 3 shows that the teachers’ respondents regarded nearly all kinds of reading activities as essential for their inclusion in the reading syllabus. A high proportion of teachers (90%) considered skimming technique very important. Scanning for specific information also plays a key role which is shown with high percentage (78%). These findings imply that skimming and scanning call for special attention and need regular practice in the teachers’ views because it serves the first and foremost purpose of reading which is to get information.
Items Topics Very relevant % Relevant % Not relevant
%
1 Globalization 20 80 0
2 Regionalization 24 76 0
3 New World Order 40 60 0
4 Development 18 35 47
5 ASEAN 30 70 0
6 EU 23 77 0
7 UN 20 80 0
8 APEC 33 67 0
9 Vietnam’s Foreign Policy 37 63 0
10 Poverty 25 19 56
11 Natural Disasters 31 62 7
12 Destructive weapons 27 72 1
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As can be seen from the table, most of teachers being asked agreed that students should be provided with a wide range of reading for practice in the class with the aim of improving students’ skills.
Items Necessary Reading skills and exercises for developing reading skills
Reading exercises
90 1. Skimming (Choose correct best title, Discover the main ideas, Choose pictures or graphs dealt with the text, etc.)
78 2. Scanning to have specific information 65 3. Utilizing the non-text information 68 4. Interpreting cohesive devices 37 5.Interpreting discourse markers 70 6.Write the summary for the texts 56 7.Read and give opinions and reasons 55 8. Give questions to the answers 73 9.Translation
Grammar exercises
56 10. Sentence building
50 11. Rewrite the sentences without changing the meaning 52 12. Put the verbs in brackets into the correct tenses 57 13. Complete sentences with the correct prepositions Vocabulary 68 14. Find synonyms and antonyms of words or phrases
used in the reading text
58 15. Find the words or phrases to match with the definition
54 16. Word-transformation