Chapter 5

Deciding learning
objectives for ESP
courses and programs
Presented by:
Nayve, Jaylord
Pabilona, Lalyn
In many real-world settings, learning
objectives are decided at the administrative
level by ESP course and program designers.
But, in other settings, ESP administrators
might only give instructors a very general or
vague course title and expect them to
formulate their own class objectives based
on a small scale, "just in time" needs analysis.
 Opening reflection

Imagine you had to teach an EAP course in scientific reading and

writing. In one of the classes, you were scheduled to teach learners
how to read and write a research article abstract using the following
abstract (taken from applied chemistry) as an example. What language
(e.g. vocabulary, grammar, organizational patterns) and skills (e.g. how
to read for gist, how to write concisely) might you target in the
class? Where would you position the lesson in the course as a whole
(e.g. early in the course, at the end of the course)? Are there any
aspects of the text that you would struggle explaining to learners?
Synthesis and Surface Modification of Highly Monodispersed, Spherical Gold Nanoparticles of 50-200 nm

Steven D. Perrault and Warren C. W. Chan*

Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering, Terrence Donnelly
Centre for Cellular and Biomolecular Research, University of Toronto,
160 College Street, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5S 3E1
J. Am. Chem. Soc., 2009, 131 (47), pp 17042-17043
DOI: 10.1021/ja907069u
Publication Date (Web): November 5, 2009
Copyright © 2009 American Chemical Society
http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/ja907069u

Elucidating the impact of nanoparticle size and shape on biological systems is of fundamental importance to
nanotoxicology and biomedicine. Currently, the ability to determine this is limited by the lack of a model nanoparticle
system having a narrow size and shape distribution over the relevant size range (2-200 nm). Hydroquinone can be
used to produce 50-200 nm gold nanoparticles that are relatively monodispersed in size with nearly spherical shapes.
 Commentary
The model abstract here is a fairly typical abstract in applied chemistry: it
uses a situation-problem-response organization, linked together with the
logical connector currently; it makes use of both active and passive
voices; it is written solely in the present tense; and it contains technical
terms, scientific abbreviations, and long noun phrases. If a learner hoped
to read and write similar texts quickly and accurately, they would need to
know about the different types of vocabulary that scientists use, the
grammar forms and organizational patterns that appear frequently in
scientific texts, various reading and writing strategies, and a host of other
language and learning points.
Foundations for deciding learning objectives
In many general English (GE) programs, learning objectives
are expressed in terms of the traditional categories of
grammar and vocabulary. Lesson and course goals are built
on concepts such as mastering the past, present, and
future tenses; using main, modal, and auxiliary verbs
correctly; constructing simple, complex, and compound
sentence patterns; expressing ideas in the active and
passive voice; learning the rules of article usage; linking
ideas with logical connectors; forming nominalizations; and
asking questions.
Foundations for deciding learning objectives

Learners in a GE classroom are often encouraged to

explain and practice the rules of grammar, and learn longs
lists of vocabulary items that appear in the reading and
speaking passages of their textbooks. Of course, much of
this might have little to do with the language that they
need in real-world target settings.
Foundations for deciding learning objectives

ESP courses and programs, in contrast, are rarely built on

grammar rules and vocabulary lists in this abstract way.
Instead, the learning objectives of ESP are expressed in
ways that are directly linked with the results of a needs
analysis and are built on a number of important,
theoretical-grounded principles. Let's look at each of these
in turn.
 Register analysis
Registers are a characteristic set of language elements,
including grammar forms and vocabulary items that people
will associate with a particular situation, purpose, or social
context (see Halliday, 1978, 1989). Registers are often
referred to as 'styles,' so you might hear about formal,
academic, and public styles contrasted with informal,
casual, conversational, private and neutral styles, among
others.
 Register analysis
Register analysis also provides ESP course designers
and instructors with an understanding of how
vocabulary is distributed in and across texts.

Register analysis provides ESP course designers and

instructors with a solid foundation for targeting and
teaching ESP-focused grammar. In an EAP setting, for
example, it allows them to identify and teach language
features that characterize the formal academic writing
style.
 Rhetorical (discourse) analysis
Rhetorical analysis (or discourse analysis) is another area of research
that has greatly informed ESP course and program design. Pioneering
work by Lackstrom, Selinker, and Trimble (1973) led many
researchers to move beyond the 'bottom-up' study of registers to
start looking at why particularly language features were more or
less frequent than others, and how language users combined
sentences and paragraphs to construct complete spoken or written
texts. This 'top-down' perspective links language form to language
use and provides ESP course designers and instructors with a more
informed basis for deciding what to include and highlight in ESP
courses and programs
 Rhetorical (discourse) analysis
In an EAP classroom, instructors can use insights from rhetorical
analyses of academic texts to focus on and explain why certain
logical connectors appear more commonly than others. Similarly, EOP
instructors can use rhetorical analyses to focus on and explain why
an increased use of modal verbs appear the language of telephone
operators that need to respond to customer inquiries in a polite and
respectful way.
What is important is that learners not only understand why the
target language is used as it is, but that they begin to develop their
own 'rhetorical awareness' that they can apply later in the
understanding and creation of as yet unseen spoken and written
texts.
 Genre analysis
John Swales (1990, p. 58) describes a genre in the following way:

A genre comprises a class of communicative events, the members

of which share some set of communicative purposes. These

purposes are recognized by the expert members of the parent

discourse community, and thereby constitute a rationale for the

genre. This rationale shapes the schematic structure of the discourse

and influences and constrains the choice of content and style.

 Learning and metacognitive skills

Beyond language itself, many ESP practices have been influenced by

research on learning theory and metacognitive skills development (e.g.

planning, selecting appropriate learning strategies, self-correcting).

Research on learning theory dates back to the early behaviorist models

of Pavlov (1897), Thorndike (1898), Watson (1913), and Skinner (1957), the

rule-governed mentalist models of Chomsky (1957), the cognitivist

models of Ausubel (1968),

 Learning and metacognitive skills
and others that focus on thinking, problem solving, and concept-

forming, and more recent constructivist models of learning, which

emphasize meaning creation over meaning acquisition (e.g. Ertmer &

Newby, 1993).

There is also the work of Hutchinson and Waters (1987) and more

recently Henter (2014) and others that reminds us that learning is an

affective process, where the learners' feelings will have a dramatic

impact on the success or failure of learning.

 figure 5.1 model of language learning

drills
repetition awareness raising noticing
memorization
problem solving
reinforcement
behavior cognition learning strategies

error correction
language learning implicit knowledge
explicit knowledge

affect

increasing reducing
motivation developing positive anxiety
attitude
Table 5.2 Sub-skills of reading, writing, listening, speaking
Sub-skills of reading

building a receptive knowledge of written general, academic, and

technical vocabulary identifying and understanding cohesive and

discourse markers

identifying main ideas, supporting ideas, and examples

predicting, inferring, and guessing from context

processing and evaluating information

scanning for specific information

selecting what information is relevant

skimming for content and meaning

Table 5.2 Sub-skills of reading, writing, listening, speaking
Sub-skills of writing

citing and paraphrasing information obtained from external sources

deciding the target reader

deciding what information is relevant

employing hedging and persuasive devices

organizing ideas using rhetorical patterns

planning the message through brainstorming and outlining

presenting main ideas, supporting ideas, and examples

refining the message through drafting and revising

understanding the target discourse community

Table 5.2 Sub-skills of reading, writing, listening, speaking
Sub-skills of listening

deducing the speaker's attitude (e.g. via politeness strategies,

volume, and stress)

identifying redundancy in speech

participating through active listening (e.g. giving non-verbal and

verbal

encouragements, making gestures, providing back channels and

feedback) predicting, inferring, and guessing from context

processing and evaluating information

recognizing the communicative functions of volume, speed, stress

and intonation
Table 5.2 Sub-skills of reading, writing, listening, speaking
Sub-skills of speaking

adjusting the message through volume, speed, stress, intonation,

and silence adopting and adapting commonly used spoken genres

asking questions to get information, clarify points, and manage

interactions building a productive knowledge of spoken general,

academic, and technical vocabulary

deciding what information is relevant

developing a good pronunciation

developing fluency

employing hedging and persuasive devices

planning and refining the delivery through mental rehearsal

Ask these questions
during the writing process.
Sequencing of learning objectives
Deciding the learning objectives of an ESP
lesson, course, or program is clearly
important. However, it is also necessary to
consider what steps will be taken to achieve
these goals, how long each step will be, and
what order the steps will follow. These
decisions are usually stated in the form of
lesson plans, course syllabuses, and overall
program curriculums.
 General principles of
sequencing
Nation and Macalister (2010: 38) suggest
several general principles that can guide you
in the sequencing of learning objectives.

progressively cover useful language items,

skills, and strategies rather than attempt
to teach everything at once
 General principles of
sequencing
sequence items to give learners
increasingly spaced, repeated opportuni-
ties to retrieve and give attention to
target items in a variety of contexts
if items are learned together, ensure that
the combination contributes to the learning
process and interference effects are
avoided
 General principles of
sequencing

help learners make the most effective use

of previous knowledge
train learners how to monitor their learning
gains so that they can become
independent language learners
They go on to explain that learners should be
exposed to an equal balance (amount of time)
of four strands of learning: meaning-focused
input (MFI), meaning-focused output (MFO),
language-focused learning (LFL), and flu- ency
development (FD) (Nation & Macalister, 2010).
In practice, not all needs in ESP are equally
balanced in terms of receptive (MFI) and
produc- tive (MFO) skills.
 Sequencing in syllabus and
curriculum specifications
Syllabus design

A syllabus specifies the content and

sequencing of language, genres, and skills
for an individual course (in addition to
information about materials and evaluation
procedures).
 Sequencing in syllabus and
curriculum specifications
Syllabus types used in ESP course designs:
Content-based
-focuses on the content of a specific subject
and sequenced according to discipline
traditions of theory and practice
 Sequencing in syllabus and
curriculum specifications
Genre-based
-focuses on the construction of written and
spoken texts through building knowledge of the
field, analyzing target texts, and constructing
target texts either collaboratively or individually,
with sequencing determined by the relative
importance of the target genres or the logical
timing of the text creation process
 Sequencing in syllabus and
curriculum specifications
Notional-functional

- focuses on notions (e.g. shopping) and

functions (e.g. asking for prices, negotiating a
price reduction) and are usually sequenced
based on importance or learner interest
 Sequencing in syllabus and
curriculum specifications
Situational

- focuses on situations in which the learner

might find themselves (e.g. doctor/patient
interaction, meeting with an international
businessperson) and are usually sequenced
based on importance, learner interest, or
timing of need
 Sequencing in syllabus and
curriculum specifications
Skill-based

- focuses on target skills (e.g. giving a

presentation, taking notes, arguing a point)
that are usually sequenced based on
importance or timing of need
 Sequencing in syllabus and
curriculum specifications
Structural

- focuses on grammar and vocabulary items

that are usually sequenced according to a
difficulty measure
 Sequencing in syllabus and
curriculum specifications
Task-based

- focuses on using (any) language to achieve

specific, meaningful, real-world objectives
that are usually sequenced based on
importance, learner interest, or a difficulty
measure
 Sequencing in syllabus and
curriculum specifications
Task-based

- focuses on using (any) language to achieve

specific, meaningful, real-world objectives
that are usually sequenced based on
importance, learner interest, or a difficulty
measure
 Table 5.4 lists various
sequencing patterns that
could be used to order the
individual items in one of
these syllabuses.
Sequencing patterns used in
ESP course designs
Many early ESP courses of the 1960s and 1970s
followed a structural syl- labus, but these were
later replaced with courses that followed a
notional- functional syllabus.

Today, most ESP courses follow a genre-based,

skill-based, or task-based syllabus. All of these
syllabus types allow for flexibility in
presentation and practice of material, and they
all place importance on needs over explicit
knowledge of language items.
 Sequencing in syllabus and
curriculum specifications
Curriculum design

A curriculum specifies the goals for an entire

language program and the gen- eral sequencing,
timing, and duration of courses created to meet
those goals. In both EAP and EOP settings,
overall program goals can be formulated in
terms of learner needs as well as the
institution's vision or mission state- ment.
For example, in the ESP program at the Faculty
of Science and Engi- neering, Waseda
University, Japan, the goals of the program are
expressed as follows (Anthony, 2009):

develop world-class, international researchers

with an ability to study, discuss, and present
specialist subject knowledge in English
develop responsible citizens who can discuss
and resolve global issues
develop valuable members of a dynamically
changing and evolving workforce
The overall design of an EAP program often
ensures some kind of baseline level competency
in target English for all learners in the system.
Individ- ual courses within a program are usually
sequenced so that they progress from
general/basic courses to more
specific/advanced courses.
In EOP settings, programs are usually aimed at
specific workers and there is less need to
achieve a baseline level of competency. In
these set- tings, courses at all levels may have
an elective or required status depending on the
position and role of the employee and the
company's overall global strategy.
 Contentious issues in ESP: addressing
the subject knowledge problem
In this section, It will return to an issue raised
in Chapter 3 concerning the role of an ESP
instructor in the classroom.

how can they confidently define learning

objectives for the classroom and explain to
learners the what, why, and how of the target
language setting?
 Contentious issues in ESP: addressing
the subject knowledge problem
The challenges facing ESP instructors when it
comes to subject knowledge can be mitigated
to some extent through careful planning. In the
simplest case, they might be able to find a
published ESP textbook that covers the target
field and design their classes around that.
 Contentious issues in ESP: addressing
the subject knowledge problem
Anthony (1997) argues, this strategy is not really
in line with the defining principles of ESP, as few
published textbooks will exactly match the needs
of the different stakeholders.

An alternative solution to this problem is for ESP

instructors to work in a team together with more
experienced ESP administrators and subject spe-
cialists.
 Contentious issues in ESP: addressing
the subject knowledge problem
This topic was investigated by Wu and Badger (2009),
who looked at the strategies that ESP instructors
adopted when faced with such in-class subject
knowledge dilemmas (ISKDs).

For ESP instructors working in isolation and those that

face tough sub- ject knowledge questions in the
classroom, one effective way to address the problem
is for them to embrace their own ignorance and use it
to their advantage.
 Contentious issues in ESP: addressing
the subject knowledge problem

Experience has shown that subject knowledge

problems and in-class sub- ject knowledge dilemmas
(ISKDs) are rare when an ESP instructor explains from
the outset what their role is in the classroom and how
they can assist learners in meeting learning needs
 Research ideas
Here are some possible ideas for small-scale
or large-scale research projects that stem
from the topics discussed in this chapter.
 Determining learning objectives
for a new genre
Choose a genre that you might expect to teach
in an ESP course or program. For the genre,
obtain one or more samples of target language
produced by members of the discourse
community (e.g. research articles produced by
chem- ists; executive reports produced by
business managers).
Determining learning objectives
for a new genre
For each genre sample, identify characteristic features of
vocabulary and grammar using a 'bottom- up' approach.
Next, consider the text at a 'top-down' level, and
attempt to understand its rhetorical structure and the
reasons why it is constructed in this way for the target
discourse community. Finally, consider what learning and
metacognitive skills would be useful to master this genre.
Report your findings.
 Analyzing language outputs
using corpus methods

find a sample of target language that you might

consider introducing to learners in an ESP course,
making sure that the sample is in an electronic form
(e.g. a web page, a Portable Document Format [PDF]
file, or Micro- soft Word document).
If you can only find a paper-based sample, you will need
to transcribe it or use optical character recognition (OCR)
software to convert it into a digital form. Next, save the
sample to a plain text (.txt) format using one of the
options in the save menu of the software you use to
view the file. Then, open the file in the AntConc text
analysis software (Anthony, 2017a) and produce a list of
all the words in the sample orderedby frequency using
the word list tool option. Look through the word list and
consider what it reveals about the vocabulary used in the
sample. Report your findings. Finally, discuss how you
might scale-up the study to gain a more complete
understanding of vocabulary used in a target area of
interest.
Critiquing syllabus and program
design in ESP
Locate a description of an ESP course or program that you
are involved in or would like to know more about. The
description might appear as an inter- nal document at an
institution, on an Internet web page, or perhaps in a published
journal article. Analyze the ESP course or program in terms of
its stated learning objectives and its sequencing of those
objectives. Summarize your findings and suggest how the ESP
course or program might be improved.
Thank you for
listening!