Questions to ask yourself about your context
- Do we understand why we are doing things the way we are?
- Do we have a philosophy of teaching and learning?
- Do we have a plan to implement this philosophical approach?
- Do we support our teachers and learners in achieving the programâs goals through our curricular documents (including assessments)?
Purpose of Book
The purpose of this book is to provide a step-by-step guide that can help practitioners effectively review and manage their English for academic purposes (EAP) learning environments. Because the content is based on current theory and research, and also grounded in and realized through relevant experiences of the authors, it offers a systematic yet flexible and context driven approach for others to share.
We are very aware that there have been several editions of curriculum development texts, some of which have been written with language learning contexts in mind. However, it is clear that many of these lack an EAP focus, or are becoming a little out of date and thus pre-date important developments in communicative language teaching (CLT), such as task-based language teaching (TBLT), which we address later in the book.
Throughout the book, we provide explicit guidance and practical tools that practitioners can use to examine their own contexts purposefully, prompting them to engage in critical reflection and helping them to better understand their learning settings, and the historical and contextual factors driving them to do the things the way they do. A central part of this process involves taking an institutionally inward look to figure out whether their own EAP program possesses a philosophy of teaching and learning, either explicitly stated or implicitly held. Whether it is tacit or expressed, we provide suggestions that are grounded in our own experience for implementing such a philosophy, and offer an example from our own practice of a paradigm that we believe is strong and current, and show how it can be implemented. This theoretical approach also suggests ways in which such thinking can be conveyed to teachers and learners, and how it can support them in achieving the programâs goals. In essence, the result of how we have organized the content of the book provides a method which is grounded in a robust, research-informed and philosophically-driven foundation, with a deeply practical and easily recognizable classroom approach. The purpose of the book is to support practitioners in all facets of curricular work in EAP contexts and we are confident that they will find it a very accessible and practical guide.
What Is EAP: The Nature and Purpose of English for Academic Purposes
EAP refers to teaching English in order to prepare learners to function in academic settings, usually as they study or engage in research (Flowerdew & Peacock, 2001). Driven by an increase in international students and new immigrants, the number of people seeking to study EAP in Canada (Douglas & Kim, 2014) and elsewhere (Charles, 2013) has risen steadily over the past few decades. EAP emerged as a minor branch of English for specific purposes (ESP) in the 1980s (Hyland, 2006) as the English language became a more dominant global language. Presently, English is a major international lingua franca for business and it is the lingua franca for academics, playing a gatekeeping role in academic publishing and other opportunities for knowledge dissemination and career advancement (Charles & Pecorari, 2016). Due in part to the pervasiveness of beliefs linking immersive language learning contexts to language mastery, well-resourced students from non-English-speaking backgrounds commonly seek out educational experiences in English-medium of instruction (EMI) environments in inner-circle (Kachru, 1992) countries (e.g., the UK, Australia, Canada) and increasingly, in expanding circle countries (e.g., Switzerland) (see Snow, 2016, for a thorough discussion of EMI and academic language development).
Unlike other areas of ESP, such as English for nursing, EAP classes are often characterized by disciplinary diversity. An EAP class at the undergraduate or graduate level might consist of business, computing science, and agriculture students (among others), each field with its own lexis and communicative norms. While there are academic activities that are common to all disciplines, such as attending lectures and writing academic texts (Charles & Pecorari, 2016), the multiple layers of diversity in EAP learning contexts also present unique challenges to learners and educators. In the following section, we outline some of the challenges of organizing teaching and learning in an EAP setting. These challenges can be addressed thanks to the development of EAP in recent years, which has benefited from various theoretical and empirical advances. No longer a fringe movement, EAP has now taken a leading role in the innovation of teaching English as a second and foreign language, particularly in relation to theory building, research development, and practice (Hyland, 2006).
The Challenges of EAP
There are particular challenges of organizing the teaching and learning environment in an EAP setting, several of which are outlined in Charles and Pecorariâs (2016) book, Introducing English for Academic Purposes. Some of the challenges relate to the policies pertaining to EAP and its status within the institution, while others relate to the students, the instructors, and of course, the teaching of language and content itself. Charles and Pecorari remark that EAP tends to be regarded as ancillary to the core work of universities, which in turn, can have an effect on resource allocation and other forms of support. Additionally, smaller institutions may not have large cohorts of students with similar levels of language proficiency and/or disciplinary aspirations, which can pose challenges for instruction and planning.
Students represent varying abilities and backgrounds (linguistic, cultural, subject-specific), which are as much strengths as they can be challenges. As Basturkmen (2010) observes of ESP learners more generally:
In some cases learners are already working or studying, or have already worked or studied in their target workplaces or disciplines, and thus have knowledge of their specific ways of working. In other cases, learners may not have entered their targeted communities and have little understanding of what work or study in these communities involves. (p. 12)
Relatedly, fostering studentsâ social acculturationâin addition to their academic socializationâhas been found to be a relatively overlooked area in EAP, but an important one that can lead to greater experiences of success beyond the EAP program and into the degree programs and professional lives of EAP students (e.g., Cheng & Fox, 2008; Fox, Cheng, Berman, Song, & Myles, 2006; Tweedie & Kim, 2015).
Diversity in terms of educational, linguistic, and cultural background can also be found among an EAP teaching team. To narrow in on educational background, whether EAP instructors started their careers as subject specialists and became EAP instructors, or whether they have always been English as an additional language (EAL) or EAP instructors (Charles & Pecorari, 2016), appropriate resources and training can be a challenge, even for well-resourced universities. The disposition of instructional staff to adopt relevant teaching methodologies can also impact the successful implementation of EAP. For instance, some EAP instructors have reported a degree of reluctance to plan dynamic and relevant learning activities such as task-based projects due to the significant time investment and âbuy inâ required of international students expecting more traditional methods (Douglas & Kim, 2014) (see the next section for more detail on the benefits and drawbacks of task-based languag...