چکیده:
English for academic purposes (EAP) is a significant part of the curriculum in Iranian universities. However, it seems that EAP programs have been developed without a systematic needs analysis. The purpose of this study was assessing the present and target situation needs of two groups of undergraduates of computer science. A total of 320 students and 44 instructors participated in this triangulated quantitative-qualitative survey. Data was collected through self-assessment, needs-analysis questionnaires and semi-structured interviews. The results indicated that there is a noticeable gap between current EAP courses and both the present and target situation needs of learners which is partly due to the low general English proficiency (GEP) of the students. Moreover, there were discrepancies between the two groups of undergraduates and their instructors regarding perceived needs. The findings provided implications for revising the current EAP curriculum for computer science students.
خلاصه ماشینی:
"Keywords: English for academic purposes, needs assessment, computer science, undergraduate students Introduction Due to the status of English as an international language and advances in technology, there has been a worldwide increase in demand for EAP (Curry & Lillis, 2004; Hyland &Hamp-Lyons, 2002; Jordan, 1997).
Questionnaires were developed based on current perspectives in needs assessment which emphasize triangulation and multiple approaches (Long, 2005; Zhu &Flaitz, 2005) and a combined theoretical model focusing on present situation analysis (PSA), target situation analysis (TSA), and lacks and wants (Atai&Shoja, 2011; Dudley-Evans &St John, 1998; Hutchinson & Waters, 1987; Hyland, 2006; Jordan, 1997; Robinson, 1991; West, 1994).
Nevertheless, content teachers focused on the following issues: developing students’ level of GEP, teaching more technical vocabulary items, presenting EAP as supplementary courses throughout students’ education, studying articles and other original sources, writing assignments in English, and collaboration of EFL and content teachers.
Some remedies for current situation include: a) offering some complementary courses to help students with their GEP (especially for AS students), b) revising the current EAP textbooks to include other skills as well as reading, c) increasing the number of EAP courses to give learners more opportunity to achieve their goals, d)supplying the EAP classes with computers to help students learn what they need in practice, and e) providing group teaching methods to enjoy the expertise and skills of both content instructors and language teachers."