English for Specific Purposes

Use the exchange below between an ESP teacher and an English language learner to answer the question that follows.

Teacher: Your group was hands down the fastest to solve

the problem!

Student: But our hands were not down; they were up!

Which of the following best explains the student's response?

• The student is transferring word meanings from the primary language to English.

• The student has an incomplete understanding of English sentence structure.

• The student is interpreting the meaning of an English idiom literally.

• The student has not yet developed cognitive academic language proficiency in English.

A fourth-grade English language learner who recently arrived in the Philippines to study has been placed in a general education class. The student studied English in his home country and has strong literacy skills in English. He demonstrates comprehension of reading assignments and performs well on written assignments but never speaks up in class or in conversations with peers. He appears to be engaged in class discussions, but has difficulty responding when called on to contribute to the discussion. Based on theories about the stages of second- language acquisition, the teacher could best address this student's learning needs by taking which of the following steps?

• Provide the student with low-risk opportunities to interact verbally and nonverbally in small- and large-group situations.

• Refer the student to the special education program to be evaluated for a possible speech disorder and set up a meeting with his parents to discuss the situation.

• Help the student become accustomed to speaking in class

  by calling on him frequently and encourage the other students in the class to include him in discussions.

• Allow the student to respond to questions in his primary language and arrange for an interpreter to be present in the classroom to interpret for him when necessary.

The primary goal of sheltered instruction is to help English language learners:

• develop communicative competence in English through meaningful interaction.

• maintain proficiency in the first language while acquiring English language skills.

• acquire English language proficiency through content-related materials.

• learn grade-level content while developing English language proficiency.

An EAP class includes a number of newly arrived English language learners who are at the advanced beginning level of English language proficiency. The teacher is aware that the students come from a culture in which classroom practices tend to be teacher- centered, and the students have limited experience working with peers cooperatively in groups. The teacher is planning a cooperative group activity and wants to promote these English language learners' ability to work cooperatively as members of a group. Which of the following teacher strategies would likely be most effective for this purpose?

• establishing class guidelines for group activities and modeling for students specific examples of the guidelines prior to the activity

• pairing each English language learner with a native English

  speaker and asking the partner to help the English language learner during the activity

• placing the English language learners together in a group for the activity and serving as the group's leader during the activity

• allowing the English language learners to observe while the rest of the class engages in the activity and discussing with the students their observations about the activity

An ESP teacher shows English language learners clips from television programs in which the characters are engaged in various conflicts involving everyday situations. In small groups, the students discuss the situations and how the conflicts depicted could have been prevented or resolved. This activity would be most effective in promoting students' ability to:

• communicate clearly to a range of audiences

• analyze the effectiveness of these conflict resolutions

• check for comprehension of these conflict resolutions

• use conversational repair as a communication strategy

An ESP teacher is working on public speaking skills with intermediate- and advanced-level English language learners. The teacher wants to promote the students' ability to assess their own strengths and weaknesses in regard to formal communication. Which of the following speaking tasks would be most effective for this purpose?

• preparing a presentation and delivering the presentation at a

  school open house

• viewing a videotape of a famous speech and discussing with a peer the speaker's use of tone and style

• giving a presentation in class and

  using a scoring rubric as a guide for revising the presentation

• attending a public lecture and participating in a question and

  answer session following the lecture

An ESP teacher is working on career preparation skills with intermediate-level English language learners. The teacher would like to promote students' ability to read career- related materials. Which of the following student activities would be most appropriate for accomplishing this goal with students at this level of English language proficiency?

• labeling photographs of people at work with the names of their careers

• completing a simple survey designed to determine one's career interests and abilities

• researching career training programs on the Internet

• writing a summary of an article from a professional journal about a career of interest

An EAP teacher would like to promote English language learners' ability to evaluate their own progress in reading. The teacher is planning to have students keep reading logs in which they will record their daily reading activities. Which of the following teacher strategies would likely best ensure the effectiveness of these reading logs for their intended purpose?

• asking students to exchange their reading logs with a partner each week and compare their reading activities with those of their partner

• encouraging students to review and edit their reading logs on a regular basis and helping them publish their reading logs at the end of the year

• having students complete and turn in a weekly worksheet listing their reading activities as described in their reading logs

• helping students set reading goals and meeting with them regularly to review the content of their reading logs in relation to their goals

An ESP teacher provides advanced-level English language learners with explicit instruction in the accurate use of language forms, such as rules of complex English sentence structure. This practice is likely to benefit these students' English language development primarily by improving their ability to:

• comprehend the general meaning of authentic texts

• communicate fluently in social situations

• use learning strategies to develop academic knowledge

• express ideas clearly in academic writing

A diagnostic language test would be most appropriate to administer to English language learners for the purpose of:

• determining their overall level of English language proficiency.

• identifying their level of proficiency in a particular aspect of English

• measuring their general capacity for learning a second language

• assessing their mastery of material covered in a language lesson