Chapter 4

ESP curriculum and syllabus development

4.1. The ESP curriculum and its dimensions

ESP curriculum design can start with investigations of specialist discourse, e.g. analysis
of specific genres that are to be taught during the course, which may suggest ideas
for course design. It may as well precede them. Consequently, the course developer
may start developing the course with a decision related to the items that need to be
included in the course content and then search for descriptions of language use for it.
It follows that the development of an ESP teaching programme can be approached in
several different ways, and their implications for curriculum design may vary.
The curriculum is a “large and messy concept” which can be understood in a number
of ways (Nunan, 2001: 55). In the context of language teaching, it typically deals with the
issues related to: syllabus design, language teaching methodology, and finally assessment
and evaluation. These aspects of the curriculum are considered in an all-encompassing
definition of the term provided by Wiggins and McTighe (2006), in accordance with
which a curriculum refers to the overall design of a course which transforms its content
(the “input”) into a blueprint for teaching and learning (the “process”) so that the desired
learning outcomes (the “outputs”) can be achieved.
“Curriculum takes content (from external standards and local goals) and shapes it
into a plan for how to conduct effective teaching and learning. It is thus more than a list
of topics and lists of key facts and skills (the «input»). It is a map of how to achieve the
«outputs» of desired student performance, in which appropriate learning activities and
assessments are suggested to make it more likely that students achieve the desired results”
(Wiggins, McTighe, 2006: 6).

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Drawing on the above definition, it is possible to distinguish three basic elements in

a curriculum. Input refers to the linguistic content of the course that is to be taught. After
being selected, it becomes organised into teachable and learnable units which are arranged
in a rational sequence. The result is the syllabus.
Issues related to teaching methods, the design of classroom activities and the
development of materials belong to the domain of process. This encompasses the types
of learning activities, procedures and techniques employed in the process of language
instruction, and the principles that underlie the design of the activities and exercises used
in the classroom. These procedures and principles relate to beliefs and theories on the
nature of language and second/foreign language learning, as well as the roles of teachers,
learners, and instructional materials.
Output refers to learning outcomes, i.e. what learners can do as a result of language
instruction. In ESP, it might be targeted at the development of the ability to engage in
specific uses of language, such as: being able to read with comprehension discipline-specific
texts or the ability to participate effectively in certain communicative activities, such
as: making phone calls, taking part in a business meeting, or making a conference
presentation. The components of the curriculum and their relationships are presented
in Figure 4.1.

Input Process Output

Syllabus Methodology Learning outcomes

Figure 4.1. Dimensions of a curriculum (Source: Richards, 2013: 7)

4.1.1. Approaches to curriculum design

Traditionally, it has been assumed that the components of a curriculum (input,

process, output) are related in a linear fashion and hence constitute a sequence of
stages occurring in a fixed order. This perspective on curriculum development does
not, in fact, seem to reflect how language teaching has been understood, theorised
and practised in recent years (Richards, 2013). The differences in starting points of
curriculum development which have different implications for and applications in
language teaching have led to the distinction between forward design, central design,
and backward design.
Forward design implies developing a curriculum by moving from the input, to process,
and then to output. In language teaching, forward planning is an option often resorted

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to when the goals of learning are understood in very general terms, e.g. courses in general
English (Richards, 2013). This is also important in the design of many ESP courses due to
their frequent focus on and preference for authentic materials and the role of corpora in
determining “a ready source of natural, or authentic texts for language learning” (Reppen,
2010: 4). And indeed, the starting point for the design of ESP courses targeted at teaching
specialised genres is corpus analysis which helps to identify the lexical, syntactic and
textual structures of different genres. Addressing the issue, Basturkmen (2010: 36)
emphasises the importance of investigations of specialised discourse as a pre-requisite to
teaching.

ESP curricula generally focus strongly on the description and illustration of communication
and language use in the specialist field. Thus the language content of ESP courses is pivotal
in ESP course design. Many courses are strongly focused on language content (as opposed to
content of another nature, such as learning strategies). Many courses have as a major objective
that the students will have better understanding of communication and language use in the
specialist field or target discourse community by the end of the course. Moreover, such courses
generally aim to offer realistic descriptions of discourse derived from empirical investigations
of communication and language use in the community or specialist field.

Central design starts with the selection of teaching activities, techniques and
methods rather than with the specification of a detailed syllabus or learning outcomes.
Consequently, the focus shifts to issues related to input and output after a methodology
has been developed or during the teaching process itself. When developing their lessons,
many teachers follow this approach since they first consider the activities and teaching
procedures they will employ in the classroom. This approach stands in contrast to the
linear forward-design model teachers are generally trained to follow (Freeman, 1996).
In its focus on the processes of teaching and learning and the selection of content based
on how it promotes these processes and learning outcomes, the central-design model
exemplifies a learner-centred and learning-oriented perspective. Not only does it view
learners as active participants capable of shaping their own learning, it also seeks to
provide them with learning experiences that enable them to learn through their own
efforts in a creative problem-solving activity (Clark, 1987).
The central-design model is used in some versions of Task-based Language Teaching
(TBLT), which employ pedagogical tasks as the basis for classroom instruction (Richards,
2013). These tasks are specially designed classroom activities that drive the processes
of foreign language learning forward, and result in the development of linguistic and
communicative competence (Willis, 1996). However, since the selection of tasks is
neither input- or output-based, central-design versions of TBLT, as opposed to forward-

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or backward-design approaches to employing tasks in the classroom, are not generally

applicable to teaching English in specific contexts and for specific purposes. Nevertheless,
depending on the needs of the target audience and objectives of the course, the approach
to curriculum design might as well incorporate process-oriented tasks targeted at
awareness raising, e.g. in a writing class, or activities involving the use of lexical strategies,
e.g. in a class focused on technical terminology.
Backward design starts with a careful statement of the desired outcomes which are
the starting point for developing instructional processes and input. Identifying learning
objectives first is frequently seen to depend on a systematic analysis of the learners’
communicative needs in target situations (Richards, 2013), and thus in line with the basic
principles of ESP pedagogy. The backward-design model is employed in some versions
of TBLT in which needs analysis serves as a starting point for determining an inventory
of the target tasks the learners are expected to perform outside of the classroom. When
used in ESP instruction, the TBLT approach builds its methodology around activities or
tasks required from the learners in specific contexts and for specific purposes. Basturkmen
(2010) describes a task-based English for Medical Doctors course, which drew on the
following sequence in its curriculum design:
1. identifying target needs through needs analysis based on the observations of authentic
medical consultations and filmed materials;
2. identifying lacks of the overseas-trained doctors through observations of role-plays;
3. designing teaching tasks and activities;
4. identifying language needs;
5. follow-up instruction.
Another well-known example of the backward-design model is Competency-based
Instruction (CpBI) (Richards, 2013). It is also employed in ESP curriculum development
since with CpBI, the starting point for curriculum design is a specification of learning
outcomes in terms of ‘competencies’, i.e. the knowledge, skills, and behaviours that are
required from the learners in specific purpose contexts. CpBI makes no assumptions
about teach­ing methods, and any set of classroom activities can be used to enable students
to master the desired competencies. However, since student learning is assessed based
on performance and the ability to demonstrate the mastery of pre-specified skills and
behaviours, teaching is generally targeted at helping learners acquire the communicative
skills needed in specific-purpose situations, tasks, and activities. Mrowicki (1986)
describes how the CpBI approach worked when developing a vocational curriculum for
refugees and immigrants in the US. The process consisted of the following stages:
1. needs analysis;
2. identification of topics for the survival curriculum (e.g. banking, health, shopping);
3. identification of competencies for each topic;

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4. grouping competencies into instructional units;

5. identification of the language knowledge and skills needed for each instructional unit
(e.g. the four skills, vocabulary, grammar);
6. selecting instructional materials.
The curriculum approaches presented above differ in how they view the relationship
between the elements of content, process, and output and in how they prioritise them.
The adoption of one of the approaches leads to certain assumptions made about the
role of the syllabus, materials, teachers, and learners in the process of curriculum
development and implementation. Nevertheless, the choice of a given approach may
depend on particular circumstances. A forward design approach, for example, is the
preferred option in contexts where a mandated curriculum is in place or in settings where
language instruction is targeted at teaching a set of pre-determined genres. The adoption
of a central-design approach gives teachers a considerable degree of autonomy and control
over the instructional process. However, its effective implementation requires high levels
of professional knowledge as well as language proficiency. A backward-design option is
often adopted in situations in which a high degree of accountability needs to be built
into the curriculum design, with resources being committed to needs analysis, planning,
materials development, e.g. large-scale curriculum development for a national educational
system or company specific-purpose ESP courses developed by an institution employing
well-trained and skilful teachers.

4.2. ESP Syllabus development

4.2.1. Syllabus design

As already observed, the syllabus is a specification of the teaching content that is

organised into learnable units arranged in a rational sequence. Designing the syllabus
involves the selection, sequencing, and justification of the content of the curriculum. In
language teaching, content selection involves selecting items of grammar, vocabulary,
pronunciation as well as experiential content such as topics and themes (Nunan, 2001).
The selection process is guided by the results of needs analysis which are a starting
point for both content specification and the setting of goals and objectives. Goals are
formulated in the process of translating the data gathered during NA, with each goal
being accomplished through the achievement of a series of objectives.

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4.2.2. Formulating goals and objectives

The goals, or aims, are broad, general-purpose statements of what the course plans to
accomplish (Nunan, 2001; Hyland, 2006). These global target outcomes of a particular
ESP course are the core of the syllabus and its organising principle. They might relate
to the development of writing skills required for the successful completion of academic
writing assignments or to the use of various listening strategies to improve lecture
comprehension and the development of effective note-taking strategies. They might
also specify that ESP instruction is targeted at enabling learners to obtain goods and/
or services through conversation or correspondence.
Although goals relate to the findings of NA, the relationship is always mediated by
the teachers’/course designers’ and learners’ views of language and learning. Accordingly,
the teacher along with the students determine the final shape of a given course in terms
of priority skills and abilities that need to be pursued and accomplished (Hyland, 2006).
Having formulated the goals of an ESP course, the course designer articulates a set
of objectives geared to achieve these goals. Objectives are more specific than goals, and
a series of objectives can be specified to accomplish a particular goal (Nunan, 2001). By
providing measurable outcomes of instruction, objectives facilitate planning and stipulate
how learning is to proceed (Hyland, 2006). Since their focus is not on what is to be
taught, but rather on what an individual can do at the end of the course, they take the
form of ‘can do’ statements, as in the following examples:
• can apply a range of listening/reading skills relevant to academic contexts;
• can write a sales report based on a bar chart and/or a line graph;
• can advise customers on transport options, shipping and packing details, the route,
details regarding weight, dimensions, and measurements.
Formal performance objectives have three elements – a ‘task’, or performance element,
a standards element, and a conditions element. The task element specifies the assignment
that the learner is to do, the standards element establishes how well the task is to be
performed, and the conditions element defines the circumstances under which the task
is to be carried out (Nunan, 2001). Figure 4.2. provides an illustration of how specific
performance objectives can be.

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• Students listen to a lecture on genres, motifs, and themes – the conditions element
• Listening to the lecture, they are to extract information on the differences between
motifs and themes mentioned by the lecturer, with specific examples provided in
the listening task – the performance element
• All key information is to be extracted – the standards element

Figure 4.2. Specific performance objectives in a listening task (Source of lecture: http://
oyc.yale.edu/music/musi-112/lecture-2#ch1 [20 October 2016])

In EAP courses, objectives often describe the learners’ competences viewed in terms
of “the cluster of skills, abilities and knowledge a person must have to perform a specific
task” (Hyland, 2006: 82). They are useful for both learners and teachers. Since objectives
provide detailed information about the course relevance to learners’ needs, they offer
the target audience of the course a basis for “explicit negotiation” over its content and
the adopted teaching approach. As for teachers, objectives “contribute to a coherent
teaching programme” (Hyland, 2006: 82), and relate learning to a particular academic
or professional context in which the course is to be run. They also play a key planning role
in selecting and sequencing content and activities, and translating them into appropriate
units of work and classes.

4.2.3. Syllabus choice

A syllabus, or a plan of what is to be accomplished through teaching and learning, is

generally organised in units. By identifying specific areas that the course will focus
on to reach the overall goals of the course, it provides a basis for evaluating learners’
progress. In the literature, a broad distinction is drawn between synthetic and analytic
types of syllabi (White, 1988), which constitute two ends of a continuum rather
than opposing poles of a dichotomy (Hyland, 2006). The former include notional-
functional syllabi (Wilkins, 1976), which are based on notions, i.e. general conceptual
meanings, such as: time, cause, duration, and functions, i.e. communicative purposes
achieved through language, such as requesting and apologising. Thus, they focus on
discrete language items that learners are expected to acquire “through decontextualised
activities before ‘re-synthesizing” such knowledge in real communication” (Hyland,
2006: 83).
Analytic syllabi, on the other hand, include task-based and process syllabus types.
They promote meaning negotiation as learners process target language samples

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presented as whole chunks and the independent acquisition of grammatical forms

at individual pace (Ellis, 2003). Thus, the two types of syllabi focus on the process
of acquiring the language, with process syllabi extending their focus on procedures
for learning by giving students more freedom in reinterpretation and decision
making (Hyland, 2006). Task-based syllabi are based on a list of communicative
tasks that learners need to carry out in an academic or professional context. They
involve “interaction between knowledge of language and using that knowledge”
(Hyland, 2006: 83) to solve problems that require active engagement in purposeful
communication. The tasks can include real-world tasks, such as: listening to lectures
or informing the customer about the reasons for the delay in delivery, and pedagogical
tasks which help learners understand how language works, such as mapping the
structure of argumentative essays.
Alongside process syllabi, ESP practitioners also continue to focus on the product of
ESP instruction, which receives due attention particularly through text-based and content-
based syllabi. These types of syllabi are extremely important in the case of narrow-angled
courses that help learners cope with the demands of target situations. The rationale for
focusing on products in ESP practice is explained by Master (1997: 30).
“ESP shifted the overemphasis on process back to a legitimate concern for product,
primarily because it reminded us that the world wants products and does not particularly
care how they were created. The concept of genre analysis has shown us that there
are prescribed forms for use in technical writing, and in order to be accepted into the
occupational subculture or discourse community, those forms must be adhered to”.
Text-based syllabi are organised around genres required by learners in their target
settings (Hyland, 2006). This approach draws on the Systemic Functional Linguistics
(SFL) tradition of the genre5, and adopts a scaffolded pedagogy, which involves active and
sustained support by an ESP instructor in guiding learners towards control of key genres.
In text-based syllabi, the planning of classroom activities is informed by the constructivist
perspective that learning new things involves using both prior knowledge and “the first-
hand knowledge gained from new explorations” (Hyland, 2006: 85).

5
Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) operates on the premise that language structure is
integrally related to social function and context. Language is organised the way it is within a culture
because such an organisation serves a social purpose within that culture. “Functional” thus refers to the
work that language does within particular contexts. “Systemic” relates to the structure or organisation
of language so that it can be used to accomplish objectives within those contexts. “Systemic” then
encompasses the “systems of choices” available to language users for the realisation of meaning. As
a theory of language learning, SFL employs linguistic analysis to establish the nature of disciplinary
discourses and ways of encouraging students to engage in these discourses. Research and pedagogy
concentrate on texts, language in use and the language system (Coffin, Donohue, 2012).

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Content-based syllabi include thematic, sheltered and adjunct types, which are
differently oriented in respect to language and content. The content-based approach to
syllabus design assumes that language learning is a by-product of acquiring some specific
topical content. Consequently, a content-based syllabus differs from a task-based syllabus in
that experiential content, which provides the point of departure for the syllabus, is usually
derived from some fairly well-defined subject area such as science or social studies, etc.
(Nunan, 1988). In a task-based syllabus, the tasks are defined as activities with a purpose
other than language learning. However, in a content-based syllabus, the performance of
the tasks is approached in a way that is intended to develop second/foreign language ability
(Reilly, n.d.).
In practice, many course designers adopt an integrated approach to syllabus
development in which different elements are brought together within a single design.
Referring to general language education, Nunan (2001) provides an illustration of
such a perspective on the syllabus. The idea presented below, however, may be as well
incorporated into the ESP syllabus:
(1) Identify the general contexts and situations in which learners will communicate.
(2) Specify the communicative events that the learners will engage in.
(3) Make a list of functional goals relevant to the learners who will need to participate
in the communicative events.
(4) List the key linguistic elements that learners will need to achieve the functional
goals.
(5) S equence and integrate the various skill elements identified in steps 3 and 4
(Nunan, 2001: 63).

4.2.4. Specifying course content

4.2.4.1. Real and carrier content

Since every genuine ESP teaching activity, irrespective of whether targeted at teaching
language or skills, is presented in a context, the notions of real content and carrier
content are essential to the understanding of ESP practice and motivation in ESP
(Dudley-Evans, M.J. St John, 2009). Real content denotes pedagogical goals, or
aims, such as the features of language that learners are to acquire (e.g. vocabulary)
or language skills they are expected to gain control of. Carrier content refers to “the
subject matter of an exercise” (Dudley-Evans, M.J. St John, 2009: XIV), and denotes
the means of delivering the real content, which might include the use of various texts
or activities.

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Thus, when teaching an ESP class for instrumentalists, for example, with a pedagogical
aim of acquainting learners with vocabulary used to explain how the French horn
produces sound, the instructor might use a lecture presented in the official website of
Yale University (at http://oyc.yale.edu/music/musi-112/lecture-2#transcript [20 October
2016]) to carry the content of particular interest to the students. Figure 4.4. presents the
transcript of part of the lecture.

Chapter 3. Introduction to the French Horn and Partials [00:16:52]

Let’s go on now to talk about instruments and how instruments produce sound. Eva Heater,
come on up. This is my friend, long-time colleague, music librarian extraordinaire and
professional French horn player, Eva Heater, who will demonstrate here — Come on over
here right in the center. Gene Kimball is in the basement somewhere recording all of this.
Eva Heater: Oh, my.
Professor Craig Wright: Oh, yeah. It’s very exciting here. What a time to be alive, huh?
Eva Heater: Yeah.
Professor Craig Wright: So Eva is going to just demonstrate the physical process of playing
the French horn.
Eva Heater: The horn obviously is a brass instrument and what makes the sound is a vibrating
column of air. In this case, the basic column of air is twelve and a half feet long and there
are something called “partials” or the “harmonic series” that happens in anything, on a string
instrument or whatever, but on the horn, it’s very distinct and that’s what makes the different
notes. Let me demonstrate to you the harmonic series. [music playing] Now I didn’t use —
no hands — that was just the notes that are naturally on the twelve and a half-foot length of
vibrating air. That’s the harmonic series that’s on that, and what the valves do is they shorten
and lengthen that vibrating column of air very much like the cello string on the fingerboard.
A cellist is always shortening and lengthening the strings. I’m doing the same thing. I’m just
doing it with a series of switches instead of a fingerboard, which we obviously don’t have —
Professor Craig Wright: Okay. That’s fine. That’s great. That’s the principle, and when she
said she was “overblowing” what that means is, and we’ll keep emphasizing this point today
— these partials — that when a sound is made you have not just one sound but that tube is
dividing up into sections, and all kinds of little sections of that one tube are sounding, not
just the big sound but the partials or the overtones, the intervals in the harmonic series. So it’s
a whole series — when we listen to a single tone it’s a whole series, and what Eva was doing
there is playing out the notes in that series successively, and we’ll keep banging on that. Now
if you would, Eva, play just the beginning of the Zarathustra or the trumpet part. Can you
do that?
[music playing]
Go, Eva. Go.

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[music playing]
One more time. [music playing] Okay, and that’s another note. Thank you very much. Thank
you. Thank you. Okay. Now Eva has another gig out in Gilford this morning so she’s going
to run off, and I’m going to show you, maybe, if we can get our slides up, this overtone series
stuff. Okay?
Eva Heater: Okay. It’s a mathematical thing too. It’s all math.
Professor Craig Wright: What we’ve got here is the following, this idea of partials that Eva was
talking about with ratios, two to one, three to two, four to three, five to four, six to five and so
on, and the point here is that the way we differentiate between instruments. Can anybody tell
me this, why — You tell me this. It’s always better when students answer. Why does a trumpet
— If I asked a trumpet to play this pitch, a trumpet played, and then I asked an oboe to play
it, the sound would be very different. Why is that the case? Gentleman here?
Student: Different overtones?
Professor Craig Wright: Different overtones. Well, actually they all have the same overtones
in a way, the same frequencies will sound, but you’ve got it — ninety-nine percent of it. It’s
which partials are particularly prominent, have extra punch or extra volume to them. The oboe
may have the seventh partial very strong and the third partial very strong whereas the trumpet
— I’m just making all of this up of course — the trumpet may have the second partial and the
fourth partial and the sixth partial. So it’s which of these partials are sounding within each of
these instruments, and the physical properties of each of these instruments are different. It’s
the particular blend.
Here’s a really dumb analogy. Any Scotch drinkers in here? No, of course not. You’re way too
young to do that, but think about a blended Scotch. You’ve got a little of this, a little of this,
a little of this, and it makes up whatever it is that you end up with, the particular recipe for
that liquid. Well, we have a particular recipe for instrumental timbre or instrumental color
and it’s the intensity of the overtones with — or partials — within each particular instrument
that creates that. Okay.

Figure 4.4. The transcript of part of the lecture on the French horn (Source: http://oyc.
yale.edu/music/musi-112/lecture-2#transcript [20 October 2016])

The lecture is a carrier content used to teach lexical items related to the French horn.
It demonstrates the use of various technical words, such as: overblowing, overtones,
partials, valve, related to brass instruments. Following the short lecture, students may be
asked questions related to the presented issue or, alternatively, the lecture may be used as
a starting point for presentations on the workings of other instruments from the family.
The content functions as a carrier of language rather than a means of providing
information about the language. By making language use meaningful, it enhances

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language acquisition and task performance. If carefully selected, with a particular focus
on learners’ professional and academic needs, it is most likely to enhance their motivation
as well (Flowerdew, Peacock, 2001). Also, as pointed out by corpus linguists, although
technical lexis constitutes a small percentage of the total vocabulary of technical texts, it
can be crucial to task performance, e.g. fluent reading (Coxhead, Nation, 2001).

4.2.4.2. Drawing up the syllabus

The results of NA affect the syllabus choice or integration of elements of various

syllabus types within one design, and the course developer’s decisions related to what
is to be included in terms of:
• types of units (notions, vocabulary, functions, skills, genres, and disciplinary,
professional, and cultural content);
• items in the units (semantic sets and functions, selected genres);
• sequencing of the above based on the priority criterion related to immediate versus
less immediate needs, level of difficulty, and logical order of communicative events
specified in the syllabus (Basturkmen, 2010).
Drawing on the results of NA that involved multiple methods and sources of
information to identify business English communicative needs of employees working
for a large Japanese company, Cowling (2007) designed a syllabus that combined the
elements of notional-functional and content-based syllabi. The notional-functional part
of the syllabus included a series of modules/units, such as: business telephoning, for
each relevant discourse features specified by the course designer (e.g. leaving a message,
checking understanding, etc.) and activities (listening/video tasks and role plays). In one
of the content-based modules referred to as Describing Products and Services, the designer
identified such discourse features as the notions of weight and measures, comparison
of adjectives, the functions of giving opinions, and content items such as presenting
selling points and giving descriptions. Each module included a cultural focus, such as
directness and gestures when describing products and services or levels of formality and
politeness when telephoning. Although the findings of NA did not explicitly suggest task-
based activities, the syllabus design incorporated some real-world tasks that provided an
authentic context for language learning.
The results of NA conducted to identify the needs of instrumentalists led Lesiak-
Bielawska (2014) to design a syllabus that integrated the elements of notional-functional,
content- and task-based syllabi. The units specified in it were construed as notions (such
as: rhythmic note and rest values, accidentals, time and key-signatures, etc.), language
functions (such as: suggesting, stating, expressing an opinion, etc.), as well as content

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items (such as: correcting the performance of a piece of music, telling the learner how
to perform a piece of music and overcome difficulties when playing it). The tasks ranged
from simple pedagogical technical terminology-focused ones, designed to ‘push’ learners
into communicating with each other in English (Nunan, 2001), to more complex ones
that specified ‘real world tasks’, such as: following the instruction on how to play a given
piece of music, explaining the problems encountered when playing a selected composition
and how to overcome them, for example. Thus, the syllabus of the course ‘English for
Instrumentalists’ was also skill-based since the tasks incorporated in it focused on both
receptive and productive skills, although special emphasis was placed on listening and
speaking.
Parkinson et al. (2007) developed a reading and writing course for the foundation
year students in a South African University. The choices made by syllabus designers were
explained in terms of the findings of NA, a reference to a previous study into the reading
and writing tasks assigned to undergraduate science students (Jackson et al., 2006), and
their views on learning. Accordingly, the course focused on developing academic literacies
and was organised around four genres, including the laboratory report as the major type
of writing an assignment, and an essay.
The above considerations illustrate three major areas of ESP course development:
analysing needs, identifying specialist discourse and defining key elements of the
curriculum. Basturkmen (2010: 143) presents a helpful representation of various aspects
feeding into ESP curriculum development (Figure 4.3.). It illustrates how the findings
from NA and related investigations of specialist discourse, the latter often regarded as part
of the NA procedure, have an influence on the decisions made regarding curriculum and
materials development. The pyramid representing ESP course development is a three-level
structure. The results of NA (level 1) constitute the bedrock and indicate which aspects
of specialist discourse or genres (level 2) are to be focused on when designing a course.
These two layers are below the surface, and hence invisible. They form the basis for the
development of the curriculum, which is the visible, or surface-layer element (level 3).

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Figure 4.3. Representation of ESP course development (Source: Basturkmen, 2010: 143)

4.3. Wide-angled and narrow-angled course designs

As shown above, the results of NA are used to formulate the goals and objectives of
an ESP course, specify its content (language, tasks, activities, and skills) and determine
the sequence of instruction. These findings are also a starting point for defining the
specificity of a particular course in terms of its target audience. Consequently, some of
the courses are referred to as ‘wide-angled’ since they are developed for disciplines or
occupations as broad fields, whereas others designed for narrowly defined specialities
within those broad fields – ‘narrow-angled’. The question of how specific the course
should be in terms of its target audience is one of the key issues pertaining to its
development and the choice of ESP materials, and has been discussed in relation
to second language writing instruction (Ferris, 2001). Addressing it, Belcher (2006:
139) argues that for many teaching practitioners the debate related to ‘wide- and
narrow-angled’ course designs is a ‘nonissue’ since “instructional decisions should have
more to do with the learners themselves than with instructor preference or beliefs”.
Undergraduate students without majors or low-proficiency adults are more likely to
benefit from a wide-angled approach, whereas postgraduate students – doctors or
nurses – may prefer a narrow-angled approach.
And indeed, although in many cases the focus of an ESP course is largely determined
by the findings from NA, ESP teaching practice shows that it may as well depend on

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institutional decisions concerning the grouping of learners. Accordingly, if dedicated

learner groups are the focus of ESP instruction, the ESP course is targeted at very
specific learners, and its objective is to pay attention to specific areas of language use
and to teach a narrow set of language skills. Alternatively, if students from different
disciplines are grouped according to appropriate proficiency levels, the course needs to
adopt a wide-angled approach, and be addressed at different language proficiencies, with
the focus on teaching them wide-angled English skills.
Consequently, it may be reasonable to adopt a stance proposed by Basturkmen (2010),
and view ESP courses on a continuum that stretches from ‘wide-angled’ to ‘narrow-
angled’. ’Wide-angled’ courses are designed for more general groups of learners and focus
on a set of generic skills in an area, e.g. Business English skills. ’Narrow-angled’ courses
are meant for very specific learner groups, i.e. learners who appear to be homogeneous in
terms of their needs and/or who study English having a particular type of academic and/
or work environment in mind, e.g. English for Logistics, English for Accountants, English
for Instrumentalists. Developing more focused courses, it is possible to design courses for
sub-areas within the broad fields of work or study, e.g. English for Financial Accountancy,
English for Logistics Management or English for Violinists.
Such a perspective on the focus of ESP courses may be extremely useful in many EAP
settings since as the experience of the Centre for English Language Education in Science
and Engineering (CELESE) Waseda University demonstrates, the baffling problem of
students of many different disciplines in the same classroom can be partially averted by
designing appropriate teaching materials that gradually shift from wide- to narrow-angled.
This design means that materials in wide-angled courses focus on ‘general ESP’ skills
required by target learners irrespective of their field, whereas the contents of materials
in narrow-angled ESP courses are in many ways determined by the students themselves.
Accordingly, the latter can be applied to classes comprising a broad range of disciplines.
For example, in the technical writing class, students are taught the principles of corpus-
based analyses which they later apply in a student-centred analysis of research articles
selected from the highest-ranking journals in their fields (Bhatia et al., 2011).
Other practical considerations related to the course focus concern the ESP background
of the teachers involved in language instruction in a given institution or workplace. A.M.
Johns and Price-Machado (2001: 46) observe that ESP teaching practitioners are often
confronted with “challenges that other instructors may be able to circumvent”. One of
them pertains to ESP content, i.e. being acquainted with technical vocabulary, discipline-
specific discourses, and processes that are essential to the ESP training of students within
specialised contexts. Another challenge for ESP instructors stems from the need to attain
“the necessary breadth of understanding about successful communication within [the]
context” (A.M. Johns, Price-Machado, 2001: 46-47) that their students aspire to enter

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or in which they are to function. Depending on the setting, the teacher needs to know
how to establish a good working or communicative relationship among negotiating
businesspeople from different cultures or how a pilot establishes contact with and gives
messages to air traffic controllers. These are very important communications issues which
can have serious repercussions for business partners involved in negotiations. They might
as well affect good working relationships or passenger safety.
In some ESP teaching contexts, the lack of appropriately qualified teaching staff may
lead to taking a pragmatic decision of widening the focus of ESP courses. In others, course
designers are given a free hand to offer narrow-angled ESP instruction targeted at specific
learner needs, which induces ESP teachers to familiarise themselves with the students’
discipline or vocation. In Fairfax County (Virginia), for example, one of the strategies of
NA that the ESP instructors employ involves attending vocational classes, “taking notes
on troublesome vocabulary, idioms, slang, concepts, cultural differences, and then (…)
address[ing] these things in the [ESP] class. This makes up most of the content of the
[ESP] class with additional practice in the development of reading, listening, speaking,
writing and problem-solving skills” (Schrage, personal communication, 2/26/00 in A.M.
Johns, Price-Machado, 2001: 46).

4.4. Concluding remarks

The chapter has presented a series of issues related to curriculum and syllabus
development. Following a brief discussion on various approaches to curriculum design,
it has focused on the models of curriculum development most frequently employed in
ESP instruction, such as central and backward design approaches. It has also shown
that the results of needs analysis determine the goals of the planned course and
selection of the teaching content. Since these findings determine the syllabus choice
or the integration of elements of various syllabus types within one design, a brief
description of different syllabus types has also been presented. After a brief discussion
on important issues related to specifying the course content and drawing up a syllabus,
the final part of the chapter has focused on a series of variables that determine the
specificity of a particular course in terms of its target audience.
As demonstrated in the chapter, ESP courses are built on the findings of NA, which
underlies many of the decisions made regarding the syllabus choice and appropriate
teaching materials. Investigations into learners’ needs give the course designer a chance
to consider various issues related to target situation analysis, such as: tasks involved in the
work or study area, the standards of their performance, or present situation analysis, such
as learners’ current difficulties to perform study- or work-related tasks, the nature of these

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difficulties, etc. The results of NA might also indicate the aspects of discourse or genres
that need to be focused on during ESP instruction, and determine an approach to specialist
discourse exploration, e.g. full text analysis or analysis for specific features. To incorporate
a variety of NA findings, many ESP syllabi are hybrid, often competence-based. They are
presented through tasks of various kinds, and frequently involve some shared negotiations
with learners.