Abstract
The purpose of this study was to find the needs of Iranian undergraduate Information Technology (IT) engineering students for their ESP course. To this end, a needs analysis questionnaire was administered to 30 undergraduate IT students to elicit information about their needs in English language at Islamic Azad University, Tabriz Branch. The results of data analysis revealed that among four skills reading was the highly needed skill followed by writing. It was also found that a majority of participants were dissatisfied with the current ESP courses for undergraduate students. This, in fact, indicated that ESP curricula have not yet been successfully developed in satisfying the students’ professional needs in target situations. Findings point to the fact that ESP and its teaching in Iran has to undergo serious rethinking not only in the content of the course but also the whole process of teaching the language. The findings can help course designers to both put much more credit for ESP courses, and consider appropriate and suitable materials which can give useful information to the students. It can also help ESP teachers to meet the language needs of their students.
Highlights
Needs analysis, as a term related to language teaching, first appeared in the 1920s (West, 1997; White, 1988)
The purpose of this study was to find the needs of Iranian undergraduate Information Technology (IT) engineering students for their English for specific purposes (ESP) course
It became popular in the decade of the 70s and early 80s by means of some major publications which were associated with teaching English for specific purposes (ESP) such as those by Richterich and Chancerel (1980) and Munby (1978)
Summary
As a term related to language teaching, first appeared in the 1920s (West, 1997; White, 1988). It became popular in the decade of the 70s and early 80s by means of some major publications which were associated with teaching English for specific purposes (ESP) such as those by Richterich and Chancerel (1980) and Munby (1978). ESP is a term that has traditionally been used for the courses which aim at teaching the English language needed for specific situation, mainly related to academic (EAP) or occupational (EOP) context. There are some views indicating that the teaching of ESP is, in many ways, similar to the teaching of English in general there are features that are typical in different specialized subjects and that ESP should be recognized as an approach (Crocker, 1981; Hutchinson & Waters, 1987; McDonough, 1984)
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