EAP Students Research Articles

Paraphrase or plagiarism? Exploring EAP students’ use of source material in a transnational university context

Paraphrase or plagiarism? Exploring EAP students’ use of source material in a transnational university context

Preparing EAP Students for the Transfer Climate: EAP Instructors’ Perceptions of the Role of EAP Courses

Preparing EAP Students for the Transfer Climate: EAP Instructors’ Perceptions of the Role of EAP Courses

Addressing the Requirements of EAP Students by Analyzing Their Demands in the Technological and Information Program

The aim of the research is to determine the specific requirements and needs of both students and lecturers in the EAP program for the Technology and Information Education Department in East Java Indonesia. A qualitative research design was adopted, utilizing closed-ended questionnaires to collect in-depth information. Contacts were made with Technology and Information students and EAP lecturers. The data collected through online forms focused on identifying needs, lacks, and wants. The data was then analyzed through coding and categorizing in a quantitative manner. The results indicate that both students and lecturers believe that the main areas of concern for prospective Technology and Information students are the need for English materials tailored to their specific field of study, as they have a limited English language proficiency. They expressed a desire for reading materials that align with their future careers. Lecturers identified the main need as English teaching materials aligned with EAP principles, and they also mentioned a lack of appropriate EAP resources and expressed a need for teaching materials focused on reading for students majoring in Technology and Information Education

Self-empowerment in the struggling transition from General English to EAP: Action and reflection of a Chinese teacher

Faced with the common challenge of professional development from the periphery of academia, EAP teachers in developing economies such as China also grapple with the particular hurdle of transitioning from teaching General English (GE) courses. While previous studies suggest aspects of how the teachers view the difficulties they encounter, the elicited data they use can hardly show the real actions the teachers take to identify problems, plan and evaluate changes. To remedy this oversight, this study adopts an action research design (Burns, 2010; Johnson, 2012) and explores how one teacher adapted to her new tasks in teaching EAP and coped with the transition through her personal actions.The results show that the teacher was empowered in her struggle with the transition to EAP teaching, and such empowerment enabled her to become an active agent in the changes and implement the accommodating strategies for the EAP curriculum and students. The empowerment was also seen in her efforts not only to accumulate EAP-related experiences and bring forth creative ideas, but also to apply them in her teaching. This action research and its analytical framework help EAP practitioners to reflect on and theorise from what they encounter in everyday classrooms.

DECOLONIZING ANGLOPHONE EAP INFLUENCE IN THE EUROPEAN HIGHER EDUCATION CONTEXT

It is widely known that English teaching practices are largely rooted in colonialism and linguistic imperialism – the belief in the superiority of the Western teaching methods and linguistic norms established in such countries as the UK and the US. The current trend to decolonize English teaching has been gaining momentum for over three decades but has not entirely penetrated into the mainstream teaching of English, with English for Academic Purposes not being an exception. Relatively little focus has been placed in the research onto non-English speaking contexts with the purpose of analysing the current state of EAP provision at universities and gauging the influence of the native-speakerist academic English norms on EAP students’ writing. In the case of the EU context, it may be particularly pertinent to investigate the potential influence that Brexit might have had in terms of rejecting the imposition of the Standard British English norms and associated teaching approaches. This paper is meant to be a reflection with an attempt to stimulate the discussion of EAP teaching practices and academic discourses in the EU higher education in the post-Brexit era. It will consider the issues in the EAP provision in the EU with the example of Portuguese HE and will reflect on the native-speakerist tendencies within the academia and ways to tackle the dominance of the Anglophone norms. This paper hopes to contribute to the argument in favor of the decolonization of EAP teaching practices in non-English speaking contexts, as decolonization can help foster a more equitable and inclusive world.

Re-exploring writer-reader interaction: Analyzing metadiscourse in EAP students’ infographics

As multimodal texts become ubiquitous in the digital age, analyzing how writers interact with readers via the multimodal genre is getting increasingly important. Enlightened by Kress and van Leeuwen's (2006) work on visual design, D'Angelo (2016) extended the metadiscourse model (Hyland, 2004) and proposed a new framework of visual metadiscourse to analyze academic posters. In this study, we adopted the well-recognized metadiscourse model (Hyland, 2004; Hyland & Tse, 2004) and developed D'Angelo's (2016) visual metadiscourse framework to evaluate the comprehensibility and engagement of medical students' infographics completed in an EAP class. A total of 127 Visme infographics on how to prevent hypertension were collected and analyzed. We focused on how the students used diverse metadiscourse resources to inform and engage the audience in their infographics. We coded interactive and interactional features regarding both textual metadiscourse and visual metadiscourse for each poster and identified the overall patterns of the EAP students' metadiscourse use. We also zoomed in on illustrative posters to depict the students' use of various metadiscourse resources. This study adds to the metadiscourse model by extending it to the multimodal genre and sheds new light on multimodal pedagogy.

“The quality of learning depends on the quality of the Wi-Fi”: The views and experiences of EAP students during emergency remote teaching

“The quality of learning depends on the quality of the Wi-Fi”: The views and experiences of EAP students during emergency remote teaching

A corpus-based study of vocabulary in massive open online courses (MOOCs)

Massive open online courses (MOOCs) provide rich academic content to learners around the world. However, understanding such content is challenging to second-language learners. Given the importance of vocabulary knowledge to comprehension, this study constructed a 10.2-million-word corpus of MOOCs from four disciplinary areas (engineering, humanities and arts, science and math, and social sciences), and examined (a) the lexical demands of MOOCs, (b) the coverage of general and discipline-specific academic vocabulary lists in MOOCs, and (c) the extent to which these lists helped learners with MOOCs' lexical demands. The results show that – together with proper nouns, marginal words, transparent compounds, and acronyms – the most frequent 3,000 and 4,000 word families of general English respectively provide 90% and 95% coverage of the corpus, indicating that MOOCs are as lexically challenging as university lectures. Also, because both general and discipline-specific academic vocabulary lists provide high coverage of MOOCs, studying them can lower students' learning burdens and help them achieve higher coverage of MOOCs than learning words by frequency. Lastly, based on learners’ existing vocabulary knowledge and target disciplines, this study provides pedagogical recommendations to teachers on how to employ general and discipline-specific academic word lists as vocabulary support for EAP students.

An autonomy-oriented response to EAP students’ learned helplessness in online classes

An autonomy-oriented response to EAP students’ learned helplessness in online classes

Suitability of TED-Ed animations for academic listening

Amid increasing demand for EAP courses, there is a pressing need to identify suitable materials for EAP instruction. This study examines the suitability of TED-Ed animations for academic listening by exploring the lexical demands, academic vocabulary coverage, lexical density, and speech rates of a corpus of 1,319 such animations covering 12 subject areas. The results show that knowledge of the most frequent 3,000–5,000 word families is necessary to follow TED-Ed animations reasonably well, meaning that they are lexically more demanding than academic lectures. The animations were also found to have a coverage of lower-frequency academic words comparable to that of academic lectures, making the former a potentially important resource in which EAP students can encounter important academic words that are seldom used in general English. Moreover, the speech rate of TED-Ed animations is comparable to that of academic lectures, but they are lexically denser, suggesting that – while they may be useful for familiarizing learners with the delivery pace of academic lectures – additional vocabulary support may be needed. Overall, these results support the use of TED-Ed animations as materials for academic listening, but adequate scaffolding and some adjustments will be needed if they are to be integrated effectively into EAP instruction.

Exploring Chinese students’ perspectives of and preferences towards formative feedback approaches on written EAP work

Feedback is an integral element in the teacher-student relationship leading to improvement and academic success, and also for encouraging learner autonomy. This has led to a variety of approaches for delivering feedback, all of which have strengths but questions remain as to how students perceive their effectiveness towards improving specific aspects of written coursework. Five feedback approaches (written comments, in-text annotations, checklist, general class feedback, and individual tutorials) are examined in this paper through a review of existing literature and a survey on student preferences. Quantitative data was gathered from eighty-six first-year EAP students at an EMI university in China on their perspectives and preferences. Statistical analysis indicates that results generally support the understanding of the current literature with a preference for individual one-to-one tutorials.This article was published open access under a CC BY licence: https://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0.

Analyzing Rhetorical Structure Development in Korean EAP Students from an Intercultural Rhetoric Perspective: A Corpus-based Genre Study

Analyzing Rhetorical Structure Development in Korean EAP Students from an Intercultural Rhetoric Perspective: A Corpus-based Genre Study

EAP Courses in Joint-Venture Institutions: A Needs Analysis Based on Learner Perceptions

With the increase in English medium instruction (EMI) in non-English-speaking countries, the role of EAP in preparing learners for the academic tasks that they will face is enhanced. Joint-venture universities (JVUs), institutions formed in collaboration between foreign universities and universities in the host country, pose even greater challenges for EAP programs. Learners in JVUs are expected to meet the requirements of the collaborating institution while simultaneously developing skills in an additional language. Critical to the success of EAP programs in JVUs, then, is the careful analysis of learners’ needs and wants. The present study aims to provide insights into the needs and wants of EAP students at a China-based JVU by focusing on the perceptions of learners who have completed their EAP studies. Data were obtained through a narrative research method based on semi-structured interviews with 16 former EAP students and compared with stated program goals in an effort to discover areas in which students’ perceptions aligned or did not align with program goals. The paper presents cases of alignment and cases of mismatches. An analysis of the mismatches leads to the following pedagogical implications for EMI programs in JVUs: (1) Programs may better cater to learners’ interests by implementing a semi-negotiated curriculum; (2) programs may better cater to learners’ discipline-specific needs by providing broad writing topics for learners to refine in accordance with their particular disciplines; (3) programs may better promote the integration of EAP students and international students by consciously providing the initial “push” toward integration

Curbing boredom in online teaching: Effects of an autonomy-oriented intervention with EAP students.

Despite the growing body of research on boredom and its causes in face-to-face classes, little is known about how pedagogical interventions can mitigate this negative emotion. The purpose of this study was to examine boredom experienced by EAP students in online classes and investigate the effects of an autonomy-oriented intervention program on students' boredom. The boredom scale was administered to 84 students before and after the autonomy-oriented intervention. By designing and implementing autonomy-oriented intervention based on the autonomy enhancement model, positive results were obtained with reduced levels of boredom. The results revealed that the intervention was effective and boredom was reduced to a noticeable extent. In addition, the qualitative results contributed to our understanding of the learners' experiences throughout the intervention. We conclude the study with implications for EAP instructors to employ different pedagogical interventions to mitigate negative emotions in online EAP classes.

RETRACTED: Multimedia Presentations Through Digital Storytelling for Sustainable Development of EFL Learners’ Argumentative Writing Skills, Self-Directed Learning Skills and Learner Autonomy

The present study explored the impact of online digital storytelling on developing EAP students’ argumentative writing skills, and its impact on improving self-directed learning skills and learner autonomy in language learning. To reach such ends, a standardized pretest and posttest in argumentative writing skills were designed, which depends on the writing tasks of IELTS task 2 and Independent TOEFL test writing tasks. Also, the self-rating scale of self-directed learning and language Learner Autonomy Scale (LAS) have been exploited. The two experimental groups were trained to write using two different types of learning; group A through online storytelling and group B used offline content producing software to produce digital storytelling to promote writing skills. On the other hand, the control group (group C) used a traditional storytelling strategy. Results primarily revealed that the literacy skills of those who produced their stories with the offline software (group B) improved significantly in comparison to the other experimental group which was taught through online digital storytelling (group A). The control group achieved the least of the three groups in developing target skills. Further, the qualitative analysis of experimental group members’ responses in the semi-structured interviews revealed positive attitudes toward learning through blended learning approaches compared with pure online web-based learning. It is, therefore, recommended that blended learning should be used for students from communities with poor digital literacy and technology infrastructure. Also, online learning should be used with care to cope with community needs to fill a real gap in field practices in language learning to improve multiliteracy skills.

Validating a rubric for assessing integrated writing in an EAP context

Although researchers have argued for a mixed-method approach to rubric design and validation, such research is sparse in the area of L2 integrated writing. This article reports on the validation of an analytic rubric for assessing a classroom-based integrated writing test. Argumentative integrated essays (N = 48) written by EAP students at an English-medium Canadian university were rated by instructors (N = 10) with prior EAP teaching experience. Employing a mixed methods design, the quality of the rubric was established through many facet Rasch measurement and perceptions from the instructors elicited during semi-structured interviews. To further explore the rubric’s ability to differentiate among students, essays from three performance levels (low, average, high) were compared in terms of fluency, syntactic and lexical complexity, cohesion, and lexical diversity measures. Results have suggested the rubric can capture variation in student performance. Implications are discussed in terms of validation of assessment rubrics in localized assessment contexts.

The Role of Needs Analysis in English for Academic Purposes in Higher Education

Despite the established importance of English worldwide, and notwithstanding the fact that in expanding circle countries (defined as expanding or extending circle countries those countries where English is used as a foreign language), English for Academic Purposes plays an increasingly important role. Studies on the linguistic needs of university students are still lacking their perspective, at least in Italy, where students studying English language in Higher Education institutions are expected to gain access to the discourses of the academia via language competence. For this reason, the present paper reviews the theoretical and practical bases of English for Academic Purposes in order to provide further thought-provoking ideas based on a study carried out in the Italian university context. As far as method is concerned, due to the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, the study was conducted through Google Forms. The results of the authors’ questionnaire model are presented and analysed for the purpose of this research. Findings demonstrate both the complex network of elements that play a significant role in determining the needs of EAP students in Italy, and the unavoidable necessity to set priorities. It is a fact that needs in a learner-centred system are not static. In addition, learning EAP is bound to mean learning to be an independent learner.

Autonomous corpus use by graduate students: A long-term trend study (2009–2017)

Corpus use by EAP students has reportedly increased over the last decade, with considerable optimism about the future of this approach (Chen & Flowerdew, 2018a). However, much research employs data from short classroom courses; little is known about how student corpus use has varied over a span of multiple years. This paper uses long-term trend data from a corpus-based course for graduates which ran 50 times (2009–2017) at a UK university. The course taught students to build do-it-yourself corpora based on their research topic and promoted autonomous consultation of this resource. Questionnaires on corpus use were administered at three stages: pre-course (544 students), immediate post-course (343) and delayed post-course, after one year (221). The data show that pre-course corpus use was constant (mean 24%), while immediate post-course use (mean 87%) and delayed post-course use rose only slightly (mean 62%) from 2009 to 2017. The lack of appreciable growth in corpus use over nine years does not support the expectation of increased take-up in future. However, the means for regular autonomous use (≥1/week) at 61% (immediate post-course) and 37% (delayed post-course), show the success of the do-it-yourself corpus approach in fostering the autonomous use of corpora by graduates.

From task-based needs analysis to curriculum evaluation: Putting methodological innovations to the test in an English for academic purposes program

An important initiative in research on second language needs analysis (NA) is the proliferation of recently-proposed methodological standards for ensuring the reliability and validity of NA findings (e.g., Serafini et al., 2015). This paper illustrates how Serafini et al.'s (2015) methodological framework was used to: (a) collect and analyze information on the task-based, academic oral communication needs of EAP students; and (b) evaluate the extent to which the existing EAP curriculum catered to these needs. The data collection featured qualitative and quantitative methods (e.g., document analysis, interviews, observations, questionnaires), a multi-phase design (e.g., open- to close-ended data collection), and multiple sources of information. The analysis focused on triangulating sources and methods in order to gain a more complete understanding of the oral tasks most important for student success. Three task types were identified in this regard: academic lectures, discussions, and presentations. A systematic comparison of the findings with the curriculum's learning outcomes and practices revealed that students' needs were largely being addressed. However, the evaluation also led to reliable conclusions about specific opportunities for curricular improvement for each task type. The results are discussed with an eye towards promoting the use of principled and rational NA in EAP.

EAP Students' Attitudes Toward Instruction Online at a Thai University : Preliminary Findings

EAP Students' Attitudes Toward Instruction Online at a Thai University : Preliminary Findings