An evaluation of the ESP materials for the 2nd year students of faculty of financial accounting, hà hoa tiên university in hà nam and suggestions for adaptation

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF
LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF
POST-GRADUATE STUDIES *********************

LÊ THU TRANG

AN EVALUATION OF THE ESP MATERIALS FOR THE SECOND YEAR
STUDENTS OF FACULTY OF FINANCIAL ACCOUNTING, HÀ HOA
TIÊN UNIVERSITY AND SUGGESTIONS FOR ADAPTATION

Đánh giá giáo trình tiếng Anh chuyên ngành dành cho sinh viên năm thứ hai
khoa Tài chính Kế toán trường Đại học Hà Hoa Tiên, Hà Nam và đề xuất
hiệu chỉnh giáo trình

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

FIELD: ENGLISH TEACHING METHODOLOGY
CODE: 60140111

Hanoi, 2014


VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF
LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF
POST-GRADUATE STUDIES *********************

LÊ THU TRANG

AN EVALUATION OF THE ESP MATERIALS FOR THE SECOND YEAR
STUDENTS OF FACULTY OF FINANCIAL ACCOUNTING, HÀ HOA
TIÊN UNIVERSITY AND SUGGESTIONS FOR ADAPTATION

Đánh giá giáo trình tiếng Anh chuyên ngành dành cho sinh viên năm thứ hai
khoa Tài chính Kế toán trường Đại học Hà Hoa Tiên, Hà Nam và đề xuất
hiệu chỉnh giáo trình

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS
FIELD: ENGLISH TEACHING METHODOLOGY
CODE: 60140111
SUPERVISOR: Dr. TRẦN THỊ THU HIỀN

Hanoi, 2014


i

STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP
I certify my authority of the submitted minor thesis entitled “An evaluation of the
ESP materials for the 2

nd

year students of Faculty of Financial Accounting, Hà Hoa Tiên

University in Hà Nam and suggestions for adaptation”, in terms of statement of
requirement for the thesis and the field study reports in Masters‟ programs, is the result of
my own work, except where otherwise acknowledged and that this minor thesis or any part
of the same had not been submitted for a higher degree to any other universities or
institutions.
Hanoi, August 2014

ii

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
On the completion of this thesis, I would like to give my sincere thanks to many
people for their encouragement and assistance during the preparation of my thesis.
First and foremost, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor,
Dr. Trần Thị Thu Hiền, who has been most willing and ready to give me valuable and
helpful guidance, advice and support during the most difficult time of thesis construction.
Without her help, this thesis would not have been made possible.
My special thanks also go to all the teachers in the English Department, at Hà Hoa
Tiên University for their enthusiastic participation and constructive suggestions for the
development of the study. And I also wish to express my thanks for the great cooperation
from the second year accounting students of the Faculty of Financial Accounting and the
graduated ones in the data collection of my study.
My gratitude also extends to my lecturers for their interesting and helpful lessons
during of working towards my master‟s degree.
Last but not least, my sincere thanks go to my family who give me much
motivation, energy and support in accomplishing this challenging work.


iii

ABSTRACT
Coursebook evaluation is of great importance in assessing how effective a
coursebook is to the teaching and learning of foreign languages. The thesis is carried out in
an attempt to evaluate the suitability of the coursebook “English for Finance” (Cao Xuân
Thiều, 2008, Publisher of Finance) for the second year students of financial accounting at
Hà Hoa Tiên University, in Hà Nam to the course‟s objectives in terms of aims, contents,
and methodology. The study makes use of survey research approach with data collection

instruments of questionnaires in form of Likert rating scale type, informal interviews, and
with the involvement of 69 informants. Type of summative evaluation was chosen to seek
for significant improvements for subsequent use. The findings points out that the
coursebook is partially suitable to the course‟s objectives and would be subsequently used
for incoming ESP courses at the university. However, seeking for effectively and
completely obtaining given objectives of the course, there should be necessary
improvements to be made with the coursebook in terms of language components, reading
topics, types of exercises and tasks, guidance and suggestion for further study and practice
as recommended in the study.


iv

TABLE O
STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP .....................................................................................
ACKNOWLEDGMENT .....................................................................................................
ABSTRACT .........................................................................................................................
TABLE OF CONTENTS ...................................................................................................
LIST OF ABBRIVIATIONS ............................................................................................
LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................................
PART A: INTRODUCTION ..............................................................................................

1.Rationale ...........................................................................................

2.Aims of the study ..............................................................................

3.Scope of the study .............................................................................

4.Research question .............................................................................

5.Research method ..............................................................................

6.Significance of the study ..................................................................

7.Design of the study ...........................................................................
PART B: DEVELOPMENT ...............................................................................................
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW ......................................................................
1.1

ESP cours

1.1.1What is m

1.1.2Why shou

1.1.3When sho

1.1.4How can t

1.1.5Who shou

1.2Materials, coursebook and textbook .............................................
1.3

Materials

1.3.1Definition
1.3.2Materials
1.4

Previous s

1.5

Chapter s

CHAPTER 2: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY ........................................................

2.1Context of the study ......................................................................


v

2.1.1
2.1.2
2.1.3
2.1.4
2.2

Data colle

2.2.1

2.2.2

2.2.2.2 For the informal interviews ..................................................
2.2.3
2.3

Chapter s

3.1

Subjective

3.2

Objective

CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSIONS ...........................................

3.2.1
3.2.2
3.2.3
3.3

Findings a

3.3.1
3.3.2
3.3.3
3.4

Recomme

3.4.1
3.4.2
3.4.3
3.5

Chapter s

PART C: CONCLUSION .................................................................................................

1.Recapitulation ...................................................................................

2.Concluding remarks .........................................................................
3. Limitations of the study .........................................................................................


vi


vii

LIST OF ABBRIVIATIONS
EGP:

English for general purposes

ESP:

English for specific purposes

FOFA:

Faculty of Financial Accounting

HHT:

Hà Hoa Tiên University

VNU-ULIS:

Vietnam National University – University of Languages and

International Studies


viii

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1:

Statistics on the 2

nd

year students‟ opinions on the coursebook in

terms of aims
Table 2:

Statistics on the 13 graduated students‟ opinions towards the
statement 1 (appendix 1)

Table 3:

Statistics on the graduated students‟ opinions toward statements 4

and 5 (appendix 1)

Table 4:

Statistics on the 13 graduated students‟ opinions towards the
statement 6 (appendix 1)

Table 5:

Statistics on the 53 second year students‟ opinions towards the
statement 6 (appendix 2)

Table 6:

Statistics on the 13 second year students‟ opinions towards the
statements 7 and 8 (appendix 1)

Table 7:

Statistics on the 2

nd

year students‟ opinions toward statements 7

and 8 (appendix 2)
Table 8:

Statistics on the 53 second year students‟ opinions towards the
statement 9 (appendix 2)

Table 9:

Statistics on the 2

nd

and 11 (appendix 2)

year students‟ opinions toward statements 10


1

PART A: INTRODUCTION
1.

Rationale
In the article “Today‟s students‟ gaps in English for specific purposes” on the

Labor newspaper, the director of Petech Corporation said that a number of today‟s young
employees were not good at English for specific purposes and they were unable to get
promoted in their jobs. He mentioned inappropriate trainings in ESP as the main reason for
the fact that lots of them were unable to read English specialized documents, or to translate
their transaction documents from Vietnamese to English and vice versa, causing
backwardness in their jobs. In another article (Mạnh Trường, 2014), the manager of human
resources of Panasonic System Networks Vietnam Company stated that knowledge of ESP
was a great barrier of many Vietnamese graduated students in career promotion, especially
at enterprises with foreign direct investment.
The mentioned above facts raise out a question for educational institutions and

educators that whether or not the ESP training programs they offer are suitable for their
students and manage to skill them up to today‟s increasingly demanding employment
requirements. More importantly, as cited by Dudley-Evans and St John (1998: 13), it is
really necessary for ESP practitioners to follow up with their students after the course in
order to assess whether the students have been able to make use of what they learned and
to find out what they were not prepared for.
Since the establishment of HHT University‟s Faculty of English Language in 2007,
the faculty‟s teaching staff has compiled some ESP coursebooks, including one for
Financial Accounting, as materials for the ESP teaching and learning at the university. The
ESP coursebook for the 2

nd

year students of Financial Accounting was brought into use in

2009 with the aims of providing the students with English vocabulary relevant to their
major and skills marketable for their future employment. However, whether or not the
cousebook is suitable to the course syllabus is still of a great concern by the university‟s
management board and ESP teachers. This study on the ESP coursebook evaluation is
therefore an effort to help them deal with this concern.
2.

Aims of the study
The study aims to assess how suitable is the coursebook “English for Finance” (Cao

Xuân Thiều, 2008) used for the second year students of financial accounting at Hà


2

Hoa Tiên University to the course‟ objectives in terms of aims, contents, and methodology.
It also aims to offer some recommendations for further improvements of the coursebook
seeking for subsequent uses for in-coming courses at the university. After all, it is carried
out in an attempt to help the university‟s management board to deal with its common
concern about how well its university‟s students of financial accounting have been
prepared for their future employment with the ESP and whether or not they can use what
they have learned from the course.
3.

Scope of the study
There are many criteria to be taken into consideration when evaluating the

coursebook, such as audience, physical appearance, needs, and so on. However, the study
only focuses on a summative evaluation on the suitability of the coursebook‟s aims,
contents, and methodology to the course‟s objectives.
4.

Research question
This study is going to deal with the university‟s common concern about if the

university‟s graduated students of financial accounting are able to use what they have
learned with the ESP course and what they have been not prepared for. Thus, the research
question to be answered is: “How suitable is the ESP coursebook for the 2

nd

year students

of Financial Accounting at Hà Hoa Tiên University to the course‟s objectives in terms of
aims, contents, and methodology?”.

5.

Research method
The study follows a survey research approach. The research question was addressed

by using both quantitative and qualitative data. A survey questionnaire was used to collect
the needed data, and aimed at exploring the opinions and attitudes of the on-studying
students and graduate ones. Besides, informal interview questions with the three ESP
teachers were also used for better understanding of the participants, as well as their
learning condition.
6.

Significance of the study
The results of this study will benefit the students, the ESP teachers, then the

university administrators. This study is significant because it will provide valuable facts
about the students and teachers‟ needs, attitude and opinions over the in-use ESP material.
The ESP teachers will better understand the difficulties and strength in using the material


3

thereby reconstructing their lessons, in terms of aims, contents, and methodology, to obtain
the course‟s objectives and to well prepare the students for their future jobs.
This study will serve as the basis for future plans of action by the university
administrators with regards to the necessary actions for any investments in ESP teaching
materials. Furthermore, it will join a common effort in providing stimuli for further studies
of the same nature.
7.

Design of the study
The study encompasses three parts as following:
-

Part A, Introduction, provides information on the rationale, aims, scope,
research question, methods, significance and design of the study.

-

Part B, Development, is comprised of three major chapters

i)

Chapter 1, Literature Review, provides theories related to ESP coursebook
evaluation and material adaptation.

ii) Chapter 2, Research Methodology, represents the context of the study, the

participants, data collection instruments, data collection procedure, and data
analysis procedure.
iii) Chapter 3, Data Analysis and Discussions, presents the subjective analysis on

the course‟s objectives, collected data analysis on the coursebook evaluation,
and discusses the findings that arise from the data, then it presents some
recommendations for material improvement.
-

Part C, Conclusion, presents major findings, limitation of the study, and
suggestion for further studies.

4

PART B: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW
This chapter is to provide a literature review which serves as theoretical framework
for the study. It is to provide basic understandings about ESP course evaluation; concepts
of materials, coursebook, and textbook; and materials adaptation.
1.1 ESP course evaluation
According to Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 152), the ESP course, like any course,
should be regularly demonstrated that its continued existence in its present form is
justified. Since the ESP course exists to satisfy a particular educational need, evaluation
helps to show how well the course is actually fulfilling the need. There are four main
aspects of ESP course evaluation (Alderson and Waters, 1983) and one more added by
Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 96) to be considered as below.
1.1.1

What is meant by evaluation?

The term “evaluation” is introduced by Dudley-Evans and St John to refer to “the
process of establishing the effectiveness” (1998: 121). They put that “fundamentally
evaluation is asking questions and acting on the responses” (1998: 128). More specific
than these linguists‟ definition, Hutchinson and Waters‟ one is concerned with “matching
needs to available solution” (1987: 97). Evaluation, in this sense, is basically a matching
process which should be done as objectively as possible. In Brown‟s words (1989: 231),
coursebook evaluation is to systematically collect and analyze all relevant information for
the purpose of later improving a curriculum. It also concerns with a necessary assessment
regarding to the curriculum‟s effectiveness and efficiency, as well as the participants‟
attitudes within the context.
From the above definitions, evaluation can be understood as a systematic process of

considering whether the content, the language area, and the methodology of the coursebook
are appropriate and useful to the learners, whether what they want and need is likely
maximized, and whether the goals of the course are matched. Thus, it is indeed important
to take the ESP teachers and learns‟ opinions into account, not only the objectives sated in
the coursebook.


5

1.1.2

Why should the evaluation be carried out?

There are a number of reasons for conducting coursebook evaluation. Sheldon
(1988: 237-246) has suggested several reasons for it. The author states that the selection of
a textbook is indicator of an educational decision in which there is considerable
professional, financial, and even political investment. Sheldon further argues that through
evaluation, teachers will become familiar with the content of available coursebooks and
recognize the weakness and strengths of them. Ellis (1997: 36-42) cited that one reason for
evaluating teaching materials is to make a choice of the most suitable material among the
available ones before for the courses takes place. The author also mentioned another reason
that evaluation is carried out to decide whether to continue using the material or to replace
it with a better one after it has been used for a period of time.
It can not be denied that the coursebook evaluation is an exceedingly complex
activity. It is really important to the class-room teachers, supervisors and administrators in
directing as well as guiding teaching and learning. Evaluation also helps to measure the
validity and reliability of teaching techniques, aids in devising more effective instructional
materials, and helps teacher to discover the needs of students. It stimulates students to
study and is helpful to teachers indeed.
1.1.3

When should the evaluation be occurred?

The evaluation can be taken place before an ESP course begins, or while the course
is ongoing, or at the end of the course. According to Robinson (1991: 59), before an ESP
course begins, the evaluation is namely preliminary evaluation. Having much in common
with Robinson‟s viewpoint, McGrath (2002: 14-15) defines the evaluation at the beginning
of ESP course as pre-use evaluation. According to him, pre-use evaluation is to examine
the future or potential performance of a textbook.
McGrath names the evaluation during the ongoing course as in-use evaluation
which is designed to examine the currently used textbook (2002: 15). The evaluation at this
stage is termed formative evaluation by Robinson (1991: 58). The term is also reintroduced
by Dudley-Evans and St John (1998: 128), and they further argue that it consists of a series
of mini-evaluations and helps to make necessary modifications to the course including
materials and books.
Sharing Robinson‟s viewpoint, they differentiate the formative evaluation from
summative evaluation which takes place at the end of the course or when the course is


6

finished in a sense that the summative one is used to measure the usefulness of the course
and make improvement in subsequent versions of the course or materials. Terming the
evaluation post-use evaluation, Ellis (1997: 36-42) also puts that the evaluation of this type
helps to decide how to improve the given textbook for subsequent use. Generally speaking,
in their argument, the evaluation is said to be valuable for durable course.
1.1.4

How can the evaluation be carried out?

Ellis (1997: 41) advocates that evaluation should be taken place on empirical basis.
It can be of benefit to teachers if they involve themselves in formalizing the procedures
used to carry out micro-evaluation as they must go beyond impressionistic assessments.
Recently, Chambers (1997: 32-33) also looks at the evaluation on an empirical basis. He
cites that it deserves mention as it attempts to be time-conscious and concise in its lay-out.
However, Sheldon (1988: 241-245) provides the evaluator with more concise
“common-core factors” for choosing and evaluating texts. The coverage includes very
practically-based criteria such as “guidance” (how teachers and students should use the
material) and “flexibility” (does the material require the teacher to do too much
preparation?). Such inclusion of even visual and financial criteria would be of direct
relevance to many evaluators. Rational use of checklist as a way to evaluate ESP courses is
also advocated by Hutchinson and Water (1987: 99-104). Their checklist is not exhaustive
in comparison with Sheldon‟s one, allowing evaluators to find other criteria which they
feel are important. They also introduce four steps of materials evaluation, including
defining criteria, subjective analysis, objective analysis, and matching (1987: 97). As
suggested by them, evaluation criteria should be set out in a form which will make it easy
to compare different sets of materials, and the subjective analysis is seen as a fixed set of
requirements.
In theory, there are many ways in which the ESP course can be evaluated, ranging
from stimulations to suggestion boxes (Hutchinson and Waters, 1987: 153). However,
according to Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 153-154) in practice, most ESP courses are
evaluated using one or more of such techniques as test results, questionnaires, discussions,
interviews, informal means (unsolicited comment, causal charts, etc.). Which techniques to
be used will depend on what suits teaching situation best.


7

1.1.5

Who should be involved in the evaluation

Chambers (1997: 34) advises that selection and evaluation of materials should be
conducted by a “wide range of users” in order to encourage “ownership” of any decision
made. The extent of involvement of any group will vary, but in practice, it is likely that the
bodies most closely concerned will be the ESP teaching institution, the ESP teachers, the
learners, and the course sponsors (Hutchinson and Waters, 1987: 154). Hutchinson and
Waters put that evaluation will be concerned with people‟s perceptions of value and their
views will vary according to their own interests and concerns. They all agree that who to be
asked and how to ask will affect what to be found out.
1.2 Materials, coursebook and textbook
Tomlinson (1998: xi) defines teaching materials as “anything which is used to help
teaching language earners”. The author adds that materials can be “in the form of a
textbook, a workbook, a cassette, a CD-Room, a video, a photocopied handout, a
newspaper, a paragraph written on a whiteboard”. Both Tomlinson (1998: ix) and
McGrath (2002: 7) consider a coursebook as a textbook which provides the core materials
for a course. The core materials which are used in teaching are usually paper-based, then
coursebook is somehow the core material serving as „source of language‟ and learning
support, and used for motivation and reference (Dudley-Evans and St John, 1998: 170171).
1.3 Materials Adaptation
1.3.1

Definition and principles of materials adaptation

Adaptations are stated as teaching and assessment strategies especially designed to
accommodate a student‟s needs so he or she can achieve the learning outcomes of the
subject or course and to demonstrate mastery of concepts (British Columbia Ministry of
Education, 2009: 2). Concerning with determining how to best use an assigned textbook
rather than how to best select an appropriate textbook, McGrath (2002: 59) describes the
process of adaptation as the „extension or exploitation of the existing material‟ for use in a

specific teaching context that has its own unique demands. McGrath focuses much more on
an exploration of current understanding of the benefits and drawback of textbooks and how
to evaluate them with the ultimate goal of adaptation of the textbook for use in a foreign
teaching environment.
Grant (1987) has listed the following principles for materials adaptation:


8

i)

Making dialogues communicative

ii)

Making learning activities relevant and purposeful

iii)

Meeting your learners‟ needs, both external and psychological

iv)

Using models of real, authentic language

In an investigation, Chunmei Yan (2007) states that teachers base their adaptation
on four principles, namely to integrate traditional and communicative methods, to cater for
students‟ needs, to integrate as multiple language skills as possible, and to meet their own
preferences and needs. She advocates Grant‟s viewpoint in a sense that materials
adaptation should focus on meeting students‟ needs and preferences.

Adaptation involves supplementation, that is, teachers add materials from other
resources to the textbook they are using. It is believed that authentic materials are better
than non-authentic materials for supplementation. So teachers who make a point of
collecting authentic materials find it much easier to adapt textbooks. This is especially true
in ELT contexts where authentic English materials are not always readily to hand.
1.3.2

Materials adaptation techniques

McDonough and Shaw (1993: 79-89) mention five techniques, including: adding,
deleting, modifying, simplifying, and reordering.
-

By the word “adding”, the author implies that materials are supplemented by
putting more into them, while considering the practical effect of time allocation.

-

Deleting is the opposite process to that of addition. This technique includes such
activities as subtraction (i.e. the quantitative reduction of the content without any
methodological changes in the content) and abridgement (i.e. influencing both the
methodology and the content).

-

Modifying includes such steps as rewriting and restructuring. Rewriting is utilized
when the content of the materials needs modification; whereas, restructuring
applies to classroom management.

-

Simplifying can be utilized for the purpose of adapting language materials. As
McDonough and Shaw put it, simplification can be used for such parts of course
materials as sentence structure, lexical content, grammatical structure, and so on.

-

Reordering refers to the possibility of putting the parts of a textbook in a different
order. This many mean the adjustment of presentation sequence within a unit or
taking unit in a different sequence from that originally intended.


9

Maley (1998) also introduces a number of options for a teacher who wants to adapt
materials, including omission, addition, reduction, extension, rewriting and modification,
replacement, reordering, and branching. In practice, language teachers will not use all the
techniques for a particular unit of a lesson. Instead, techniques can be used individually or
in combination with others depending on the teacher‟s decision underlying the adaptation
towards particular part of a given teaching material.
1.4 Previous studies
It is said that there have been a variety of studies on cousebook evaluation,
particularly ESP coursebook evaluation. Nemati‟s study published on a journal of language
(2009: 91-99) has been introduced as one specialized in a systematic vocabulary
evaluation. Another study can also be mentioned here, that is a study on a textbook
evaluation for the students of speech therapy by Jamshidi (2013). This study aimed to
evaluate an ESP textbook in terms of McDonough and Shaw (2003) based on external and
internal evaluation. This evaluation revealed that the ESP textbook would be appropriate
with some modifications and also with some additional materials to meet the needs of the
students of computer sciences. Differently from Jamshidi, Baleghizadeh and Rahimi (2013)

attempt to describe a process that was undertaken to evaluate the textbook English for the
Students of Sociology: Social Science Texts taught at the University of Tehran. The purpose
of their research project was to determine the overall pedagogical value and suitability of
the book toward this specific language program.
In Vietnam, there seem to be not many M.A minor theses relevant to evaluation of
ESP coursebook of financial accounting. From the database of VNU-ULIS, the electronic
records of M.A minor theses in 2010 show some typical evaluations of ESP coursebooks
for geography engineering (Nguyêñ Thi Kiềụ Giang , 2010), tour guide (Ngô Thi Myỵ̃Binh ̀ ,
2010), and so on , and in 2013 evaluations of ESP coursebooks for marine engine (Lương
Thị Minh Thu, 2013), pharmaceutical course (Nguyêñ Thi Thạạ̉o, 2013), and economics and
business management (Nguyêñ Thi Maị Hương , 2013). The common things among these
researchers lie in their use of Hutchinson and Water‟s four major steps of evaluation, and
their evaluations are summative.
There have not been many researchers interested in evaluating ESP coursebook for
financial accounting so far . In HàHoa Tiên University alone , there have not been any
evaluation conducted in terms of coursebook in general and ESP coursebook in particular.


10

Therefore, my study on evaluating ESP coursebook for the second year students of
Financial Accounting at this university is really in need and plays a significant role.
1.5 Chapter summary
Though coursebook evaluation and materials adaptation are understood and
presented in different ways by different theorists or linguists, works relevant to coursebook
evaluation and materials adaptation introduced so far by them have been found as
theoretical framework for any researches in this area. Under a summative evaluation
approach, the current study was underway basing on Hutchinson and Water‟s four major
steps of evaluation. For the purpose of the current study, rational use of checklist would be
of good choice, one presented by Hutchinson and Water would be adapted.

11

CHAPTER 2: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
This section seeks to represent methodology of the study, including the context of
the study, the data collection instrument, and procedures of data collection and data
analysis.
2.1 Context of the study
2.1.1

The ESP course

The study has been taken place in Hà Hoa Tiên (HHT) university, a private
university established seven years ago in Hà Nam province. The total university population
is accounted for 421, with 219 students majoring at financial accounting. It has been
offering the students of financial accounting a two stage course of ESP as below:
-

Stage 1 (semester 3) consists of 45 credit hours of ESP1

-

Stage 2 (semester 4) consists of 45 credit hours of ESP2

Accordingly, the ESP is taught to FOFA‟s students in the third and the fourth
semesters following 120 credit hours of English for general purposes (EGP) in the first and
the second semesters, 60 credit hours of EGP for each. The course is compulsory to the
students. It is to train students with skills in English reading comprehension and
translation, enhance their English grammar knowledge, and provide them with English

technical vocabulary relevant to economics, finance, banking, accounting, marketing,
business administration and so on. Finishing the course, the students are expected to be
able to read English written documents on financial accounting, translate financial and
accounting documents from English to Vietnamese and vice versa, and make transaction
documents in English. They are hoped to be skillful up to requirements of their future jobs.
2.1.2

The ESP coursebook

The coursebook has been kept the same since it was first employed in the university
in 2009. Its title is „English for Finance‟ comprising of 42 units which are categorized into
six major topics including economics, money and banking, finance, accounting and
auditing, financial analysis, and international business. Of the 42 units, only twenty units
were selected for the ESP course of FOFA‟s the second year students. Ten units for the first
stage of the course cover the topics of economics, money and baking, including:
Unit 1: Economics
Unit 2: Economic system


12

Unit 3: Microeconomics
Unit 4: Macroeconomics
Unit 5: Demand and supply
Unit 6: Raising money for investment
Unit 7: Money and its functions
Unit 8: Money and banking
Unit 9: Banks and interest rate
Unit 10: Banking business
Other ten units for the second stage cover the topics of accounting and auditing,

financial analysis, and international business, including
Unit 1: What is accounting?
Unit 2: The balance sheet
Unit 3: Auditing
Unit 4: The roles of auditors
Unit 5: Distinction between accounting and auditing
Unit 6: Financial analysis
Unit 7: Financial evaluation
Unit 8: International business
Unit 9: Trade and surplus deficits
Unit 10: What is the balance of payment?
Each unit has three main sections, including reading comprehension, language
focus, and word study.
Types of tasks and exercises in the coursebook are pointed out as following:
-

Reading comprehension: answering given questions, multiple choices, true or
false.

-

Language focus: gap filling, sentence completion, sentence transformation,
matching, mistake identification.

-

Word study: sentence completion, matching, gap filling, word formation,
multiple choices.

2.1.3

Other ESP materials resources

Since its establishment in 2009, the faculty‟s teaching of EGP and ESP has been
underway by both permanent and non-permanent teaching staffs. The permanent teaching


13

staffs cover an estimated 70% of the teaching jobs, and there are about three ESP teachers
who are the university‟s permanent staffs and in charge of teaching the second year
students of Financial Accounting with ESP courses. There has not been a fully equipped
lab for teaching English in the university so far. Two CD players and the coursebook serve
as the main materials of teaching and learning ESP at the university. As the coursebook
consists of no listening tasks, the two CD players play no role in this case.
2.1.4

Participants

The participants in the study involve 53 second year students of financial
accounting who have just finished their ESP course. Their age is ranged from 22 to 23 and
they are both male and female. Most of these students have been learning English for no
less than five years. None of them starts learning English after being admitted to the
university.
The second group of participants encompasses 13 graduate students who have
experienced the ESP course at the university and are working as accounting staffs at
different companies. They are selected at random to participate into the research via email
contact.
The third group involves three ESP teachers of the university. They are from 32 to
35 years old and are female. All of them have taught second-year students with the

material. They have experienced in teaching English for Financial Accounting at least for a
year. It is noticeable that they are all non-majoring at Financial Accounting. Two of them
have master degree and one is attending a master course.
2.2 Data collection
2.2.1

Data collection instruments

The research made use of the instruments of questionnaire and informal interviews
to collect data.
2.2.1.1

Questionnaire

The survey questionnaires were designed to evaluate the ESP coursebook from
perceptions of the targeted 53 the second-year students who have just finished the ESP
course and 13 graduate students who have ever experienced the ESP course at Hà Hoa Tiên
University. The survey questionnaires consisted two parts. The first was to get the
participants‟ personal information. The second one contained questions designed in the
form of Likert scale type making use of five scales ranging from strongly agree to strongly


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disagree. The survey questionnaires seeked to find out the participants‟ opinions toward
the coursebook. The results from the survey questionnaires were used to assess the fitness
of the coursebook to the course‟ objectives in terms of aims, contents, and methodology.
2.2.1.2

Informal interviews

These were unstructured interviews which were intentionally free talks with the
three ESP teachers seeking for their opinions on the coursebook in terms of aims, contents,
and methodology. They were conducted based on the teachers‟ agreement about where and
when the interviews were convenient for them. Their opinions were recorded on an
interview report.
2.2.2

Data collection procedures
2.2.2.1

-

For the questionnaire

Step 1: Designing questionnaires for the students in the form of Liker five
rating scale type.

-

Step 2: Delivering questionnaires to the 2

nd

year students after their lessons and

the students were requested to complete the questionnaire during the class time;
those to the graduate group were sent via email, they were kindly asked to reply
within three days.
-

Step 3: Handling the process of questionnaires‟ fulfillment by the 53 second
year students who were gathered in one room, answering their questions, is any,
to make sure that the students clearly understood the survey questions, and
collecting the papers, 53 ones in total; keeping in touch with the selected 13
participants of graduated group to ensure that the questionnaires would be sent
back on due date, and to explain the questions if anyone were in need to make
them clear, 13 questionnaires were collected at the end.
2.2.2.2

For the informal interviews

The interviews were conducted with the three ESP teachers during their relaxing
time at their offices. Open-ended questions were used to elicit the needed data.
2.2.3

Data analysis procedures

The process was divided into three stages, objective analysis, subjective analysis,
and the matching.
The first stage aimed to subjectively realize the course‟s objectives by looking
carefully at the course syllabus itself.


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The second stage was to objectively evaluate the coursebook from the targeted 2ndyear students, graduate students, and the ESP teachers‟ perceptions. It focused on
exploring their opinions and attitudes toward the coursebook in terms of aims, contents,
and methodology. The stage made use of different tables to represent its results.
The last stage was to match the results of the stages of objective analysis and

subjective analysis basing on one-by-one comparison for the purpose of evaluating the
suitability of the coursebook with the course‟s objectives. This stage made use of
Hutchinson and Waters‟ way of awarding points (1989: 104) as below:
0 = does not match the desired feature
1 = partially match the desired feature
2 = closely match the desired feature
2.3 Chapter summary
In brief, the course of ESP for HHT‟s students of financial accounting is divided
into two stages with 90 credit hours in total. The study involved 69 people, including the
second-year and graduate students of financial accounting, and the ESP teachers. For the
given purposes of evaluating the suitability of the coursebook to the course syllabus, the
researcher made use of two important instruments of questionnaire and informal interview
to collect the needed data. Descriptive strategy and some analysis tools of tables were used
to present the results.