PART I: INTRODUCTION
1. RATIONALE
The status of English has turned a significant percentage of the world’s population.
In addition to General English, English for Specific Purposes (ESP) has been gaining an
increasing importance and it has grown to become one of the most prominent areas of the
Teaching of English as Foreign or Second Language (TEFL/TESL). Ewer (1976: 247)
believes that “the teaching of English for scientific, technological and technical purposes is
of comparatively recent growth as specialized activity, but it is now emerging as one of the
most rapidly expanding and important branches of TEFL/TESL today”.
To meet the demand of the learners, many ESP programmes have been designed.
Together with the worldwide trend to learn ESP, the teaching staff of Foreign Languages
Department at Vinh University collected documents and designed some ESP programmes
for some specific fields, including the ESP programme for Construction which was first
taught for K.46 Construction Engineering students at Vinh University.
Besides an effort to offer the learners with the ESP programme according to their
specific needs, it is necessary to implement an evaluation. Furthermore, the fact is that the
ESP programme for Construction designed by the teaching staff of Foreign Languages at
Vinh University was first taught for K.46 Construction Engineering students at Vinh
University and it received some learners’ evaluative comments while it was in the progress.
Therefore, it is necessary to have an evaluation on the ESP programme for Construction at
Vinh University carried out by the learners themselves as Wallace (1991: 163)‘s thought
“One source of evaluation will obviously be the trainees themselves”.
2. AIMS AND SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
The study is aimed at researching Construction Engineering students’ evaluation on
the ESP programme at Vinh University in terms of audience, aims, time allocation,
contents and methodology in order to determine whether the ESP programme for
Construction is suitable to the learners’ abilities and needs.
Significantly, the process of this ESP programme evaluation can be seen as a way
of developing our understanding of the ways in which it works and, in doing so, of
contributing to both acquisition theory and pedagogic practices. Hence, the teachers would
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6. DESIGN OF THE STUDY
The minor thesis is composed of three main parts: introduction, development and
conclusion.
The introduction presents the rationale, aims and significance, research questions,
method of the study, scope of the study, as well as design of the study.
The development consists of three chapters:
- Chapter I, “Literature Review”, provides the relevant theories: an overview of
ESP (definition of ESP, classification of ESP and the development of ESP), evaluation
(terminology definition, types of programme evaluation, purposes for evaluation, criteria
for evaluation and central questions in programme evaluation design) and learner-
centeredness in ESP.
- Chapter II, “An overview of English for Construction at Vinh University”,
presents background information about English for Construction at Vinh University,
including in the teaching and learning situation, a description of current ESP programme
for Construction and the learners at Vinh University.
- Chapter III, “The study”, describes the methodology employed to collect data for
this thesis at first (participants, data collection instrument and procedure). Then it reports
on the learners’ evaluation of the ESP programme for Construction at Vinh University and
their needs, and shows the major findings. Finally, it provides some suggestions to improve
the ESP programme for Construction at Vinh University.
The conclusion presents what have been found out from the study and the
limitations and suggestions for further study.
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PART II: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW
This chapter aims to provide a theoretical base to develop an operational framework
for programme evaluation. The first part presents an overview of ESP with regards to
definition, the classification and the development of the ESP. The second part discusses
about evaluation, concerning in terminology definition, types of programme evaluation,
purposes for evaluation, criteria for evaluation and central questions in programme

specifically linked to a particular profession or discipline, makes use of a methodology that
differs from that used in General Purpose English teaching. They also believe that language
should be included as a defining feature of ESP.
In summary, all the above definitions show that ESP belongs to English Language
Teaching (ELT). The ESP courses are performed successfully in occupational roles by an
individual or a group whose need is considered to be a distinguished feature from General
English.
1.1.2. Classification of ESP
ESP has traditionally been divided into two main areas: English for Academic
Purposes (EAP) and English for Occupational Purposes (EOP).
According to Robinson (1991), the classification of ESP is generally presented in a
tree diagram as follows:
Pre-experience
EOP Simultaneous / In-service
Post-experience
ESP Pre-study
For study in a In study
specific discipline Post-study
EEP/EAP Independent
As a school subject
Integrated
Figure 1: ESP classification by experience (Robinson, 1991: 3-4)
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The diagram shows a useful division of courses. Those distinctions are very
important and they will affect the degree of specificity that is appropriate to the course.
Dudley-Evans and St John (1998) also present the classification of ESP through a
tree diagram but it divides EAP and EOP according to discipline or professional area as in
the figure 2.
English for Specific Purposes


features of these registers. A good example of a syllabus is “A Course in Basic Scientific
English” by Ewer and Latorre (1969) and their aim is to produce a syllabus which gives
high priority to the language forms students meet in their Science studies and low priority
to forms students do not meet.
Whereas in the first stage of its development, ESP focuses on language at the
sentence level, the second stage of development shifts attention to the level above the
sentence with the emerging field of discourse or rhetorical analysis. Attention shifts to
understanding how sentences are combined in discourse to produce meaning. Therefore,
the concern of research is to identify the organizational patterns in texts and to specify the
linguistic means by which these patterns are signaled. These patterns will then form the
syllabus of the ESP course.
The third stage is characterized by the target situation analysis. The most thorough
explanation of the target situation analysis is the system set out by John Munby in
“Communicative Syllabus Design” (1978). The Munby model produces a detailed profile
of the learners’ needs in term of communication purposes, communicative setting, the
means of communication, language skills, functions, structures, etc. And the target
situation analysis stage marks a certain ‘coming of age’ for ESP. What it aims to do is to
take the existing knowledge and set it on a more scientific basis, by establishing procedures
for relating language analysis more closely to learners’ reasons for learning. This stage also
marks a significant change is that the purpose of an ESP course is to enable learners to
function adequately in a target situation in which the learners will use the language they are
learning.
Unlike the above three stages of the development of ESP, mainly looking the
analysis of the learners’ need at the surface linguistic features of the target situation, the
fourth stage of ESP attempts to look below the surface and to consider not the language
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itself but the thinking processes that underlie language use. This stage is characterized by
skills and strategies. Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 13) point out a great influence of
researchers’ works (Françoise Grellet (1981)’s, Christine Nuttall (1982)’s and Charles
Alderson and Sandy Urquhart (1984)’s) on developing strategies for reading skills for the

which begins with determining what information to gather and ends with bringing about
change in current activities or influencing future ones”. They believe that evaluation must
be more than collecting and analyzing data. They describe evaluation as formative or
summative. Evaluation which takes place during the lifetime of an activity /a course and
the findings help to shape the course during its life-time is called formative evaluation.
Summative evaluation takes place at (or after) the end of an activity and so does not
influence that version of the activity. Its purpose is to assess impact and to provide
information that can be fed into repeat versions or related activities. Therefore, summative
evaluation is valuable for durable courses.
Hedge (2000: 351) refers to the term “evaluation” as “the assessment of students at
the end of a course, but in recent years its meaning has widened to include all aspects of a
programme”. Evaluation can relate to courses and learners in a number of ways: (1) It can
try to judge the course as it is planned; (2) It can try to observe, describe, and assess what
actually happening in classroom as a course progresses; (3) It can test what learners have
learned from a course.
In summary, evaluation relates to courses and learners. It has been widened to
include the aspects of a programme and it should be carried out at the end of the courses.
The aspect of the programme which is chosen to evaluate depends on the purpose of the
evaluation.
1.2.2. Types of programme evaluation
According to Stufflebeam (1971), there are four types of programme evaluation
which are identified as: context evaluation, input evaluation, process evaluation and
product evaluation
The table below is the CIPP model for programme evaluation by Stufflebeam
(1971).
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Table 1: The CIPP model for programme evaluation
Context evaluation Input evaluation Process evaluation Product evaluation
Objective
To define the institutional context, to

the Delphi
b
technique.
By inventorying and analyzing
available human and material
resources, solution strategies
and procedural designs for
By monitoring the activity’s
potential procedural barriers and
remaining alert to unanticipated
ones, by obtaining specific
By defining operationally and
measuring outcome criteria,
by collecting judgements of
outcomes from stakeholders,
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relevance, feasibility, and
economy. And by using such
methods as literature search,
visits to exemplary
programme, advocate teams,
and pilot trials.
information for programmed
decisions, by describing the
actual process and by continually
interacting with and observing
the activities of project staff.
and by performing both
qualitative and quantitative
analyses.

(Source: Stufflebeam, 1971; cited in Nunan, 1992: 194-195 )
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Tomlinson (1998) divides programme evaluation into macro- and micro-evaluation
as follows: task evaluation of evaluation
of evaluation, sequencing levels of
etc. practice, ect. participation
etc.

Figure 3: Macro- and micro-evaluation in language teaching (Tomlinson, 1998: 219)
It is necessary for the evaluator to study the types of programme evaluation because
it can help him or her decide what type of evaluation he or she would like to conduct in
specific situations and for purposes of evaluation.
1.2.3. Purposes for evaluation
Evaluation plays a very important role in the improvement of a language
programme. There is no language programme which can be completely useful to all
teaching situations.
Evaluation is a matter of judging the fitness of something for a particular purpose,
and then it is concerned with relative merit. Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 96) emphasizes
that “There is no absolute good or bad – only degrees of fitness for the required purpose”.
In any kind of evaluation, the decision finally made is likely to be the better for being based
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Program /
project
evaluation

whether there has been value for money; Evaluation for purposes of curriculum
development will involve information from teachers and other relevant ELT
professionals; Evaluation for purposes of teacher self-development involves in
describing and better understanding the teachers’ own contexts with a view to
improving the teaching.
- For specific, topic-related purposes of evaluation, Rea-Dickins and Germaine
(1992) consider evaluation as the means by which we can gain a better
understanding of what is effective, what is less effective, and what appears to be of
no use at all.
Hedge (2000: 352) refers to the purposes of evaluation are for accountability and
for development. The purpose which evaluates for accountability is to make staff and / or
institutions answerable to authorities and / or sponsors and evaluation for development
aims at improving to the current programme as well as to future programme.
In summary, it is necessary to evaluate aspects of a language programme in order to
understand how the programme works and how successfully it works. The results of
evaluation enable the different kinds of decision to be made about the programme, such as:
to decide whether to continue the programme or not or to improve the programme to make
it more useful.
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1.2.4. Criteria for evaluation
1.2.4.1. Criteria defined by Hutchinson and Waters (1987)
Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 99-104) suggest five evaluation criteria for objective
and subjective analysis which are summarized as follows:
- Audience: the learners and the materials intended for.
- Aims: the aims of the course and the aims of the materials.
- Content: language description, language points, proportion of work on each
macro- skill, micro-skills, text-types, subject-matter area(s) (level of knowledge,
types of topics, treatment), organization of content within the course units, sequence
of content throughout the course, sequence of content within a unit.
- Methodology: theory/ies of learning, aspects of the learners’ attitudes to /

summarizing sets of more specific criteria and the specific criteria can only be determined
on the basis of individual circumstances. He sets out a possible basic set of such criteria
which consists of: Practical considerations (all components available; affordable; multi-
level); Support for teaching and learning (additional components (teacher’s book, tests,
cassettes), suitable or self-study); Context-relevance (suitable for course (length of course,
aims of course, syllabus, exam), suitable for learners (age, level, cultural background),
suitable for teacher, required resources available, evidence of suitability); Likely appeal to
learners (layout, visuals, topics, suitable over medium term).
In short, studying criteria is very important when an evaluation is carried out. One
essential issue is that a wide variety of relevant and appropriate criteria for the evaluation
of the ESP programme should be established and applied to evaluate the suitability of the
programme to the learners’ needs and abilities.
1.2.5. Central questions in programme evaluation design
Nunan (1992: 196) makes a list of questions which needs to deal with some
practical issues in programme evaluation as follows:
• What is the purpose of the evaluation?
• Who is the audience for the evaluation?
• What principles of procedure should guide the evaluation?
• What tools, techniques, and instruments are appropriate?
• Who should carry out the evaluation?
• When should it be carried out?
• What is the time frame and budget for the evaluation?
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• How should the evaluation be reported?
It is useful to studying Nunan ‘s (1992) central questions in programme evaluation
design before evaluating so that all factors that need evaluating will be covered.
1.3. LEARNER-CENTEREDNESS IN ESP
1.3.1. Learner-centered approach
Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 19) state ESP as “an approach”, not as “a product” to
stress the commonality of the language and learning in which the learners are centered. The

Brumfit (1984: 7) states that an ESP course is a direct factor concerning with
purposes of the learners: “First, it is clear that an ESP course is directly concerned with the
purpose for which learners need English, purposes for which are usually expressed in
functional terms. ESP fits firmly within the general movement towards ‘communicative’
teaching of the last decade or so”. Any learner learns for his or her own purposes. He or she
wants to learn what he or she needs. That appears more clearly in ESP learning. The ESP
learners aim to learn about their specific fields.
Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 16) distinguish ESP courses by the general nature of
the learners’ specialism and they divide ESP into three large categories basing on the
learners’ specialism: EST (English for Science and Technology), EBE (English for
Business and Economics) and ESS (English for the Social Sciences).
Nunan (1988) develops the learner-centered courses within an adult ESP context
basing on the principles of learner-centeredness. He assumes that “in most learning context,
it is impossible to teach learners everything they need to know in classes. Little class time
therefore must be used effectively to teach those aspects of the language which the learners
consider to be ‘mostly urgently required’” (Nunan, 1988: 3).
Schleppegrell (1994: 233)’ opinion about the learners in an ESP course is to bring
to class a reason for learning English and a real life context for its use; the learners should
have knowledge of the specific vocation the course is addressing and well-developed
learning strategies.
In summary, chapter I has presented an overview of ESP and evaluation. The
purposes for evaluation, criteria for evaluation central questions in programme evaluation
design and the learner-centered in ESP imply that those are issues to carry out a programme
evaluation in which the learners are centered.
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CHAPTER 2: AN OVERVIEW OF ENGLISH FOR CONSTRUCTION
AT VINH UNIVERSITY
Chapter 2 provides background information about English for Construction at Vinh
University, including in the teaching and learning situation, a description of current ESP
programme for Construction and the learners at Vinh University.

The ESP programme for Construction at Vinh University consists of 4 courses and
it is described as follows:
- Time allocation:
+ Course 1: The time allocated for English course 1 is 75 periods and the
time for ESP is the time for reading because the reading texts from units 4-6
in the textbook Headway-Elementary by Liz and John Soars are replaced by
some passages/ conversations relating to Architect and Construction.
+ Course 2: The time allocated for English course 2 is 75 periods and the
time for ESP is the time for reading because the reading texts from units 7-
12 in the textbook Headway-Elementary by Liz and John Soars are replaced
by some texts / dialogues relating to Construction.
+ Course 3: The time allocated for English course 3 is 75 periods. At first,
the time for ESP is the time for reading because the reading texts from units
13-15 in the textbook Headway-Elementary by Liz and John Soars are
replaced by the ESP reading texts. Then the time is only for ESP because six
other ESP reading texts are chosen to teach for the rest of the course.
+ Course 4 (only for ESP): The time allocated for the course 4 is 45
periods. There are 7 units in this course and each unit lasts 6 periods. 3
periods left is used for a mid-term test and revision.
- Contents: The contents of the ESP programme for Construction at Vinh University
is described in the following table:
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Table 2: The description of the contents of the ESP programme for Construction at Vinh University
Course 1 Course 2 Course 3 Course 4
Topics The plans of single-storey
house and two-storey house
Description of a Building,
Properties, The Layout of Frames,
Steel Beams, Types of
Construction and Building

Present Participle and Past
Participle
Compound Nouns, Relative
Clauses, Passives, Infinitives,
Future Tenses
Types of
exercises
matching, conversations,
true(T)/false (F)
answering questions, true(T)/
false(F), gap-filling
true(T)/false(F), answering
questions, verb tenses, translation
answering questions, gap-filling,
verb tenses, translation

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2.3. THE LEARNERS
The K46 Construction Engineering students of Technology Department - Vinh
University are aged from 20 to 27. Most of them are at the ages 22, 23 and 24. They have
been learning English for the time period of 2 to 12 years. Those factors seem to be their
advantages in learning English.
However, those students have some disadvantages in learning English. Two main
disadvantages are described as follows:
- The first disadvantage is about the students’ language background. They come
from different parts of the country. Some of them come from the rural areas; the
others come from cities and towns. The students who come from cities have learned
English a lot at schools before going to university, whereas the others have learned
only little even there some students have never learned English before entering
Vinh University. This mixture has caused certain problems to teaching and learning

English proficiency level. At the time when I did the data collection, they had finished four
English courses with their subject matter relating to Construction. Those students think that
the learning of ESP is very important (83%) and important (17%). Their main purposes of
learning ESP are: to be able to read and translate ESP texts/documents (67.1%); to widen
ESP vocabulary (20.7%); to learn grammar (6.7%) and for the others (5.5).
3.1.2. Data collection instrument
Questionnaire is used as an instrument to collect data for this study. I discussed with
two groups of students chosen randomly to get some information about their evaluative
comments and their needs before designing the questionnaire.
The questionnaire is designed without requiring informing the students’ names. The
questions in the questionnaire are presented in English and then Vietnamese in the
brackets. The responses for questions are mainly designed by the “multiple-choice” form.
The questionnaire (see Appendix 1) consists of three sections:
- Section 1 was designed to get the information about the learners: gender, age, the
time of learning English, the thought of the importance of learning ESP, and the main
purpose of learning ESP.
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- Section 2 was designed to collect the information on the learners’ evaluation of
the ESP for Construction at Vinh university; relating to the time allocated for the learning
ESP in the courses, the contents and general evaluation.
- Section 3 was designed to gather the information about the learners’ needs.
3.1.3. Procedure
164 questionnaires were administered to K46 Construction Engineering students
while they were in their classrooms. The teacher guided to the students how to write the
answers. The teacher also helped them remember the programme when they asked. They
spent about one hour on remembering, thinking and answering the questions. After they
finished, the teacher collected their questionnaires to gather and analyze the data.
3.2. DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION
3.2.1. Learners’ evaluation of the ESP programme for Construction at Vinh
University

0.6% the learners think that the topics of the ESP reading texts in the course 2 are useless).
Most of the learners think that the topics of the ESP reading texts are useful (95.1% the
learners think that the topics of the ESP reading texts in the course 1 are useful; 90.8% the
learners think that the topics of the ESP reading texts in the course 2 are useful; 94.5% the
learners think that the topics of the ESP reading texts in the course 3 are useful; 70.7% the
learners think that the topics of the ESP reading texts in the course 4 are useful and 13.4%
the learners think that the topics of the ESP reading texts in the course 4 are very useful. In
general, those figures show that the learners satisfy with the topics of the ESP reading texts
in the courses.
Considering the length of the ESP reading texts, the figures are revealed in chart 3:
Chart 3: Learners’ evaluation on the length of the ESP reading texts in the courses
The figures in chart 3 indicate that no one thinks that the ESP reading texts of the
course 1 are long as well as no one thinks that the ESP reading texts of the courses 2, 3, and
4 are short. While the length of the ESP reading texts in the courses 1 is evaluated to be
OK, the length of the ESP reading texts in the courses 2, 3 and 4 is evaluated to be long.
One noticed thing that over half of the learners (65.2%) find the length of the ESP reading
texts in the course 1 suitable while over half of the learners (67.7%) complain about the
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