VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES
*********
NGUYỄN THỊ THÚY HẰNG TEACHING ESP VOCABULARY TO STUDENTS
MAJORING IN HEAT AND REFRIGERATION
ENGINEERING AT INDUSTRY UNIVERSITY OF HO
CHI MINH CITY: DIFFICULTIES AND SOLUTIONS

(NHỮNG KHÓ KHĂN VÀ GIẢI PHÁP TRONG VIỆC DẠY TỪ VỰNG
CHO SINH VIÊN CHUYÊN NGÀNH NHIỆT LẠNH TẠI TRƯỜNG
ĐẠI HỌC CÔNG NGHIỆP THÀNH PHỐ HỒ CHÍ MINH)

M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Language Teaching Methodology
Code: 60 14 10 Hanoi – 2013 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

IUH: Industry University of Ho Chi Minh City
L2: Second language
GE: General English
T: Teacher
T1: Teacher 1
T2: Teacher 2
T3: Teacher 3 v

LIST OF CHARTS & TABLES
Chart 1: Teachers’ opinion about teaching ESP vocabulary
Chart 2: Teachers’ evaluation about students’ learning ESP vocabulary
Table 1: Teachers’ comment on the course-book

List of abbreviations……………………………………………………………
List of figures and tables………………………………………………………
Table of content…………………………………………………………………
PART A: INTRODUCTION…………………………………………………
1. Rationale………………………………………………………………………
2. Aims of the study…………………………………………………
3. Research questions……………………………………………………………
4. Scope of the study…………………………………………………………….
5. Method of the study…………………………………………………………
6. Design of the study…………………………………………………………
Part B: Development …………………………………………………
Chapter 1: The Theoretical Background……………………………………
1.1. English for Specific Purposes………………………………………………
1.1.1. Definition of ESP………………………………………………………….
1.1.2. Classification of ESP……………………………………………………
1.1.3. Teachers‟ roles and challenges in teaching ESP ………………………
1.1.3.1. The roles of ESP teachers………………………………………………
1.1.3.2. Challenges for the ESP Teacher………………………………………
1.2. ESP vocabulary……………………………………………………………
1.2.1. What is ESP vocabulary?
1.2.2. Terminology………………………………………………………………
1.2.2.1. Definition of terminology………………………………………………
1.2.2.2. Characteristics of terminology…………………………………………
1.2.3. General vocabulary and ESP vocabulary teaching and learning…………
i
ii
iii
iv
v
vi

1.3.2. Vocabulary in Heat and Refrigeration Engineering English ……………
1.3.3. HREE vocabulary teaching and learning …………………………………
1.4. Previous Research on teaching ESP vocabulary……………………………
1.5. Conclusion…………………………………………………………………
Chapter 2: Methodology……………………………………………………….
2.1. Context of the study………………………………………………………
2.1.1. Textbook………………………………………………………………….
2.1.2. Students and their background…………………………………………….
2.1.3. Teaching staff and teaching methods……………………………………
2.2. Method of study……………………………………………………………
2.2.1. Research questions…………………………………………………………
2.2.2. The participants……………………………………………………………….
2.2.3. Data collection instruments……………………………………………………
2.2.4. Data collection procedure……………………………………………………
2.2.5. Data analysis…………………………………………………………………
Chapter 3: Findings and discussion………………………………………………
3.1. Findings……………………………………………………………………
8 9
10
10
11
11
12
12
13
14
15

2. Limitations of the study……………………………………………………
3. Suggestions for further research ……………………………………………
References……………………………………………………………………
Appendices…………………………………………………………………

21
30
35
37
37
37
38
38
39
39
41
41
42
42
i
ii

these problems.
2. Aims of the study
The study aims at:
- Finding out difficulties that ESP teachers and learners at IUH are facing in teaching
and learning English for HRE vocabulary
2

- Suggesting some solutions to teaching HREE vocabulary effectively
3. Research questions
The research is carried out with an attempt to find out the answer to the
following research questions:
1. What are the difficulties experienced by English teachers in their teaching HREE
vocabulary at IUH?
2. What major problems are HRE students facing in learning ESP vocabulary at
IUH?
3. What are solutions to improving HRE vocabulary teaching at IUH?
4. Scope of the study
The study limited itself to the investigation of difficulties in teaching and learning
ESP vocabulary to students of HRE at IUH. The solutions are also provided to help to
improve teaching and learning English in general, teaching and learning HREE
vocabulary in particular at IUH.
5. Methods of the study
The research is carried out using both qualitative and quantitative methods.
The main data collection instruments are survey questionnaires and informal
interviews. The informants are students at HRE Department and English teachers at
IUH. The questionnaire was designed in such a way that both closed and open-
ended questions to ensure deep data. One questionnaire is designed for the students
and the other is designed for the teachers. The informal interview to teachers is to
get more information to support the study.
6. Design of the study


4

Part B: Development
Chapter 1: Theoretical Background
In this chapter, the author addresses some theoretical angles from which she views
her ideas. Firstly, definition of ESP, classification of ESP, teachers‟ roles and
challenges in teaching ESP are given in English for Specific Purposes. Secondly, in
ESP vocabulary, it includes definition and characteristic of terminology, general
vocabulary and ESP vocabulary teaching and learning. Thirdly, to regard with Heat and
Refrigeration Engineering English (HREE), introduction, vocabulary in HREE and
HRE vocabulary teaching are presented in turn. Finally, some research of abroad and
domestic researchers is mentioned in brief.
1.1. English for Specific Purposes
1.1.1. Definition of ESP
To understand the term ESP correctly, we will ponder on certain following
clarifications. The first one is that of Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 19). They define
ESP as „an approach to language teaching in which all decisions as to content and
method are based on the learners‟ reason for learning‟. This elucidation emphasizes that
ESP should pay suitable attention to the learners and their motions for studying it.
In an understandable way, Martin (1992: 16-23) has explained the E, S and P
elements of ESP. The „S‟ element is inclined to mean „specifiable‟. For the „E‟ of ESP,
there is a general field of „languages for specific purposes‟ (LSP). The „P‟ in ESP refers
to the learner‟s purpose, which was defined as „a combination of pre-determined or pre-

typical consideration. Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 157) think that „ESP teachers do
not need to learn specialist subject knowledge‟. They list three requirements of the ESP
teachers as follows:
- a positive attitude towards the ESP content;
- a knowledge of the fundamental principles of the subject area;
- an awareness of how much they probably already know.
When mentioning the roles of the ESP practitioner, Evans and St John (1998: 13-
14) claim that „the teacher is not in the position of the „primary knower‟ of the carrier
content of the material‟. They also believe that „the teachers have clear objectives for
6

the class and a good understanding of the carrier content of the teaching material. ESP
teachers also need to have a great deal of flexibility, to be willing to listen to learners,
and to take an interest in the disciplines or professional activities the students are
involved in.
Obviously, the ESP teacher must be flexible and their roles will vary according to
type of syllabus and course, teaching and learning environment, etc.
1.1.3.2. Challenges for the ESP Teacher.
One of the characteristics or even a critical feature of ESP is that a course
should involve specialist language (especially terminology) and content. In the majority
of cases ESP teachers are not specialists in the students‟ professional fields. That is why
the primary issue in ESP teaching is the struggle to master language and subject matter.
Teachers find themselves having to teach with texts whose content they know little or
nothing about. In addition, the ESP teacher happens to be the syllabus designer and is
responsible for the teaching material and evaluation. The basic problem in designing a
topic syllabus is that the ESP syllabus designer is not a specialist in the specific area
(e.g. engineering), consequently he/she is not capable of deciding by himself/herself
which topics to include in the syllabus to provide the required terminology. It is also
very difficult for him/her to arrange the topics in the most suitable order.
1.2. ESP vocabulary

which occur in a particular discipline”. According to Nguyen Thien Giap (1985: 308),
“Terminology, which is understood as a special linguistic unit of a language consists of
word and fixed phrase that provide definitions of objectives that belong to a particular
scientific area”. Also, Do Huu Chau (1998) states: “Terms are specialist words used
within a scientific field, a procession or any technological field”. These definitions
though rose at different times and by different people indicate that there exist “special
words in specialized fields or branches of human knowledge”,
1.2.2.2. Characteristics of terminology
8

Features of terminology have been mentioned in certain research works since the
appearance of this field. One of the theories in terminology concentrates on „assigning
terms to concepts‟. This research field is „primarily concerned with the relationship
between the real objects in the real world and the concepts represent them‟. (Cabré,
1999: 7-8) Terminology also cares about the „nature of things in the real world‟ and the
relationships formed in this world. (Cabré, 1999: 8) In addition, it is considered as
„closely linked to the special subject fields‟. Subject specialists and terminologists may
cooperate to arrange and standardize „the concepts and terms for each special field‟.
(Cabré, 1999: 9)
In summary, terminology focuses on the process from the concept to the term. It
also concerns the features of things in the reality and the relationships in that real world,
and may be used for specific subject field.
1.2.3. General vocabulary and ESP vocabulary teaching and learning
1.2.3.1. Vocabulary and its role in language teaching and learning
Words are the building blocks in a language. By learning the lexical items, we
start to develop knowledge of the target language. Based on our experience of being a
language learner, we seem to have no hesitation in recognizing the importance of
vocabulary in L2 learning. Meare (1980) points out those language learners admit that
they encounter considerable difficulty with vocabulary even when the upgrade from an
initial stage of acquiring a second language to a much more advanced level. Language

 Translation
 Associated ideas, collocations
Mucia 1991:301-302 lists different techniques used in presenting new vocabulary as
follows:
10

 Visual aids (Pictures, Objects)
 Word Relations (Synonyms, Antonyms)
 Definition, Explanation, Examples, and Anecdotes
 Context
 Word Roots and Affixes
1.2.3.4. ESP vocabulary teaching
“All courses are based on a perceived need of some sort. It is often argued that
the needs of the General English learner […] are not specifiable. In fact, there is always
an identifiable need of some sort.” (Hutchinson and Waters, 1987: 50). What I would
like to emphasize here is Hutchinson and Waters‟ suggestion that “it is not so much the
nature of the need which distinguishes the ESP from General course but rather the
awareness of a need” to communicate in English (1987: 53). According to Hutchinson
and Waters (1987: 55) target needs represent what the learner needs to do in the target
situation and involve necessities, are lacks and wants, and whereas learning needs
represent what the learner are expected to do in order to learn.
When we make decision about what ESP vocabulary to teach, it is necessary to
look at the above-mentioned necessities, lacks and wants in more details. According to
Hutchinson and Waters, necessities can be understood as “what the learner needs to
know in order to function in the target situation effectively,” which in terms of
vocabulary means to know vocabulary which is “commonly used in the situation
identified” (1987: 55).
So far, the objective aspects of the target needs were taken into consideration,
but also the learner has his own idea of his needs. Since the learner motivation is of
high importance in both the learning and teaching process, the learner‟s wants is the

Bui Trung Thanh, a lecturer of IUH, there are a lot of technical vocabulary related to
installation, repairing, and maintaining cooling, heating, air
handling, humidification, filtering, and refrigeration equipment including motors and
machine shafts, main components of air-conditioners. Also, vocabulary about electric
wiring electronics, hydronics, air conditioning, refrigeration, solar geothermal and
12

thermodynamics are included in this course book. Through learning the technical
vocabulary, students can understand energy conservation theory and equipment as well
as energy management techniques and equipment in English. Furthermore, this course
book consists of the technical vocabulary related to a substantial component of
instruction in the physics of heat, fluids and gases, the mathematics of heat gains and
losses, and engineering design of heating and cooling systems.
1.3.3. HREE vocabulary teaching and learning
The students should be encouraged to think about the importance of the word,
therefore the examples in context are highly useful. Moreover, ESP teachers should
choose methods which must be focused predominantly on learners, each unit has to
have clear aims, motivating topics and challenging practical activities. The appropriate
issues must be presented in the context of the real life, in this case, of the present
vocational school, where “young people are given numerous opportunities to follow
purposeful learning” (Buchanan 6). As Maehr points out, in this way, teachers can
support the naturalness of learning vocabulary, and in such an enriched atmosphere,
learners find ideal authentic reasons for learning a foreign language. ESP vocabulary
can be presented, practiced and consolidated by similar methods and techniques used
for practicing and consolidation of general vocabulary. Writing tasks can include
reports and different instructions for heat and refrigeration, making summaries from
technical journals, describing processes and techniques, labeling diagrams and pictures,
describing graphs, etc.
1.4. Previous Research on teaching ESP vocabulary
ESP vocabulary teaching is carried out by various researchers from different

teaching and learning ESP vocabulary of both teachers and students. Based on the
study, the researcher gave some suggestions to help teachers and students at Thanh Hoa
teacher‟s training school overcome the difficulties and cooperate with each other to
have the best result.
1.5. Conclusion
14

In conclusion, this chapter briefly presents the literature related to the study. By
presenting the most remarkable features of almost gone over and currently used
approaches to teaching and learning ESP vocabulary, the author hoped to make a note
that each of those approaches can be adaptable and utilized in a specific teaching
condition, rather than being swept away. Besides, the author also referred ESP
vocabulary teaching and learning are difficult, however, he suggested that a good
teacher should be flexible in combine a lot of techniques to present ESP vocabulary
lessons with different groups of learners more effectively. Moreover, the author also
presented the brief analysis of her ESP vocabulary teaching environment, which can be
considered as the rational for her hypothesis of the integrated approach in her own
teaching context.

- Each chapter is written clearly and understandably. Each chapter is divided into 5
parts, and each part focuses on one aspect of air-conditioning. For example, in chapter
1, it contains some aspects such as compressor, condenser, evaporator, refrigerant
controllers, metering devices.
Each week, teachers of English have to teach 5 periods of 45 minutes. The aims
and objectives of the ESP curriculum are to help students consolidate, widen and enrich
their English competence related to their majors including both language knowledge
and skills which they have gained at university. From my own experience and other
16

teachers‟ ideas and through my interviews with a lot of students at my school, the
suitability of the textbook including knowledge points (information and vocabulary
areas) is not very insufficient. Furthermore, linguistic competence like listening,
speaking, and writing is not covered in this textbook. Therefore, it can not help students
improve their skills like listening, speaking, or writing except for reading
comprehension. Furthermore, there are a lot of difficult abbreviations and too many
difficult and long terms, formulas or units in a task e.g. 1lbf/ in², H=e.σ.A T³, ft.lb/s,
Btu/lb ºF, Kj/kg.Kº, Counter-flow heat exchanger, latent heat of sublimation, mixing-
grain batch dryer, counter-flow forced draft cooling tower, PSC, PRC and so on.
Students find it hard to understand the formulas, express their understanding in
explaining the positions, functions or operations of the parts of machines by their own
words because they lack a great number of vocabulary about the matters. Therefore,
they have little interest in learning ESP and the teaching English at my university is not
satisfactory. This is obviously manifested in teaching methods used by most teachers in
my university.
2.1.2. Students and their background
Actually, there are 4 classes of HRE, which made up totally 170 students at IUH.
All of them are male students, aging from 18 to 24. The majority come from different
parts of Thanh Hoa province. Some are from several cities in Vietnam such as Thai Binh, Tay
Nguyen, Vinh, Ha Tinh City. The students coming from cities have finished three years or

teaching process such as the lack of the specialized knowledge, the choice of teaching
methods and teaching materials.
In terms of methodology, the teachers at IUH are intensively using the Grammar-
Translation method. Most of the spoken interaction in English classes is conducted in
Vietnamese.
As mentioned above, the context of IUH reveals a situation whereby students are
required to learn English, but the English they have learned in traditional language
classes may not be used effectively in real life. It is apparent that student-centered
approach has not been widely used in teaching English at IUH. The teachers still play
the key role in classroom activities and corner the students to be active learners.
18

Therefore, we should apply more appropriate teaching techniques to improve the
situation of teaching ESP vocabulary at IUH.
2.2. Method of study
2.2.1. Research questions
The research is carried out with an attempt to find out the answers to the following questions:
1. What are the difficulties experienced by English teachers in their teaching HREE
vocabulary at IUH?
2. What major problems are HRE students facing in learning ESP vocabulary at
IUH?
3. What are solutions to improving HRE vocabulary teaching at IUH?
2.2.2. The participants
The participants in these survey questionnaires are both teachers and students. The
first group consists of 12 English teachers, including 3 teachers who are teaching HREE.
These 12 teachers of English at the university are chosen for the investigation as all of them
have been teaching ESP. They are 8 females and 4 males and have at least 3 years‟ experience
in teaching ESP. The other group includes 100 students majoring in HRE aged from 19
to 24 and randomly chosen from four HRE classes at IUH based in Thanh hoa. They are
all male students and have been learning English at least two or three years at IUH.