Need Analysis in ESP by Ana Haluoleo University

 

Need Analysis in ESP

            The question why in ESP need analysis answered by the ESP course is characterized by its content (Science, Medicine, Commerce, Tourism, Engineering, etc.), this is, in fact, only a secondary consequence of the primary matter of being able to readily specify why the learners need English. Put briefly, it is not so much the nature of the need which distinguishes the ESP from the general course but rather the awareness of a need.

            This being said, e would still maintain that any course should be based on an analysis of learner need. This is one way in which ESP procedures can have a useful effect on GE and indicates once more the need for a common approach. The answers to the analysis will probably be different, but the questions that need to be asked are the same. Nevertheless, for being, the tradition persists in GE that learner needs can’t be specified and as a result no attempt is usually made to discover learners’ true needs. Thus if we had to state in practical terms the irreducible minimum of an ESP approach to course design, it would be needs analysis, since it is the awareness of a target situation is a definable need to communicate in English – that distinguishes the ESP learner from the learner of GE.

            According to Iwai et al. (1999), formal needs analysis is relatively new to the field of language teaching. However, informal needs analyses have been conducted by teachers in order to assess what language points their students needed to master. In fact, the reason why different approaches were born and then replaced by others is that teachers have intended to meet the needs of their students during their learning. From the field of language teaching the focus of this paper will be on ESP. Clearly, the role of needs analysis in any ESP course is indisputable. For Johns (1991), needs analysis is the first step in course design and it provides validity and relevancy for all subsequent course design activities.

            Though needs analysis, as we know it today, has gone through many stages, with the publication of Munby’s Communicative Syllabus Design in 1978, situations and functions were set within the frame of needs analysis. In his book, Munby introduced ‘communication needs processor’ which is the basis of Munby’s approach to needs analysis. Based on Munby’s work, Chambers (1980) introduced the term Target Situation Analysis. Form that time several other terms have also been introduced: Present Situation Analysis, Pedagogic Needs Analysis, Deficiency Analysis, Strategy Analysis or Learning Needs Analysis, Means Analysis, Register analysis, Discourse analysis, and Genre Analysis. This article attempts to present an overview of the aforementioned approaches to needs analysis.

            Probably, the most through and widely known work on needs analysis is John Munby’s Communicative Syllabus Design (1978). Munby presents a highly detailed set of procedures for discovering target situation needs. He calls this set of procedures the Communication Needs Processor (CNP). The CNP consist of a range of questions about key communication variables (topic, participants, medium etc.) which can be used to identify the target language needs of any group of learners. In Munby’s CNP, the target needs and target level performance are established by investigating the target situation, and his overall model clearly establishes the place of needs analysis as central to ESP, indeed the necessary starting point in materials or course design (West, 1998). In the CNP, account is taken of “the variables that affect communication needs by organizing them as parameters in a dynamic relationship to each other” (Munby, 1978: 32).

            We can make a basic distinction between target needs (what the learner needs to do in the target situation) and learning needs (what the learner needs to do in order to learn). We can identify further divisions under the general heading of seed.

 

 

 

The Target Needs

	OBJECTIVE (i.e. as perceived by course designers)	SUBJECTIVE (i.e. as perceived by learners)
NECESSITIES	The English needed for success in particular studies	To reluctantly cope with a ‘second-best’ situation
LACKS	(Presumably) areas of English needed for particular studies	Means of doing particular studies
WANTS	To succeed in particular studies	To undertake particular studies

 

 

Analyzing Learning Needs

 

            Hutchinson and Waters’ (1987) definition of wants (perceived or subjective needs of learners) corresponds to learning needs. Similar to the process used for target needs analysis, they suggest a framework for analyzing learning needs which consists of several questions, each divided into more detailed questions. The framework proposed by Hutchinson and Waters (1987) for analysis of learning needs is the following:

1. Why are the learners taking the course?

• · compulsory or optional;
• · apparent need or not;
• · Are status, money, promotion involved?
• · What do learners think they will achieve?
• · What is their attitude towards the ESP course? Do they want to improve their English or do they resent the time they have to spend  on it?

1. How do the learners learn?

• What is their learning background?
• What is their concept of teaching and learning?
• What methodology will appeal to them?
• What sort of techniques bore/alienate them?

1. What sources are available?

• number and professional competence of teachers;
• attitude of teachers to ESP;
• teachers’ knowledge of and attitude to subject content;
• materials;
• aids;
• opportunities for out-of-class activities.

1. Who are the learners?

• age/sex/nationality;
• What do they know already about English?
• What subject knowledge do they have?
• What are their interests?
• What is their socio-cultural background?
• What teaching styles are they used to?
• What is their attitude to English or to the cultures of the English-speaking world?

1. Where will the ESP course take place?

• Are the surroundings pleasant, dull, noisy, cold etc?

1. When will the ESP course take place?

• Time of day
• Every day/once a week
• Full time/ part time
• Concurrent with need or pre-need