Sunday, September 14, 2008

An Introduction to English for Specific Purposes


The responsibility of the teacher
A teacher that already has experience in teaching English as a Second Language (ESL) can exploit her background in language teaching. She should recognize the ways in which her teaching skills can be adapted for the teaching of English for Specific Purposes. Moreover, she will need to look for content specialists for help in designing appropriate lessons in the subject matter field she is teaching.
As an ESP teacher, you must play many roles. You may be asked to organize courses, to set learning objectives, to establish a positive learning environment in the classroom, and to evaluate student s progress.

Organizing Courses
You have to set learning goals and then transform them into an instructional program with the timing of activities. One of your main tasks will be selecting, designing and organizing course materials, supporting the students in their efforts, and providing them with feedback on their progress.

Setting Goals and Objectives
You arrange the conditions for learning in the classroom and set long-term goals and short-term objectives for students’ achievement. Your knowledge of students' potential is central in designing a syllabus with realistic goals that takes into account the students' concern in the learning situation.

Creating a Learning Environment
Your skills for communication and mediation create the classroom atmosphere. Students acquire language when they have opportunities to use the language in interaction with other speakers. Being their teacher, you may be the only English speaking person available to students, and although your time with any of them is limited, you can structure effective communication skills in the classroom. In order to do so, in your interactions with students try to listen carefully to what they are saying and give your understanding or misunderstanding back at them through your replies. Good language learners are also great risk-takers, since they must make many errors in order to succeed: however, in ESP classes, they are handicapped because they are unable to use their native language competence to present themselves as well-informed adults. That’s why the teacher should create an atmosphere in the language classroom which supports the students. Learners must be self-confident in order to communicate, and you have the responsibility to help build the learner's confidence.

Evaluating Students
The teacher is a resource that helps students identify their language learning problems and find solutions to them, find out the skills they need to focus on, and take responsibility for making choices which determine what and how to learn. You will serve as a source of information to the students about how they are progressing in their language learning.

The responsibility of the student
What is the role of the learner and what is the task he/she faces? The learners come to the ESP class with a specific interest for learning, subject matter knowledge, and well-built adult learning strategies. They are in charge of developing English language skills to reflect their native-language knowledge and skills.

Interest for Learning
People learn languages when they have opportunities to understand and work with language in a context that they comprehend and find interesting. In this view, ESP is a powerful means for such opportunities. Students will acquire English as they work with materials which they find interesting and relevant and which they can use in their professional work or further studies. The more learners pay attention to the meaning of the language they hear or read, the more they are successful; the more they have to focus on the linguistic input or isolated language structures, the less they are motivated to attend their classes.
The ESP student is particularly well disposed to focus on meaning in the subject-matter field. In ESP, English should be presented not as a subject to be learned in isolation from real use, nor as a mechanical skill or habit to be developed. On the contrary, English should be presented in authentic contexts to make the learners acquainted with the particular ways in which the language is used in functions that they will need to perform in their fields of specialty or jobs.

Subject-Content Knowledge
Learners in the ESP classes are generally aware of the purposes for which they will need to use English. Having already oriented their education toward a specific field, they see their English training as complementing this orientation. Knowledge of the subject area enables the students to identify a real context for the vocabulary and structures of the ESP classroom. In such way, the learners can take advantage of what they already know about the subject matter to learn English.

Learning Strategies
Adults must work harder than children in order to learn a new language, but the learning skills they bring to the task permit them to learn faster and more efficiently. The skills they have already developed in using their native languages will make learning English easier. Although you will be working with students whose English will probably be quite limited, the language learning abilities of the adult in the ESP classroom are potentially immense. Educated adults are continually learning new language behaviour in their native languages, since language learning continues naturally throughout our lives. They are constantly expanding vocabulary, becoming more fluent in their fields, and adjusting their linguistic behaviour to new situations or new roles. ESP students can exploit these innate competencies in learning English.

Monday, September 8, 2008

JUE BU NENG SHI QU NI Lyric and Translation

JUE BU NENG SHI QU NI (Will never loosing you)
by : F4

(Jerry)
Mei You Ni, Wo Hui Shi Shui
(Without you, I don't know who I am)
Xin Ting Zai Na Li Dou Bu Dui
(Hati cemas di mana berada selalu tidak benar)
Na Jin Tian, Cai Diao Zhuo Tian .. Kong Bai Yi Pian
(Ambil hari ini, lepaskan kemarin … penuh dengan kekosongan)

(ZaiZai)
Na Yi Tian, Zai Na Yi Tian
(Ambil satu hari, di hari itu)
Ke Yi Jian Xu Wei Wan Qing Jie
(Boleh bertahan untuk akhir hubungan kita)
Zai Zhi Jiao Cha Dian, Shui Pei Zai Ni Shen Bian
(Baru diskusi yang mana, siapa yang menemani di sisimu)

(Ken)
Jiu Shuan Quan Shi Jie Dou Yao Ba Ni Fou Ding
(Walaupun seluruh dunia harus menyangkal kamu)
Ye Bu Neng Rang Wo Fang Qi Ni
(Tidak akan boleh untukku melepasmu)

(Vanness)
Jiu Shuan Wo Men De Guo Qu Dou Mei You Le Zheng Ming
(Walaupun kehidupan lama kita tidak ada hasilnya)

(F4)
Wo Yi Ran Shou Hu Ni ...
(Aku ‘kan tetap menjagamu)

OH BABY BABY BABY
MY BABY BABY
Wo Jue Bu Neng Shi Qu Ni
(Tidak boleh kehilanganmu)
Ni Shou Xin, Ni Sheng Yin
(Cinta-mu, suara-mu)
Hai Zai Ling Wo De Xin, Zhen Neng Wang Ji
(Serta hati yang selalu memperdulikanku, mana boleh dilupakan)
Xiang Ni Jiu Xiang Shi Hu Shi
(Memikirkanmu sama seperti bernafas)

OH BABY BABY
MY BABY BABY
Wo Jue Bu Neng Shi Qu Ni
(Tidak boleh kehilanganmu)
Bu Guan Ni Zai Na Li
(Di manapun kau berada)
Wo Yi Ding Hui Zhao Dao Ni ...
(Aku pasti akan menemukanmu)

You Ni De Shi Jie Lyric and Translation

You Ni De Shi Jie (My World With You)

Jimmy Lin

Sleep till dawn breaks, we thank that piece of beach land.
yi jiao dao tian liang, wo men gan xie na yi pian sha tan

Road has become wider, we thank that sun that shine far and wide.
lu bian kuan guang, wo men gan xie na yi ke si mian ba fang de tai yang

Don't think of anything else, two persons still have each other's shoulders to overcome sadness.
shen me dou bie xiang, liang ge ren hai you bi ci jian bang ai guo ju sang

Now still heating cold rice, thinking back the taste is even worse.
xian zai zai chao chao leng fan, hui wei qi lai zi wei geng zao gao

Turn, turn, time is in your hands.
zhuan, zhuan, shi jian zai shou shang

Accompany you to explore around.
pei ni qu si chu huang huang

See, see if the beautiful scenery is still well.
kan, kan qian shan wan shui an bu an hao

Finding if the dream we had together is still carved on the tree.
zhao yi zhao yi qi zuo guo de meng shi fou hai ke zai shu shang

With you, the world is no longer the same.
you le ni, shi jie bian de bu yi yang

Love can actually be such a wonderful place.
ai jing ran hui shi zhe zhong hao di fang

What colour is the sky, I don't care about that.
tian kong shi shen me yan se, cai bu zai hu ne

Just gazing at you, I'll have a good view.
wo yi shi zhe ni, jiu you yi pian hao feng guang

Loving you, even fatigue is no longer the same.
ai shang ni, lian pi juan dou bu yi yang

Loneliness and frustrations are all chased away.
gu dan fan zao quan bu bei gan guang guang

What is the temperature of a hug? Asking you who's in my arms, the answer is in your eyes.
yong bao shi shen me wen du? wen huai li de ni, jiu zai ni de yan shen

Thursday, September 4, 2008

INTRODUCTION TO DISCOURSE ANALYSIS

Prepared by Norazlina Binti Jaafar

Read the two texts carefully and answer the question that follows.

Text 1
And then, in the blowing clouds, she saw a band of faint iridescence colouring in faint shadows a portion of the hill. And forgetting, startled, she looked for the hovering colour and saw a rainbow forming itself. In one place it gleamed fiercely, and, her heart anguished with hope, she sought the shadow of iris where the bow should be. Steadily the colour gathered, mysteriously, from nowhere, it took presence upon itself, there was a faint, vast rainbow.
(D. H. Lawrence, The Rainbow, chapter 16)

Text 2
normally after + very heavy rain + or something like that + and + you’re driving along the road + and + far away + you see + well + er + a series + of +stripes + + formed like a bow + an arch + + very very far away + ah + seven colours but + + I guess you hardly ever see seven it’s just a + a series of + colours which + they seem to be separate but if you try to look for the separate colours they always seem + very hard + to separate + if you see what I mean + +
(Postgraduate student speaking informally)

+ indicates pauses

Analyse the texts above and comment how the two texts are different based on Paltridge’s (2006) argument for the differences between spoken and written discourse.


Answer.

The message or content in Text 1 and Text 2 are similar but they differ greatly in the way they were delivered or conveyed. The first one is in a written form and the second one is in spoken form.

In Text 1 , the rich lexis and well-organized structure are indications that the writer has taken time in the construction, and possibly reconstruction after several rewritings, of the final product. There are complete sentences, containing subordination, frequent modifications via adjectives and adverbs, and more than single predicates per referential expression. In Text 2, there are frequent pauses, often interrupting major syntactic units, repetitions, incomplete sentences, generalized vocabulary, fillers, and one example of a tongue-slip. The speaker planning in the here-and-now, possibly threatened with his interlocutor wanting to take a turn, typically repeats himself a good deal, using the same syntactic structure, the same lexical items, using the first word that comes to mind rather than hunting for the appropriate word or expression, filling in pauses with ‘fillers’. The overall effect is of information produced in a much less dense manner than is characteristic of written language.

Based on the elaboration above of the both text, there are a number of important differences between spoken and written language, which have implications for discourse analysis. The first one is grammatical intricacy. Writing is more structurally complex and elaborate than speech. Halliday (1989) argues that speech is no less highly organized than writing. Spoken discourse, he argues, has its own kind of complexity. He presents the notion of grammatical intricacy to account for the way in which the relationship between clauses in spoken discourse can be much spread out and with more complex relations between them than in writing, yet we still manage to keep track of these relations.

The syntax of spoken language is typically much less structured than that of written language. Spoken language contains many incomplete sentences, often simply sequences of phrases. But still it is comprehensible as illustrated in the extract taken from Text 2 below:
normally after + very heavy rain + or something like that + and + you’re driving along the road + and + far away + you see + well + er + a series + of +stripes + + formed like a bow + an arch + + very very far away + ah + seven colours but + + I guess you hardly ever see seven it’s just a + a series of + colours

(D. H. Lawrence, The Rainbow, chapter 16)

From the extract, we can understand that the speaker is trying to tell about the formation of a rainbow after the rain.

In written language and extensive set of metalingual marker exists to mark relationships between clauses such as: that – complementisers, when / while – temporal markers, so-called ‘logical connectors’ like besides, moreover, however, in spite of, etc. In spoken language the largely practically organized chunks are related by ‘and’, ‘but’, ‘then’ and, more rarely, ‘if’. The speaker is typically less explicit than the writer is: “I’m so tired (because) I had to walk all the way home”. In written language rhetorical organizers of larger stretches of discourse appear, like firstly, more important than and in conclusion. These are rare in spoken language.

Written discourse tends to be more lexically dense than spoken discourse. Lexical density refers to the ratio of content words to grammatical, or function words, within a clause. Contents words include nouns and verbs while grammatical words include items such as prepositions, pronouns, and articles. In spoken discourse content words tend to be spread out over a number of clauses rather than being tightly packed into individual clauses which is more typical of written discourse as illustrated in the extract from Text 1. The content words in this extract are in italics. There are many more content words than function words in this extract.
And then, in the blowing clouds, she saw a band of faint iridescence colouring in faint shadows a portion of the hill.
As compared to the spoken form as illustrated below that showed fewer used of content words than in the previous example of written text. The content words are italicized:
normally after + very heavy rain + or something like that + and + you’re driving along the road + and + far away + you see + well + er + a series + of +stripes + + formed like a bow + an arch + + very very far away
(Postgraduate student speaking informally)


There is also a high level of nominalization in written texts; that is, where actions and events are presented as nouns rather than as verbs. Halliday (1989) calls this phenomenon grammatical metaphor; that is, where a language item is transferred from a more expected grammatical class to another. Written texts also typically include longer noun groups than spoken texts. This leads to a situation where the information in the text is more tightly packed into fewer words and less spread out than in spoken texts. The analysis from Text 1 illustrates this. It shows the use of long noun groups that are typical of much written discourse. Another example includes an example of grammatical metaphor. Here, the verb ‘hover’ is changed into the noun hovering (clouds), an example of nominalization:

And then, in the blowing clouds, she saw a band of faint iridescence colouring in faint shadows a portion of the hill. And forgetting, startled, she looked for the hovering colour and saw a rainbow forming itself. In one place, it gleamed fiercely, and, her heart anguished with hope, she sought the shadow of iris where the bow should be. Steadily the colour gathered, mysteriously, from nowhere, it took presence upon itself, there was a faint, vast rainbow.
Whereas, Text 2, is an example of the typically low level of nominalization and shorter noun groups in spoken discourse. The noun groups in this extract are simpler and less dense than in Text 1 and there is no example of grammatical metaphor.

Writing is more explicit than speech. This depends on the purpose of the text and, again, is not an absolute. A person can state something directly, or infer something, in both speaking and writing, depending upon what they want the listener or reader to understand, and how direct they wish to be.

Furthermore, writing is more decontextualized than speech. This view is based on the perception that speech depends on a shared situation and background for interpretation whereas writing does not depend on such a shared context. This is generally true of conversation but is not true of speech and writing in general (Tannen : 1982). Spoken genres, such as academic lectures, for example, do not generally show a high dependence on a shared context, while written genres such as personal letters or memos do. Both written fiction and non-fiction may also depend on background information supplied by the reader and an active role of the reader to enter into the world of the text.

Speaking is disorganized and ungrammatical, whereas writing is organized and grammatical. As we have seen, spoken discourse is organized, but it is organized differently from written discourse. Spoken discourse does, however, contain more half-completed and reformulated utterances than writing discourse. This is because spoken discourse is often produced spontaneously and we are able to see the process of its production as someone speaks. This is not to say that written discourse is not at some stage half-completed or reformulated. It is just that the text we see (apart from synchronous online chat and discussions boards) is simply the finished product and as Halliday (1989 : 100) points out, ‘a highly idealized version of the writing process.’ With spoken discourse, topics can also be changed and speakers can interrupt and overlap with each other as they speak. Speakers can ask for clarification and they can correct what they have said. Misunderstandings, further, can be cleared up immediately. Also, spoken discourse is able to use intonation, gesture and body language to convey meaning, whereas written discourse is more constrained in that ways of conveying meaning are more limited.

Speaking also uses much more repetition, hesitation and redundancy than written discourse. This is because it is produced in real time, with speakers working out what they want to say at the same time as they are saying it. A further characteristic of spoken discourse is the use of pauses and ‘fillers’ like ‘hhh’, ‘er’ and ‘you know’. Speakers da this to give them time to think about what they want to say while they are speking. They also do this to hold on to their turn in the conversation while they are thinking about what they want to say, and how they will say it. Text 2 illustrates the use of pauses and’fillers’ like ‘er’ and ‘ah’. Here ‘+’ indicates pauses and the number of it indicates the length of the pause in seconds:
you see + well + er + a series + of +stripes + + formed like a bow + an arch + + very very far away + ah + seven colours but + +

To sum up, there can be no doubt that spoken discourse, even though, conveying same message as in written discourse, differ greatly in many aspects. The differences are in the form of grammar and syntax, nominalization, explicitness, contextualization, repetition, hesitation and redundancy.




BIBLIOGRAPHY

Brown, Gillian and Yule, George. (1983). Discourse Analysis. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.

Nunan, D. (2000). Introducing Discourse Analysis. London, Penguin Books.

Paltridge, Brian. (2006). Discourse Analysis. MPG Books Ltd, Bodmin, Cornwall.

Paramasivam, Dr. Shamala. (2006). Introduction to Discourse Analysis. Language
and Language Use. Directions and development of a BA Enlish Programme.
PEARSON. Prentice Hall