Associate Professor

English

G.F. College

Shahjahanpur  Uttar Pradesh India

The present study ‎‫is an attempt to investigate the role of ESP course in teaching English to tourism learners and various roles played by an ESP teacher during ESP course. The study highlights the difference between ESP & EGP teachers keeping in mind the  needs of the learners. Study shows  the significance of ESP course is the most suitable approach which should be framed  in a manner that L1 from any background should capable of speaking, writing listening the discourse of tourism industry in English. As the field of tourism have considerably increased around the  globe, due to that the demand of English is increased and tourism is one of the most promising industries, the growing demand for qualified learners at different stages to serve this industry are needed. Study shows the use of specific terms and discourse should be included in preparing the ESP course for tourism courses. Finally, the study gives some common specific terms that  if used definitely enhance the language competence of tourism students. History of ESP from various experts throws light on the importance of ESP course in tourism in today English language teaching.

Introduction

Communicating in a foreign language is an essential requirement of the present job market and one can notice its constant pressure on the educational system that is expected to render professionals who can communicate effectively in a foreign language (mainly English) in their work settings. This means that knowledge of General English is implicit for undergraduates who further on need to be equipped with the ESP language skills so as to be able to meet the selection criteria of the job market. Companies are not so willing to invest in fresh graduates who after completing their degrees, are expected to be ready to compete for jobs and enter the working life instantly.

English for Specific Purposes (ESP) refers to the teaching and learning of English as a second/foreign language which, in contrast to other pedagogical approaches, bases the course contents and objectives on the specific needs of target learners. Thus, it is frequently contended that ESP is an umbrella term which covers a range of diverse teaching contexts. They are broadly defined as English for Academic Purposes (EAP), English for Occupational Purposes (EOP) and English for Professional Purposes (EPP). EGP Since in each area of ESP teaching, it is customary to distinguish between general and specific purposes, its main branches are further subdivided. Accordingly, in EAP, it is possible to differentiate between English for General Academic Purposes (EGAP), e.g., English for academic reading, and English for Specific Academic Purposes (ESAP).

According to Dudley-Evans & St. John (2009), the study of languages for specific purposes is centuries old. Its modern origins, however, go back to the early 1960s and are associated with J. M. Swales' Episodes in ESP. During the early phase of ESP evolution, research focused on English for Science and Technology (EST) in academic settings (Hutchinson, Waters, 2010) and involved statistical grammatical counts within written discourse (Johns, 2013).

There has been a significant change in the domain of teacher-learner relationship under the impact of differences in the roles of ESP and EGP teachers. ESP teaching is more student-centred as compared to EGP. In an ESP classroom, a teacher will find older students than EGP ones. Sometimes, even students are more knowledgeable about subject content than teacher himself. Teachers should avoid asserting absolute authority in such situations and try to adopt an informal style of teaching to encourage students' participation in the classroom activities. Initiation Response-follow up sequence of classroom discourse (Sinclair & Coulthard, 1975 as cited in Dudley-Evans & John, 1998) may not work in an ESP teaching situation where a learner can initiate the discussion or ask question to which a teacher has to respond. So, ESP teachers are suggested to be flexible in their classroom practices even during the lesson (Jordan, 1997).

Objective of the study     

The particular paper aims at providing an in-depth knowledge about what English for Specific Purposes is English skills in correlation to by focusing especially on the category of English for Tourism and the activities used in the classroom in order to assist learners overcome their difficulties. Also, the role that students and teachers have in the particular English lesson will be mentioned.

Historical Background

English for Specific Purposes (ESP) is a branch of English as a Second Language (ESL)/English as a Foreign Language (EFL), which are the main A branches of English language teaching. It can be said that ELT is an umbrella term which subsumes ESL and EFL. Among them. ESL is further subdivided into sub-branches namely English for General Purposes (EGP) and English for Specific Purposes (ESP) (Robinson, 1991). Discussing the concept of ESP, Widdowson, 1984 (as cited in Alharby, 2005) states, “If a group of learners' needs can be accurately specified, then this specification can be used to determine the context of a language program that will meet these needs” (p. 10).

A working definition of ESP can be that it is a comprehensive term which refers to the teaching of English to those students who learn the language a particular work or study-related reason. ESP has always focused on needs analysis, text analysis and the training of learners to communicate effectively in the tasks prescribed by their academic or professional situation (Dudley-Evans & St. John, 1998). ESP can broadly be divided into two main kinds: English for Occupational/ Vocational/Professional Purposes (EOP/EVP/EPP) and English for Academic Purposes (EAP) (Jordan, 1997, p.4).

Widdowson (1984) describes syllabus as “A framework within which activities can be carried: a teaching device to facilitate learning” (p. 26). Furthermore, Widdowson (1987) defines it as the specification of teaching program or a pedagogic document which defines a particular group of learners because of the peculiarities. Nunan (1984) quotes the ideas of Breen (1984) who is of the view that syllabus includes assumptions about the psychological process of learning, assumption about language and about the social and pedagogic process within a classroom. Nunan (1984) highlights that syllabus design is seen as being concerned essentially with the selection and grading of content. In order to design a syllabus for students of computer science, it is important to have an understanding of different types of syllabi. There are basically two types of syllabi: one is process-oriented and the other is product- oriented. Nunan (1984) states that process oriented means a series of actions that the students do in the classroom, related to language learning. Such types of syllabi focus on learning experiences. The product syllabus on the other hand, focuses on the end itself.

Discussion

English for specific purposes (hereafter ESP) is considered as an approach to teaching and learning of English as a foreign language (Hutchinson & Waters, 1987). However, in contrast to other pedagogical approaches, the entire course, its content and objectives are based on the specific needs of target learners (Lesiak-Bielawska, 2015). ESP emerged as a subcomponent of language teaching with the need of an international language due to the unstoppable rise of technology and commerce. In addition, the shift in language teaching from grammar to actual use of language in specific situations was also a significant factor for the emergence of ESP (Hutchinson & Waters, 1987). Especially these facts called forth the need of a language for real communication in ESP, which conforms with the constructivist learning perspective supporting the idea that language learners should engage in activities fostering real life use of language rather than memorizing rules (Hart, 2003).

Due to considerably changing nature of language from one context to another, i.e., tourism, commerce, engineering, medical, law, information technology, management etc. so and so forth, the activities employed and the materials used in ESP classes in these specific fields should be meticulously chosen through considering learners' needs and demands.

ELT can broadly be divided into ESP and EGP (Hutchinson &Waters, 1987). ESIIS assumed to be more focused, practical and object-oriented (Dudly-Evans &St John, 1998) as compared to EGP. It is interested in investigating the needs of the learners, preparing teaching materials, and 4 devising appropriate teaching methodologies. Owing to these special roles, an ESP teacher is termed as 'practitioner' (ibid) and holds a different position than an EGP teacher. The differences of context and purposes of instruction assign distinctive roles to ESP and EGP teachers. The ESP teachers perform a variety of roles like that of collaborator, researcher, course designer and material developer along with conventional role as a teacher. That's why an ESP teacher has to be well trained in professional skills and flexible in approach in order to cope with the specific needs of his/her students. In an ESP context, the target situation demands a teacher to tailor his/her instruction to specific rather than general purposes.

English for General Purposes (EGP) is called "TENOR- the teaching of English for No Obvious Reason (Abbot, 1981 in Jordan, 1997, p.4). The title applies to those English language learning contexts where learners have no easily recognizable reason to learn the language. EGP generally.

According to Widdowson (1983 cited in Ajideh, 2009), the distinction between ESP and EGP lies in the way we define and implement the learning purpose. While (ESP is objective-oriented learning where the specification of objective corresponds to the aim – the training operation - which deals with the development of restricted competence, EGP, on the other hand, is aim-oriented which does not equate the specification of objective to aim - an educational operation – dealing with the development of general capacity (ibid). While the primary role of an. ESP teacher is to design a syllabus based on realistic goals and evaluating students' performance through the evaluation of relevant language skills, the EGP teacher does not necessarily set the goals and objectives of the programme. Therefore, an ESP teacher is basically involved in a training operation equipping the learners with a restricted competence' to cope with defined tasks, an EGP teacher, on the contrary, is involved in an educational operation equipping learners with a general capacity to cope with undefined eventualities in future (ibid, p.163).

The specificity of ESP courses demands a teacher to adopt a different role and teaching strategy to transfer knowledge to his students. First of all, he/she has to identify learners' needs that will, in fact, determine the method, material and the level of language teaching (Robinson, 1991).

"What distinguishes ESP from General English is an awareness of the need' (Hutchinson and Waters, 1987, p.53). So, it can be inferred that an ESP practitioner is almost a teacher of General English unless he understands and focuses upon the special needs of his/her students (Robinson, 1991). However, it is likely that specific linguistic knowledge and skills may be relevant and useful to more than one subject or profession (Holme, 1996). For example, skills required for communicative competence for different occupations may be similar (Potocar, 2002).

Generally speaking, needs assessment is common practice in English for Specific Purposes ESP programmes. In this respect, ESP teachers or practitioners usually start with this question. "Why do these learners need to learn English”? (Hutchinson & Waters, 1987, p.53) to put it another way, ESP programmes recognize needs analysis as a starting point for examining what kind of English learners need to learn. Needs analysis in ESP programmes is not a new concept; "it has a long history and is constantly evolving and redefining itself. Before the 1970s, needs analyses were based on teacher intuitions and sometimes informal analyses of student' needs" (West, 1994, as cited in Flowerdew, 2013b.p. 326) Belcher (2006, p. 135) points out that "needs assessment is seen in ESP as the foundation on which all other decisions are, or should be, made". This assessment helps ESP teachers and course designers to identify specific needs of learners before and even during the course that learning needs in particular continue to evolve.

ESP courses should be designed accordingly to learner's needs and purposes, first thinking is that who are the learners can be and what are their purposes. English language course should enhance the communicative effectiveness of ESP learners as it is based on instructional methodologies like content based and problem-based learning. For the purpose of real-life communication in classroom, the use of selective discourse is an important aspect of ESP course. The terminology of special field is also included in ESP course. Traditional methods like grammar translation method and vocabulary teaching method have also been found (Maher, 1986).

Needs analysis had taken the need of students in ESP is very crucial "which aims to specify as closely as possible what exactly it is that students have to do through the medium of English" (Robinson, 1991). It was “designed to meet specified needs of the learner" (Johns & Dudley Evans, 1991). According to Robinson (1991) needs analysis is the important and crucial factor of ESP. Learners' target needs and learning needs are assessed by using different evaluation technique. These evaluation strategies are used to determine the communicative needs to learners in specified fields (Brown, 1995). Based upon the information obtained from the need analysis process, new courses are designed or existing courses are modified.

Various Role of ESP  Teacher

The ESP practitioner is a teacher first, so he must possess the qualities of a good general language teacher along with the specific qualities desired for his own field (Robinson, 1991). "The methodology of ESP teaching may not differ radically from that of General English' (Dudley-Evans & St. John, 1998, p.13). But keeping in mind the specificity of ESP in the strict sense, it is assumed that the role and methodology of a practitioner varies from that of EGP teacher. An ESP teacher is not the primary knower of the carrier content of the material (ibid). The reason is obvious because ESP includes the specific knowledge of the target situation, field of knowledge or profession but a teacher is, usually, trained in language skills only. That's why learners may know more about teaching material or content than teacher. A skilled teacher can channelize students' knowledge to bring forth effective communication strategies in the class. The teacher in these situations becomes a 'consultant (Robinson, 1991) who prepares a classroom strategy with the help of students to meet their desired learning goals.

Material Provider

ESP practitioners are expected to devise courses and provide materials to - their students. These courses and materials should be in line with different needs and contexts of the learners. Usually, it is very hard to find appropriate textbooks that respond to most of linguistic and communicative needs of students in a certain context (Dudley-Evans & St. John, 1998). That's why an ESP teacher has to prepare his own teaching materials. He/she either collects materials from various sources or writes his/her own when the desirable is not available (Kennedy & Bolitho, 1984). But the job of an ESP teacher does not end here; he/she has to assess the efficacy of those materials during and after the course.

As a Collaborator

As ESP practitioners work in various academic and professional genres, they need to have knowledge of their students' specialism to plan courses and teaching materials. Practically speaking, a teacher cannot master specific requirements of all the disciplines, he is asked to teach. In such a situation, the collaboration with the subject specialists of the specific disciplines is advised (Dudley-Evans & St. John, 1998). This kind of collaboration may be of various kinds, simple cooperation, specific collaboration and the fullest collaboration (ibid). In cooperation, an ESP teacher with the help of subject specialist knows about the subject syllabus and the professional responsibilities of his/her students. The specific collaboration involves some extended cooperation between ESP teacher and the subject specialist.

As a Researcher

An ESP practitioner is also supposed to have an interest in tesca" methods that can be helpful in performing various tasks like need analysis, course designing and material selection. This role is much needed in the field of EAP where volumes of research have been published already (Swales, 1990 cited in Dudley-Evans & St. John, 1998). In order to get benefit from this research, a teacher should have aptitude and skill for the research. While assessing the needs, teachers must go beyond the cursory analysis of students' desired skills. They should make a comprehensive view of learners' identified skills and the relevant texts (Dudley-Evans & St. John, 1998). In the field of EGP, there is no such research because the same traditional grammatical structures are being taught till now.

As an Evaluator

An ESP practitioner not only evaluates the linguistic knowledge and skills of students but also the courses and materials he himself devised (ibid). Discussion with the students and their on-going needs analysis can be very helpful to know the compatibility between course and materials taught and students' identified learning priorities.

Material Provider

Syllabus designing is another major role of an ESP practitioner. If an ESP practitioner is going to deal with the group of students with special field than he has to prepare a syllabus, according to the field and interest of Learners.

However, the materials should be  in line with the course goals. It should  function as a link between previous knowledge and the new information they will learn. As stated by Hutchinson & Waters (1992), choosing ESP materials determine the running of the course and underline the content  of the lesson. The teachers should be aware of whether or not the materials are suitable  or not for a particular discipline.

ESP and Teacher of  Tourism Course

The rapid development of world's tourism industry has increased the demand for service staff and management staff with high English proficiency, which has promoted the development of tourism English courses. Tourism English has become a compulsory course for students majoring in tourism management. It is a highly practical course based on tourism common sense, tourism services, world countries and famous attractions. Therefore, Travel English is a practical English based on tourism expertise, including tourism English, tour guide English and hotel English Tourism English conforms to ESP and is related to specific occupations It is used in specific occasions and has professional characteristics. Travel English belongs to ESP category. It can study the teaching of travel English on the basis of ESP demand analysis.

Tourism English is based on professional knowledge and has the following three characteristics for practical purposes: first, it is practical. Whether it is the management staff and service staff of the hotel, or the dispatchers and tour guides of the travel agency, in the specific work, they communicate with the customers through language and provide services to the customers. Good language skills and communication skills are a beautiful landscape in tourism services and the focus of tourism English teaching. Second, it is professional. Travel English involves a lot of professional basics about travel. Including tourist attractions, tourism planning, tourist hotels, travel agency business, tour guide practice and tourist transportation, students are required to have the basic knowledge of tourism before learning English, in order to facilitate the course. This is also a reflection of the professionalism of travel English Third, is comprehensive. The comprehensiveness of Tourism English is reflected in a wide range of topics, including history. geography, humanities, customs, literature, religion, art, cooking and architecture. Through tourism English teaching, we will pass on a wealth of knowledge, broaden our knowledge, expand our horizons and enhance the overall quality of our students. In the specific use process, travel English is mainly spoken, requiring accurate and clear style, euphemistic, and enjoyable.

ESP expert use all those terms of special field in real life situations explaining grammar rules, examples, using phrases & terms by using specific terms and develop Learner’s competence at all four levels. Since the language learning is specified in a particular context the task of ESP teacher uses the terms according to the subject. While teaching LSRW as communicative goal of learner focus on the target terms to comprehend the contextualized context. Selecting the teaching material should include the specific terminology of the text, dialogue, real life situation, while dealing grammar rules. It was noticed that when a group of learners of L2 learners within a framework or module made up from specific discourse the impact of learning a language develops communicative competence as well as other three skills. So, all the skills of language should be taught within a selected discourse which enables learners to use the language with ease the ultimate objective of language learning is language use in his subject area. If a group of students who are planning to go in Tourism Industry, then the ESP teacher/practitioner should use the terms, jargons which is common in tourism field and related with the tourism subject as- Length of Stay, Valuables, Vacation home, Travel party, Tourism expenditure, Tourism Consumption, Services, Seasonal adjustment, Excursion, Place of usual residence, Outbound tourism expenditure, National tourism consumption, Internal Tourism expenditure, Domestic tourism trip, Destination, Country of residence, Accommodation Capacity, After departure charge, Alloceatric, (C.T.C. Certified Travel Counselor), Concierge, Consolidation, Cultural tourism, Escort, FIT,  Frequent  ladepedent Travel,(inter modal tour), Nature Tourism (Nature- based tourism),pacing, Tariff, trip director, Visa Waiver, World Heritage Area (DMC) Destination Management Company, Inbound Tour Operator, Low Season Travel, NTA- National Tour Association, OTA-Online Travel Agency, Catering, Accommodation, Leisure activities

Conclusion

The paper has discussed the relevance of the ESP courses on some common grounds and shows the role and responsibility of an ESP teacher. It shows how a teacher has to deal in various teaching activities during the class which makes their job more demanding. The most important motive and purpose of ESP teachers is to deal mostly with “language in context” by using the terms of the subject in which he is going to search job and focusing on grammar rules will real life situations applying specific discourse/ terms of specific subject that full-fill the exact motive and purpose of the learners. The diversity of an ESP teacher/ practitioner needs to be highly reflected is various teaching techniques and method for the maximum input to learner and specifying learners needs. So, learner actual needs, modified course, special discourse all of these collectively gain self-confidence and competence in all the skills for their future and enable them to encounter confidently in front of recruiter.

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