An evaluation of the ESP course book for students of tourism and hospitality department at national economics university students’ perspective

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHER EDUCATION GRADUATION PAPER An Evaluation of the ESP Course Book

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHER EDUCATION

GRADUATION PAPER

An Evaluation of the ESP Course Book for Students of Tourism and Hospitality department at National Economics University: Students’ perspective

Supervisor: Nguyễn Thụy Phương Lan, M.A

Student: Bạch Hà Phương

Course: QH2017.F1.E2

HANOI - 2021

ĐẠI HỌC QUỐC GIA HÀ NỘI TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ KHOA SƯ PHẠM TIẾNG ANH

KHÓA LUẬN TỐT NGHIỆP

Đánh giá giáo trình tiếng Anh chuyên ngành cho sinh viên khoa Du lịch và Khách sạn trường Đại học Kinh

Tế Quốc Dân từ quan điểm của sinh viên

Giáo viên hướng dẫn: Nguyễn Thụy Phương Lan, M.A Sinh viên: Bạch Hà Phương

Khóa: QH2017.F1.E2

HÀ NỘI - 2021

I hereby state that I: Bach Ha Phuong, being a candidate for the degree of Bachelor of Arts (B.A honors) accept the requirements of the College relating to the retention and use of Bachelor’s Graduation Paper deposited in the library

In terms of these conditions, I agree that the origin of my paper deposited in the library should be accessible for the purposes of study and research, in accordance with the normal conditions established by the librarian for the care, loan or reproduction of the paper

Signature

Date

Acknowledgement

First and foremost, I would like to express my utmost gratitude to my supervisor,

Ms Nguyen Thuy Phuong Lan (M.A), whose guidance and support have enabled me to carry out the thesis Her knowledge and valuable advice have deepened my understanding of the topic and her encouragement has been a driving force for me to complete the study with enthusiasm

Second, I am grateful for all of the participants who have been generous to spend their time and effort doing the survey and participating in the interview, especially Ms Nguyen Thi My Hanh (Ph.D), who has helped me contact with all of the participants of the study and provided information about the ESP course at NEU The study would not have been carried out without their participation

Third, I would like to send my appreciation to my family members who have been encouraging me throughout the process

Last, I wish to thank Hien Anh, Tam Nguyen and Ha Linh, my best friends at ULIS for their constant encouragement and support Even though the workload and distance hindered us from interacting face-to-face, their messages and phone calls have been more than enough to keep me motivated

Abstract

Materials evaluation is essential in language learning and teaching process This study was carried out to investigate the strengths and weaknesses of the ESP course book used for the Tourism and Hospitality Department at National Economics University (NEU), as well as how the course book can be improved from the perspectives of the students at NEU

The data collection instruments used in this study were questionnaire and interview The questionnaire was distributed to second-year students currently undergoing the ESP course at NEU It is based on Hutchinson and Waters’ (1987) framework for materials evaluation The interview with the ESP teachers, second-year students and first-year students were conducted to triangulate the data gathered from the second-year students The questionnaire looks into students’ perspectives about the course book being used in terms of strengths and drawbacks in its aims, contents, and methodology

The results of the study showed the strengths as well as weaknesses of the course book in those aspects Overall, while the course book needs improvement in some aspects such as the contents and methodology, it has many strong points which are suitable for the learning context at NEU

Key words: materials evaluation, English for Specific Purposes, students’ perspectives

List of tables

Table 2: Students’ judgement of their English proficiency 26

Table 3: Students’ needs for learning ESP based on the course’s objectives 26

Table 4: Students’ overall evaluation of the course book’s fulfilment of

Table 5: Students’ opinions about how well the course book meets the

Table 6: Students’ opinions about how well the course book meets the

Table 7: Students’ opinions about the importance of the macro-skills

Table 8: Students’ opinions about the macro skills presented in the

Table 9: Students’ opinions about the importance of micro-skills 34

Table 10: Students’ opinions about the micro skills presented by the course book 35

Table 11: Students’ opinions about the importance of the language components 36

Table 12: Students’ opinions about the language components (grammar,

pronunciation and vocabulary) presented by the course book 37

Table 13: Students’ opinions about the relevance of the topics of each unit in

Table 14: Interviewees’ preferences of the topics in the course book 40

Table 15: Students’ opinions about the importance of the methodology 41

Table 16: Students’ opinions about the methodology presented in the course book 42

Table 17: Students’ suggestions in terms of the contents 43

Table 18: Students’ suggestions for the methodology 46

List of acronyms CEFR: Common European Framework for Reference

CLIL: Content and Language Integrated Learning

EAP: English for Academic Purposes

EFL: English as a Foreign Language

ELT: English Language Teaching

EOP: English for Occupational Purposes

ESL: English as a Second Language

ESP: English for specific purposes

EVP: English for Vocational Purposes

GE: General English

HaUI: Hanoi University of Industry

NEU: National Economics University

POHE: Profession - Oriented Higher Education

VESL: Vocational English as a Second Language

2.1 The importance of course books in language teaching 5

2.3 Materials evaluation based on perspectives 7

3 A review of materials evaluation framework 10

3.1 Cunningsworth’s materials evaluation framework 10

3.2 Hutchinson and Waters’ materials evaluation framework 11

2.2 Course book for English for tourism at NEU 18

4 Purposive sampling 20

1 Students’ opinions about the course book 26

1.2 Students’ opinions about the suitability of the course book in terms

1.3 Students’ opinions about the suitability of the course book in terms

1.3.1 Students’ opinions about the difficulty 30

1.3.2 Students’ opinions about the macro-skills 32

1.3.3 Students’ opinions about the micro-skills 34

1.3.4 Students’ opinions about the language components 36

1.4 Students’ opinions about the suitability of the course book in terms of

2 Students’ suggestions for improvements of the course book 43

2.1 Students’ suggestions in terms of the contents 43

2.2 Students’ suggestions in terms of methodology 46

3 Suggestions for further studies 51

Introduction

1 Research problems and rationale

English for specific purposes (ESP) is a movement which is continuously growing more influence on the demand for using English for occupational purposes (Purwanti, 2019; Hutchinson & Waters, 1987) Learning ESP for career-oriented tasks has gained popularity on a global scale and has since attracted ESP specialists to design ESP courses and programs in accordance with learners’ needs and career goals (Hutchinson & Waters, 1987) ESP is now a very crucial part of English language teaching (ELT) (Hutchinson & Waters, 1987) and is constantly undergoing development

to deal with the essential English skills based on learners’ professional background (Purwanti, 2019)

To achieve the best outcomes for a subject, it is important that a course book be used, especially for an ESP course A course book contributes greatly in aiding teachers and learners in the teaching-learning process and it can be used to achieve the course objectives (Purwanti, 2019) Moreover, course books are crucial for language teaching,

so an evaluation is necessary for the material to be up-to-date with the contemporary teaching programs and methods Additionally, the process will not be complete without

a suitable course book, as stated by Hutchinson and Torres (1994)

Whether it be a commercial or compiled book, an evaluation of materials is a vital process to decide how its suitability can be a driving force for students’ learning motivation Materials evaluation is a common process for language practitioners in order

to establish the suitability of the contents and the methodology used in the materials in

a specific context (Littlejohn, 1998) Furthermore, Tomlinson (2001) and Cunningsworth (1995) suggested that evaluating and adapting materials is vital to ensure that the materials can fulfill the course objectives and learners’ needs, since rarely can any textbook be utilized for all situations Therefore, course book evaluation is essential

as it can help the teachers select and adapt the materials according to their strengths and weaknesses Identifying the strengths enables the teachers to exploit the book to its

fullest extent, while identifying its weak points helps teachers improve, adapt or replace the materials (Cunningsworth, 1995)

English has been regarded as an international language in Vietnam and it is becoming increasingly important in several industries such as business, trade, economy and tourism (Bach, 2015) Moreover, ESP has become a popular trend around the world since 1960s and 1970s and it has become an established part of the curriculum in Vietnam ESP is among the main courses taught in most Vietnamese universities, whose aim is to prepare students for their future professions In 2019, the tourism sector in Vietnam contributed approximately 9.2% to the country's GDP (Vietnam National Administration of Tourism, 2019) Therefore, tourism is one of the leading industries in Vietnam, so it is essential for the pre-service as well as in-service employees of this industry to be familiar with one of the most used languages in the world In addition, since inter-cultural encounters are the norm in tourism and hospitality, English plays an important part as a means of negotiation between tourists and employees (Bach, 2015) For the students of the Tourism and Hospitality department at NEU, “English for International Tourism: Intermediate Course book” by Dubicka and O’keeffe (2013) has been used for the ESP course since 2020 While the topic of materials evaluation has been previously investigated by precedent researchers, none has taken this particular course book as the subject of evaluation, especially in Vietnam Thus, this study will contribute to the existing body of knowledge on ESP materials evaluation, and serve as

a reference for ESP specialists who want to use this course book for their ESP course

2 Scope of study

The researcher aims to evaluate the course book “English for International Tourism: Intermediate Course book” used for the ESP course from the perspectives of full-time students at NEU in Hanoi, Vietnam 83 students and two ESP teachers will be the participants of this study Specifically, the data is gathered from 79 second-year full-time students who are undergoing the course, 4 first-year full-time students who are

going to take the course and 2 ESP teachers at NEU The viewpoints from the students will be the main focus of this study

3 Research aims and objectives

This research aims to investigate the perceptions and attitudes of 79 full-time students towards the course book that is used for studying English for Tourism at NEU

The objectives of this study is to evaluate the course book in terms of:

● its strengths and drawbacks from the students’ perspectives;

● its shortcomings when compared with the objectives of the course;

● suggestions for improvements as proposed by the students

The ESP teachers were asked about the strengths, weaknesses and suggestions for improvements in the interview

To reach the aims and objectives of the study, the following research questions are designed:

1 What are the strengths and weaknesses of the course book “English for International Tourism: Intermediate Course book” as perceived by the students of the Tourism and Hospitality Department at NEU?

2 What are the aspects of the course book “English for International Tourism: Intermediate Course book” that should be improved as perceived by the students of the Tourism and Hospitality Department at NEU?

Chapter I: Literature review

1 An overview of ESP

1.1 Definition of ESP

Since the 1960s, ESP has attracted many specialists and researchers’ attention and become a prevalent area in the language teaching field (Hutchinson & Waters, 1987; Ibrahim, 2010) In defining ESP, Hutchinson and Waters (1987) saw it as an approach

to language learning that centered its focus on learners’ needs, rather than a product or

a specific language or methodology Mackay and Mountford (1978, p.2) also shared the view that the purpose of ESP is decided by learners’ needs, whether it be for academic

or vocational purposes Furthermore, ESP is also responsible for the development of learners’ abilities that are needed in order for them to perform tasks in a particular field

or profession

ESP is also referred to as the teaching and learning of English as a second language (ESL) where English is used in a certain field by learners (Hutchinson & Waters, 1987) Ibrahim (2010) added that the nature of the language, the learners and the learning context are the three aspects of ESP that are closely connected to each other From that, he defined ESP as the teaching of specialized discourse in English in which learners use it in a specific field Specifically, ESP is viewed as a “goal directed kind of language”, in which students learn and use English because there exists a need for its practice in the working environment (Ibrahim, 2010) Because of the nature of ESP, all decisions for the use of contents, teaching methodology, and curriculum of an ESP course are determined by the learners’ reasons for learning

In summary, while ESP can be viewed and defined in many ways, it is mostly viewed as an approach to teaching based on learners’ needs

Language), where ESP is further broken down to two main types: English for Academic Purposes (EAP), and English for Professional Purposes (EOP) (Hutchinson and Waters, 1987; Robinson, 1991) Other names for EOP include EVP (English for Vocational Purposes) and VESL (Vocational English as a Second Language) As the name suggests, EAP is taught for learners at academic institutions who want to learn English for their academic study Meanwhile, EOP is taught for those who use their knowledge of language in their work or career training With that classification, since the students of the Tourism and Hospitality at NEU undergo the ESP course to use their language as part of their career training, we can say that they learn EOP in their course

2 An overview of materials evaluation

2.1 The importance of course books in language teaching

To understand the importance of materials evaluation, first we must look into what is defined as a material and its importance in ELT “Materials” consist of the equipment or tools used in the teaching-learning process Furthermore, “they can be linguistic, visual, auditory, or kinesthetic, and they can be presented in print, live performance, or display or on cassette, CD-ROM, DVD or the Internet” (Tomlinson,

2001, p 66) Therefore, a course book or textbook are also considered materials, so the terms “course book”, “textbook” and “materials” will be used interchangeably throughout this study

Course books play an important role in language teaching as it can be a source of activities to promote and encourage communicative purposes, a reference source for learning language components and ideas for classroom activities, a syllabus or a support for teachers with little experience (Cunningsworth, 1995) Nowadays, course books still play a vital role in ELT classrooms and are still being widely used around the world (Dendrinos, 1992; Lee, 1997; Williams, 1983) Since it is established that ESP is a branch of ELT, it can be inferred that the use of course books is still prominent in ESP context

For Hutchinson and Torres (1994), course books can provide the learners with security, system, progress and revision while being cost-effective Furthermore, course books serve as an aid to attain credibility and standardization Meanwhile, Cunningsworth (1995) noted that overdependence on course books would result in severe constraints in flexibility and in reducing the importance of individual contributions that teachers make during the learning process, making it not at all ideal Skehan (1998) also argued that the use of course books does not align all the notions of learning centeredness since modifying the material according to learner differences is very constrained Nevertheless, Hutchinson and Waters (1987) argued that if a thorough needs analysis is conducted and if students are able to negotiate the curriculum with the teachers, then the teachers can make appropriate decisions to the materials such as what

to include or omit, making the materials relevant in the learning and teaching process Therefore, the chosen course book should be used selectively and aided with other materials when necessary

Overall, there is an agreement among researchers that course books are vital to ELT Given the educational context in Vietnamese schools and universities, course books are regarded as a crucial element in the language learning and teaching process

2.2 Definition of materials evaluation

Course books are used in classrooms around the world as a tool for instruction, and they can influence the way the learning content is delivered to the students Therefore, it is of utmost importance to decide on the suitability of a course book To do

so, a thorough evaluation of the material should be carried out

Hutchinson and Waters (1987) defined evaluation as a process of judging the suitability of something for a specific purpose, or a matching process between the needs and the available solutions Ultimately, evaluation is concerned with relative merit, in which there only exists a certain level of suitability for the given purpose When defining materials evaluation, Cunningsworth (1995) and Tomlinson (1998) described it as the process of analyzing the materials in terms of their strengths and weaknesses, which can

help instructors exploit the material to its fullest extent, or adapt it to be more suitable

to the learning and teaching context For Brown (1989, p.231), course book evaluation

is a systematic process of collecting and analyzing the relevant aspects to make improvements to the curriculum In addition, course book evaluation also includes examining the curriculum’s effectiveness and the participants’ opinions within the context The participants can be the teachers or students using the course book in a learning-teaching context, so it can be inferred that investigating the students’ perspectives of a course book is an important part of the evaluation process

In Cunningsworth’s study (1995), there are two approaches for evaluating a material: impressionistic approach and in-depth approach To ensure a good match between the course books and the learning-teaching context, an impressionistic overview will not be sufficient as it will not be able to examine the shortcomings of the material (Cunningsworth, 1995) Furthermore, the impressionistic approach is receptive since we only look for things in the material that it deemed interesting or relevant Rather, an in-depth evaluation is needed in order to examine more aspects of the course books By carrying out the in-depth approach, we are analyzing the information about the materials that aligns with an already chosen agenda (Cunningsworth, 1995) According to him, combining the two approaches will form a solid foundation for evaluating and consequently selecting a suitable way to adopt the materials

In summary, many researchers concluded that materials evaluation is the process

of giving judgement on the given material in terms of its strong points, shortcomings, and suitability to the given learning and teaching situation Based on those aspects, necessary adjustments can be made so that it is more suitable to the curriculum and learners’ needs

2.3 Materials evaluation based on perspectives

Throughout the years, there has been a plethora of studies on materials evaluation

in ELT as well as ESP, many of which also investigate the materials based on the perspectives of the users, such as teachers or students Perspectives can be understood

as individual awareness and interpretation of the world based on personal experience (Given, 2018) Therefore, having the experience from students, who are one of the most important stakeholders in language learning, can contribute greatly to the changes and adaptations that can be made for the learning and teaching process Salehi, Khavidar and Mehrabi’s research in 2015 focused on evaluating the ESP course book based on the lecturers’ and learners’ perspectives Their results showed that the instructors and students have a positive view on the ESP course book A study undertaken by Sari and Sari (2019) also looked into evaluating the ESP course book from the perspectives of teachers, cadets and graduates Both studies used questionnaires and interviews as data collection instruments to investigate the participants’ views on the course book Aside from these two studies, a large number of studies with similar topic of interest have been carried out, which goes to show how important students’ and teachers’ perspectives are when it comes to judging the strengths and weaknesses of a course book

2.4 The importance of materials evaluation

According to Hutchinson and Waters (1987), there is no best or worst material, but rather materials that can be suitable to a certain extent Tomlinson (2001) also shared the same viewpoint, stating that there is no course book suitable to any particular context, so the teacher’s duty is to warrant the match between the learners and the used materials by carrying out an evaluation of the materials In doing so, the evaluation results will serve as a reference for material designers and instructors to formulate a more improved version, allowing them to apply a more appropriate teaching methodology Furthermore, before one can select a suitable course book, an evaluation

of the course book is a vital process (Ellis, 1997), as the selection of a suitable material will be the foundation for the aims and objectives of a course or teaching program Additionally, it is important to have a suitable textbook that can meet learners’ needs and fit the curriculum (Byrd, 2001; Hutchinson & Waters, 1987) Sheldon (1988) gave two reasons to evaluate course books First, it helps the teachers make a decision on an appropriate course book Second, a thorough evaluation of a course book could help the

teachers familiarize with its contents By being familiar with the contents, the evaluators could make optimum use of the book’s strong points and consider the drawbacks Cunningsworth (1995) shared the same view that identifying the strengths and

weaknesses is essential as the strong points can be fully optimized while the weaker parts can be improved by adaptation or replacement

Materials evaluation may also be beneficial to teachers’ training and career development as it familiarizes them with a range of materials (Cunningsworth, 1995) Evaluating materials can be a valuable experience for language instructors as they have the chance to be exposed to different ELT or ESL (English as a Second Language) materials, which can be of use for their career whenever they need to make a decision about a material in the teaching-learning process

Additionally, Hutchinson and Waters (1987) suggested several reasons to conduct a materials evaluation First, it is carried out in order to identify the effectiveness

of the used material in the classroom Second, evaluating materials is conducted to investigate the extent to which the materials fulfill the course objectives at the end of the lesson Third, it is also to examine how well the material allows students to achieve the learning objectives by looking into the difficulty of the tasks and observing learners’ performance Last, it is to identify whether the designs of the materials are ideal for a syllabus

As suggested by Cunningsworth (1995), despite students’ lack of knowledge in ELT compared to the teachers, it is still important to explore their perspectives on the usefulness of the course books This is because they are the prime users of the materials, and with carefully selected questions, useful feedback will be collected from the learners

Moreover, learners can have the opportunities to use the target knowledge to achieve communicative purposes with the help of learning materials (Tomlinson, 1998) This is particularly vital to ESP as many ESP courses apply communicative methodology, and being competent in English can strengthen learners’ professional and

personal development (Hutchinson & Waters, 1987) Therefore, evaluating materials is also crucial in ESP

To sum up, materials evaluation plays a key role in ELT as well as ESP The reason for conducting an evaluation is to select a suitable material, as it becomes a basis for devising a course’s aims and objectives Furthermore, appropriate modifications can

be made to ensure the match between the material and the learners by conducting an evaluation Finally, the materials evaluation process contributes to the teachers’ or language instructors’ training and career development, as it provides them with experience on evaluating, selecting and modifying a material

3 A review of materials evaluation framework

To evaluate the material, it is vital to have a set of criteria for materials evaluation According to Tomlinson (1998), criteria are used to decide on the aspects that need evaluating, and defining those criteria is an important step of the evaluation process before the process takes place Until now, many scholars and researchers have developed their sets of criteria to create a materials evaluation checklist or framework Among those frameworks, one of the most widely known and used frameworks are Hutchinson and Waters’ (1987) and Cunningsworth’s (1995) Their frameworks will also be the subject for review in this study

3.1 Cunningsworth’s materials evaluation framework

The framework for materials evaluation and selection by Cunningsworth (1995)

consists of 8 criteria: aims and approaches, design and organization, language content, skills, topics, methodology, teacher’s book, and practical considerations Each criterion

is a section in which it is followed by a set of detailed questions for evaluation

In comparison with Hutchinson and Waters’ framework (1987), both frameworks

quite resemble each other in some aspects such as the aims and approaches, content, methodology and practical considerations (other criteria) The evaluation criteria such

as topics, skills, design and organization, language content and teachers’ books are all covered in the content section in Hutchinson and Waters’ (1987) framework However,

Cunningsworth’s framework (1995) does not examine who the material is intended for

or who the learners are

3.2 Hutchinson and Waters’ materials evaluation framework

Hutchinson and Waters (1987) identified four stages in the process of materials evaluation: defining criteria, subjective analysis, objective analysis and matching

The first stage: defining criteria is where one provides a list of criteria to evaluate the material Those criteria focus on the foundation in which one will judge the material, and decide which criteria is more prominent

Subjective analysis involves the teachers’ opinions and feelings about the material and which criteria one wants to include in their course Objective analysis takes into consideration how well the materials can realize those criteria In this stage, one should not take into account any subjective views

The final stage, which is the matching stage, helps the evaluator decide how well the material meets their needs

Hutchinson and Waters’ (1987) framework for materials evaluation includes both subjective analysis and objective analysis The subjective analysis analyzes the course

in terms of material requirements, while the objective analysis frameworks analyzes the

material under evaluation The criteria for evaluation relates to the audience, the aims and objectives, the content, the methodology, and other criteria (such as the cost and the

availability of the material)

Audience: The evaluator gains information about the learners regarding their

personal information, educational backgrounds, knowledge of English, and their interests to examine the materials’ compatibility with the learners

Aims: To examine whether the aims of the materials can satisfy the aims and

objectives of the course

Content: In order to evaluate the materials’ suitability, the evaluator should look

into the aspects of the materials’ content such as: language descriptions, language points, macro-skills, micro-skills, text-types, subject-matter areas, content organization and

sequencing and compare them with the requirements of the language course In this study, macro-skills will be referred to as listening, speaking, reading and writing skills, and the micro-skills are the set of skills that help learners achieve the macro-skills, such

as deducting unfamiliar words, starting or maintaining a discourse and so on

Methodology: This criterion helps the evaluator measure how effective the

methodology in the materials are for the students The criterion includes examining the learning theory the course is based on, learners’ attitudes or expectations, kinds of exercises or tasks, teaching-learning techniques, available aids, guidance or support for the teaching process, and flexibility

Other criteria: When selecting a material, several practical considerations should

be looked into such as the price range and the availability of the material

This framework has been used in previous studies concerning the evaluation of ESP materials, course books or textbooks, such as Nguyen (2015), Ha (2016) and Nguyen (2013)

When compared to Hutchinson and Waters’ framework (1987), most of the items

in Cunningsworth’s framework (1995) focus on objective analysis, which includes examining the materials being evaluated and not the material requirements based on the course Furthermore, since this study aims to evaluate the course book “English for International Tourism: Intermediate Course book” based on students’ perspectives, these sets of questions may not be adequate to serve that purpose

There exist many frameworks for evaluating materials, and in this study, Hutchinson and Waters’ (1987) framework will be selected to evaluate the course book

“English for International Tourism: Intermediate Course book” that is used for the ESP course in the Tourism and Hospitality department at NEU as it can answer research questions of this study in greater detail Their framework can deal with the shortcomings

of Cunningsworth’s framework (1995) by providing a fuller and more detailed outline

of a materials evaluation framework as it examines both the objective and subjective view The framework is also able to provide more information regarding learners’ view

of the course book, something that Cunningsworth’ s framework (1995) may not be able

to achieve as well as Hutchinson and Waters’ (1987)

4 A review of precedent research

A number of studies have contributed to the topic of ESP course book or materials evaluation, among those are the studies conducted by Suhirman (2018), Baleghizadeh and Rahimi (2011), Nguyen (2015), Ha (2016), and Nguyen (2013)

Suhirman (2018) conducted a study evaluating an ESP textbook and was able to present a thorough analysis on the importance of books in an ELT or ESP context However, the research was lacking in several aspects Firstly, the researcher did not carry out the evaluation process based on a materials evaluation framework, but rather

on observation through reading the textbook Secondly, no other instruments other than the questionnaire was used to collect data from the participants While the questionnaire holds many merits to the researcher regarding its convenience, it might not help the researcher gather more in-depth knowledge from the participants Moreover, 21 participants might not be enough to draw a conclusion from the collected data (Suhirman, 2018)

A strong point of Baleghizadeh and Rahimi’s study (2011) was that the reliability

of the questionnaire was tested using Cronbach Alpha, and the result of which was 0.76, which indicates that the questionnaire is reliable However, similar to Suhirman (2018), Baleghizadeh and Rahimi (2011) also used a questionnaire as the only instrument to collect information from the participants Furthermore, while Suhirman (2018) was able

to collect data from both students and teachers, Baleghizadeh and Rahimi (2011) only investigated the opinions from students, meaning the research lacked the opinions from the experts of the field

Nguyen conducted a study in 2015 in Vietnam about evaluating materials for English for tourism, but at a different university - Hanoi University of Industry (HaUI) Nguyen (2015) along with Ha (2016) and Nguyen (2013), also employed questionnaires for the students and interviews for the teachers as data collection instruments By having

the students and teachers as the participants, the researchers can triangulate the information collected from different types of participants Additionally, Nguyen (2015) not only carried out the interview for the English teachers, she also interviewed the teachers of the tourism department at HaUI The questionnaire collected data about students’ opinions on the material’s aims, contents, methodology and suggestions for improvements A strong point about Nguyen’s (2015) is that the researcher included open-ended questions so that students would have more freedom in sharing their perspectives About 58 students participated in the study, while being slightly more in number compared to Suhirman (2018), the number of participants might not be representative enough

Ha (2016) evaluated the material used by the nursing students at Quang Ninh Medical College Ha’s (2016) study is thorough in that the researcher collected data by giving questionnaires and interviews to both the students and teachers Unlike Nguyen (2015), Ha (2016) does not enquire about the participants’ suggestions for the material, but rather gives her own recommendation for the changes of the course book Viewpoints from a researcher and language practitioner may be useful in providing a different look on the course book outside its users However, Ha’s study (2016) could benefit from including participants’ perspectives on what should be changed about the book first before giving her own interpretation

Nguyen’s (2013) study is about the evaluation of the material used at Hanoi University of Mining and Geology for the economics and business management students While Nguyen (2013) included teachers’ and students’ input on the recommendations for improvements in the questionnaire, the questions are 4 close-ended items which address the necessity of the supplementary material for the four macro-skills Although Nguyen’s (2013) suggestions and interpretation are more in-depth, the researcher should also design the questionnaire in a way that can gather more data on the participants’ input on the suggestions for the course book

Overall, it can be seen that the primary data collection instrument for the aforementioned studies are questionnaires and/ or interviews, and the data is mostly gathered from the students and/ or teachers Most of the studies evaluated the materials based on Hutchinson and Waters’ (1987) materials evaluation framework Additionally, several studies pointed out their shortcomings in the insufficient number of participants, which will leave room for further studies in evaluating ESP materials

Chapter II: Methodology

1 Research questions revisited

This study is conducted with a view to investigate the perceptions and attitudes

of 79 students towards the course book that is used for studying English for tourism at NEU To reach the aims and objectives of the study, the following research questions are designed:

1 What are the strengths and weaknesses of the course book “English for International Tourism: Intermediate Course book” as perceived by the students of the Tourism and Hospitality department at NEU?

2 What are the aspects of the course book “English for International Tourism: Intermediate Course book” that should be improved as perceived by the students of the Tourism and Hospitality department at NEU?

In order to answer the research questions, this study utilizes the quantitative approach Questionnaires are used to collect data from the students, while semi-structured interviews are carried out to gather data from the students as well as teachers who teach English for tourism at NEU The questionnaire was distributed to students via face-to-face distribution, while the interview with the students was conducted via Google meet, and face-to-face interview was carried out to interview the teachers teaching ESP in the Tourism and Hospitality department at NEU

2 Review of the context: ESP course at NEU

2.1 ESP course at NEU

The study takes place at National Economics University (NEU), a public university located in Hanoi, Vietnam NEU consists of three modes of training: full-time, POHE (Profession-Oriented Higher Education) and International Hospitality The ESP course is compulsory for students of the Tourism and Hospitality department who undergo full-time studies at NEU, while the students from the International Hospitality curriculum are not required to take the course As of 2021, freshmen and sophomores from POHE no longer undergo the ESP course, while it was compulsory for juniors and

seniors Therefore, they will not be the participants of this study Most of the courses of the POHE curriculum now apply the CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning) approach, so the application of an ESP course is no longer suitable for the learning context of the POHE curriculum The participants of the study were the second-year full-time students of the Tourism and Hospitality department, who are currently undergoing the ESP course at NEU

The ESP course covers 3 credits, which adds up to 38 credit hours in total Within those 38 credit hours, there are 18 credit hours in which students learn in class, and the other 20 credit hours is for practice, discussion and assessment (see Appendix 10) Full-time students that major in Tourism and Hospitality must complete the course within a span of a semester, which is 13 weeks The prerequisites of the ESP course are the General English course, the outcome of which is B2 in language proficiency, and the Tourism Economics course (learned in Vietnamese) According to the syllabus, the course objectives are as follows (see Appendix 10):

As for knowledge, at the end of the course, students will be able to:

 use the vocabulary items, definitions, technical terms (about niche tourism, mass tourism, transportation, accommodation, destination, customer service and so on) and basic grammar

 recognize the common situations in travel, tourism and hospitality

As for skills, at the end of the course, students will be able to:

 use listening, speaking, reading and writing skills for handling particular situations in tourism and hospitality

 apply independent and team working skills

As for attitude, at the end of the course, students will be able to:

 participate actively with a positive attitude in class

 be more confident in partaking in activities and situations in their future career in the field of tourism and hospitality

Overall, at the end of the course, students will be able to communicate in English and apply skills (including writing, speaking, presentation skills…) that they have learned in order to work in the tourism field Additionally, students will be able to work

in groups, showcase their leadership skills and moderate their team members

2.2 Course book for English for tourism at NEU

Previously, the course book “English for International Tourism: Pre-intermediate course book” was used for the ESP course at NEU However, the course book currently used for the ESP course is “English for International tourism: Intermediate course book” The current course book has only been in use in 2020, and the reason for the change is that after a period of using the Pre-intermediate level course book, the teachers find that the book may be too easy for students, so the Intermediate level course book has been selected instead

The book has 10 units in total, with two extra units used for revision purposes

Of the ten units, six units were selected for this course, which are Unit 2, 3, 4, 6, 8 and

9 Each unit covers a topic and has the same structure, including Grammar, Vocabulary, Professional skills and Case Study This book belongs to a three-level series of course book: “English for International Tourism”, which is designed to meet the English language needs of professionals in the tourism industry and students of tourism in further education The main objectives of the course book are:

 building confidence in professional skills such as dealing with enquiries, marketing destinations, offering advice, negotiating, writing emails and speaking

to groups;

 developing language awareness through an integrated grammar and skills syllabus;

 acquiring the specialized vocabulary needed by the tourism professionals;

 practicing language skills in realistic Case studies that reflect issues in the tourist industry today;

 using the grammar more confidently;

 using the specialist vocabulary in appropriate tourism contexts;

 discussing the issues and recommending solutions through group work;

 communicating in tourism-related contexts;

 writing the texts related to tourism such as emails, reports, tour itineraries, brochure descriptions, meeting minutes and so on;

 exploring tourism-related issues on the internet or in their location

The “Grammar” section introduces students with essential aspects of grammar within an authentic tourism context The “Vocabulary” section provides words and expressions required in the tourism industry through reading texts or listening The

“Professional skills” section helps students practice effective interpersonal and business skills which are vital to the travel and tourism industries Each unit ends with a “Case studies” section, which are designed to motivate and engage students in discussing the issues and recommending solutions through group work, using the language and professional skills that the learners have acquired while going through each unit The course book also consists of the language skills, including speaking skills, listening skills, reading practice and writing practice Specifically, in speaking skills, a variety of pair work tasks are designed to give students the opportunities to communicate in tourism-related context In listening skills, the audio features a range of international and non-native speakers to help learners recognize how English is spoken across the globe The reading texts include tourism-related topics The book also provides learners with opportunities to write the texts related to tourism such as emails, reports, tour itineraries, brochure descriptions, meeting minutes and so on Another set of skills included in the course book is called the “Workplace skills”, in which students are asked

to explore tourism-related issues on the internet or in their location

In order to answer the two research questions above, the quantitative approach will be used in order to reach as many partipipants in the population as possible Using quantitative approach enables the researcher to get a higher level of reliability from the

gathered data (Balsley, 1970) The survey was used as a data collection instrument, and the data was analyzed based on the participants’ perspectives and opinions on the course book “English for International Tourism: Intermediate level”

Purposive sampling method was used to select the participants The participants are second-year full-time students of the Tourism and Hospitality department at NEU that are currently taking the ESP course, first-year full-time students of Tourism and Hospitality department at NEU that will be taking the ESP course in the next academic year, and teachers who teach English for Tourism at NEU The first-year students were asked about their learning needs and expectations for ESP and the course book in order

to determine if those expectations match with the course book Additionally, the data gathered from the interviewees were used to triangulate the data gathered from the second-year students Since this is the first time the course book is used at NEU, there are no alumni As long as they satisfy the requirements, they will be selected as the participants The survey was distributed to 100 students, 79 of whom completed the questionnaire in full Although the students were thoroughly instructed to answer every question, there were 21 responses that were invalid because some items were left unanswered The interview was carried out with 9 interviewees, 4 of whom are first-year students, 2 of whom are ESP teachers, and the other 3 are second-year students The interviewees are also selected based on their willingness to participate, which results

in a limited number of 9 interviewees

Using purposive sampling will be convenient for the researcher to choose the participants for their research Furthermore, by using purposive sampling, the researcher can access specialists (the teachers) - people with in-depth knowledge about a certain field - who may provide deep insight on the researcher’s topic of interest (Ball, 1990)

The data collection instruments utilized for this study are (1) questionnaire and (2) interview The questionnaire was distributed to the full-time students of the Tourism

and Hospitality department at NEU The questionnaire was distributed to 79 students who completed the questionnaire in full While it is more ideal to gather about 100 responses to get the more reliable results, the researcher can still make a conclusion from the data gathered from 79 participants

5.1 Questionnaire

The questionnaire is in Vietnamese and distributed from March 15th, 2021 to

March 21st, 2021 via face-to-face distribution, to students who are undergoing the ESP

course at NEU The questionnaire utilizes Vietnamese instead of English since 17.7%

of students judge themselves to be at A1 level and 13.9% students are at A2 as can be seen from table 2 of the Findings and analysis chapter Therefore, some of them may have a hard time understanding the questions and completing the questionnaire if it is written in English The questionnaire was distributed while the course was in week 11, two weeks before the completion of the course Since students have had an overall impression of the course and course book by then, the information gathered from them will be more reliable The data collected from the students will help the researcher examine the strengths and drawbacks of the course book, how suitable it is compared to students’ demands and how the aims, approaches, contents and methodology of the book align with that of the course

The questionnaire utilized for this study is created based on Hutchinson and Waters’ (1987) framework for materials evaluation The questionnaire consists of 6 parts Part 1 is about the students’ personal information Part 2 investigates their needs for learning English for tourism Part 3 to 5 examines their opinions about the aims, approaches as well as the contents and the methodology of the course book Finally, part

6 examines what their suggestions for the course book are

From Part 2 to Part 5, the questionnaire employs Likert scale, ranging from 1 to

4 (1 - Strongly disagree, 2 - Disagree, 3 - Agree, 4 - Strongly agree) Part 6 uses multiple choice questions to receive students’ opinions about what can be improved about the course book regarding its contents, genres, difficulty, tasks, skills and methodology

The questionnaire (see Appendix 1) was used to investigate:

 students’ opinions about the contents (such as the skills, topics, and language components) in the book in terms of their suitability and difficulty;

 students’ opinions about the variety and suitability of the methodology used in the course book (such as the tasks and activities);

 students’ opinions about the skills they would like to focus more on;

 what suggestions for changes they would like to offer for the book

Questionnaires are chosen as an instrument to collect data for the following reasons According to Gillham (2000) and Wallace (1998), constructing and distributing questionnaires provide the advantage of being cost-effective Another advantage of questionnaires is the convenience in being able to reach a large number of participants

in a short period of time and process the data via modern computer software (Gillham, 2000; Kothari, 2004) Therefore, this instrument is suitable for the scope of this study

as it can gather data from a large population in a short amount of time

5.2 Interview

For the interview, there are 9 participants in total Specifically, 2 teachers who teach ESP at NEU, 4 students who will attend the ESP course in the upcoming academic year and 3 students who are undergoing the ESP course All of the interviews were in Vietnamese to reduce the risk of having the interviewees misinterpret the questions, thus providing them with more flexibility and comfort in conveying their answers using their mother tongue Additionally, the students may not be proficient enough in English or knowledgable in ELT to answer fluently about aspects related to it The interview was carried out in order to triangulate the information gathered from the interview and survey with the students

The interview with the teachers was a face-to-face interview, and carried out on March 18th, 2021 There are 4 ESP teachers using this course book at NEU, and the researcher was able to reach 2 of them The interview aims to investigate: (see Appendix 5)

 the suitability of the book (as perceived by the teacher) in comparison with the aims and objectives of the course;

 teachers’ opinions about the variety and suitability of the methodology that can

be applied to the course book (exercises, activities);

 what suggestions for changes they would like to offer for the book

The interview with 4 first-year students was carried out to investigate their expectations of the ESP course book Gathering data from students who will be undergoing the course can be beneficial in exploring their needs for learning ESP The interview process took place from March 22nd, 2021 to March 24th, 2021 via Google meet The interviewees were asked about: (see Appendix 3)

 the reason(s) they learn English for tourism;

 their expectations about the course and the course book;

 what they wish to learn about from the contents of the book;

 which skills (micro and macro skills) they would like to focus on

The interview with 3 second-year students was carried out to further investigate their perspectives on the course book’s fulfillment of their needs, of the course objectives as well as its strengths and weaknesses (see Appendix 7) The interview process took place on March 25th, 2021

The interview for the teachers and students was conducted using a structured interview, which can investigate interviewee’s responses more thoroughly by asking for clarification or further explanation if the initial answers are vague, incomplete

semi-or off-topic Furthermsemi-ore, semi-structured interviews can allow msemi-ore flexibility (compared to structured interviews) and exploration of emerging themes and information that may not be anticipated by the researcher (Gill, Steward, Treasure, & Chadwick, 2008; Gill & Johnson, 2002)

The data received from the participants was used for the purpose of this research and any personal information of the participants was kept confidential

In the next chapter(s), the interviewees will be referred to using pseudonyms as seen in table 1 IN.1, IN.2, IN.3 and IN.4 refer to the first-year students IN.5 and IN.6 refer to the ESP teachers IN.7, IN.8 and IN.9 refer to the second-year students

Table 1: Information of the interviewees

6 Data collection procedures

To collect the data, two instruments including questionnaire and interview are applied

The questionnaire was created based on Hutchinson and Waters’ (1987) framework for materials evaluation The questionnaire was first written in English and then translated into Vietnamese before being delivered to students By using Vietnamese, the researcher can avoid making the students misinterpret the questions, since the questionnaire uses some technical terms about language teaching that students may not understand if the terms are written in English Moreover, about one-third of the students’ level of English proficiency ranges from A1 to A2 (as perceived by students themselves), so many students may have difficulty completing the questionnaire if it is

in English, and the reliability of the results may be reduced As mentioned above, the questionnaire was given to 100 second-year students of the Tourism and Hospitality department from the full-time studies, but there are 21 invalid responses since some

questions were not answered The questionnaire was distributed March 15th, 2021 to

March 21st, 2021 via face-to-face distribution, in which students were asked to complete

the questionnaire while they are in class after being explained about this study and how

to do the questionnaire

As for the interview, three sets of interview questions were designed, one for the teacher and two for the students at NEU The questions were first written in English and later translated into Vietnamese The researcher used Vietnamese during each interview

to remove the language barrier and help the interviewees convey their answers more fluently using their mother tongue The interview for the teacher was carried out on March 18th, 2021 via face-to-face interview The researcher interviewed two ESP teachers who use “English for International Tourism: Intermediate course book” for the ESP course at NEU Four students who will undergo the ESP course in the next academic year were interviewed from March 22nd, 2021 to March 24th, 2021 Finally, the three students who are underdgoing the ESP course were interviewed on March 25th,

2021 During each interview, the interviewer recorded and took notes of the answers to transcribe and translate, the process of which was carried out from March 25th, 2021 to March 26th, 2021 The notes, recordings and transcription were then used to analyze and answer the research questions and kept confidential

Due to the privacy and ethical matters, the identity of the participants will be kept confidential, and pseudonyms will be used to refer to the interviewees

Chapter III: Findings and discussions

1 Students’ opinions about the course book

1.1 Students’ background

Table 2 represents findings of the question from part 1 in the questionnaire:

“Which level of English proficiency do you judge yourself to be when you started the course?”

Table 2: Students’ judgement of their English proficiency

Students’ English proficiency according to

CEFR (Common European Framework for

1.2 Students’ opinions about the suitability of the course book in terms of aims and approaches

Table 3 demonstrates results from survey question 1, part 2: “What do you expect

to gain from the course? You may choose more than one option”

Table 3: Students’ needs for learning ESP based on the course’s objectives

Students’ needs for learning ESP Students (%)

1 Widen my English lexical resources about niche tourism, mass

tourism, transportation, accommodation, destinations, customer

services and so on

67.1

2 Be familiarized with situations in tourism and hospitality 43

3 Improve and practice listening, speaking, reading, and writing skills

for handling particular situations in tourism and hospitality

81

5 Develop and improve independent working skills 11.4

6 Communicate with colleagues or customers in the tourism field in

English

59.5

As can be seen from table 3, the three most chosen options are 1, 3 and 6 These options are about improving English skills or language components, so the participants mostly learn ESP in order to enhance their knowledge about vocabulary and improve their macro skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing skills) Specifically, the majority of students (81%) learn ESP with a view to enhancing their macro skills (listening, speaking, reading, writing), 67.1% students aim to enrich their lexical resources and 59.5% students stated that they learn ESP for communication purposes

Findings for survey question 2, part 2: “In your opinion, how well does the course book “English for International Tourism: Intermediate Course book” help you fulfill your expectations?” can be seen in table 4 below:

Table 4: Students’ overall evaluation of the course book’s fulfilment of the course objectives

Students’ overall evaluation of the course book’s

fulfilment of the course objectives

Students (%)

When asked about their overall evaluation, students’ opinions split almost in half regarding how well the book meets the course objectives (table 4) Specifically, 55.7%

of students think the course book can fulfil most of the given objectives, and the other

41.8% think otherwise A more in-depth evaluation of each objective is included in table

5 below, which demonstrates the findings for the question in part 3 as to what sort of knowledge and skills the students have been provided with by the course book

Table 5 below shows findings for the question in part 3, which examines students’ opinions about how well the course book performs in helping them meet the course objectives

Table 5: Students’ opinions about how well the course book meets the course objectives

Students (%) Scale

Item

Completely disagree

Disagree Agree Completely

Agree

1 Widen my English lexical resources

about niche tourism, mass tourism,

transportation, accommodation,

destinations, customer services and so

on

2 Be familiarized with situations in

tourism and hospitality

1.3 13.9 51.9 32.9

3 Improve and practice listening,

speaking, reading, and writing skills

for handling particular situations in

tourism and hospitality

6 Communicate with colleagues or

customers in the tourism field in

English

From table 5, there is not a significant difference in agreement among students about how well the course book helps them meet the course objectives Specifically, the agreement rate is high in which students agree that the course book helps them enhance their lexical resources, be familiar with the situations in the Tourism and Hospitality field, improve their macro skills and group working skills Findings from table 3 show that about 59.5% of students learn ESP to improve their communication skills, and the number of students who agree that the course book to be useful in helping them with communicating accounts for a total of 81% (table 4)

Additionally, the response in the interview by IN.5 reveals that although the learning outcomes for the ESP course was quite general, the course book could still be used to accommodate with the learning outcomes in terms of knowledge, skills and attitudes For IN.6, he gave score of 4 out of 5 in terms of the match between the course book and course objectives He found that the unit outcomes of the course book were quite specific, so it was easy to see what the students had achieved He also added that

it was a challenge to fully achieve the objectives due to the large class size, which is about 60 students per class (see Appendix 11) As can be seen from table 5, most students supported the idea that the course book could fulfill the course objectives

In the interview with three second-year students, when asked if they were able to achieve their learning needs in terms of knowledge and skills after undergoing the ESP course, they expected their lexical resources to be expanded by the end of the course Additionally, IN.8 and IN.9 said that they expected to improve communication or speaking skills The results, according to them, are that they were able to achieve their initial goals, even though two out of three found that it was only a small improvement

When asked about what the first-year students expect to learn from the ESP

expected to widen their lexical resources (see Appendix 11) Other macro skills such as reading, speaking and writing skills were also mentioned by three interviewees respectively One interviewee expressed the need for widening his knowledge on the field of tourism However, there are two course objectives that were not mentioned by the students, which are “Developing group working skills” and “Developing independent working skills” While students did not mention these sets of skills when asked “What do you expect to learn from the course English for tourism?”, they expressed interest and found those skills to be relevant in their field of study in the questions “Do you think group working skill is an essential skill to have?” and “Do you think independent working skill is an essential skill to have?” Overall, the course objectives match quite closely to the students’ demands and expectations for learning ESP, especially the demands for learning communication skills is high in both the interviewees and the second-year full-time students

1.3 Students’ opinions about the suitability of the course book in terms of the contents

1.3.1 Students’ opinions about the difficulty

The findings for part 4, question 1, section A: “Students’ opinions about the difficulty of the course book” are presented in table 6 below:

Table 6: Students’ opinions about how well the course book meets the course objectives

Students (%) Scale

Item

Completely disagree

Disagree Agree Completely

Agree

1 The grammar items in the book

are complex

2 The vocabulary items in the

book are difficult to remember

and use in context