Needs Analysis in Syllabus Design

Thank you for choosing our Language centre as one of your prospective providers. In this envelop you will find what you have requested from us. An essay with the explanation of ‘Needs Analysis’ and ‘Syllabus design in TESOL’, and a description and rationale of the syllabus items for the two weeks course. We hope that you will be satisfied with the work we have produced. We would be very happy if we had the chance to collaborate with you.

Part A:

Needs Analysis:

Needs analysis procedure in language teaching was first introduced and used by Michael West in 1920, but then re-emerged during 1970 as a result of intensive studies conducted by the council of Europe team. Needs analysis was developed and was emphasized in ESP (English for Specific Purposes) and it is argued that it is not possible to specify the needs of general English learners. Hutchinson and Walters (1987) describe need analysis as the most characteristic feature of English for Specific Purposes course design. It is also notable that a needs analysis is the starting point for a syllabus/course design. It is a part of a curriculum development, and is required before developing a syllabus. Thus, the information gathered from a need analysis can be used to define the program goals or sometimes to select the most relevant material for the language syllabus.

Johnson K. (2008, pg.200) points out that: ”in order to plan a foreign language teaching we need to find a way of analysing learners’ needs. What is going to tell us just how much, and for what purposes our learners will need which foreign languages, it is the process of needs analysis.”

Needs Analysis in language teaching and language programme design, can be defined as a systematic process which helps teachers to collect information and get an accurate and complete picture of their students’ needs and preferences. Then they interpret the information collected and they make decisions about what to include in their programme, based on the interpretations in order to meet the students’ needs. This process can be used in response to the academic needs of all the students, for improving their achievements and meeting challenged academic standards. However, this process sometimes does not involve looking at the learners’ individual needs, but may involve looking at the requirements and expectations of other members involved, such as employees, parents, teachers and financial supporters.

Some probable resources for gathering information are: questionnaires, surveys, tests, observations and individual interviews. Generally a need analysis tries to get information on the situations in which a language is going to be used, the purposes for which that language is needed, the types of communication that are going to be used in the course and the level of proficiency that is required to develop a syllabus.

If a need analysis is used as a current part of teaching, it helps learners to reflect on their learning, to identify their needs, but also control their learning. Additionally, as Amie M. Casper (2003) states: ” The information gleaned from a need analysis can be used to help you define program goals. These goals can be stated as specific teaching objectives, which will function as the foundation on which a teacher will develop the lesson plans, materials, tests, assignments and activities.” Thus, a need analysis helps you to elucidate the purposes of your learning program.

Syllabus design in TESOL:

All professional people, who are labelled as teachers or are somehow related to language teaching, sometimes in their career path will be responsible of creating a syllabus or at least they have created one. Basically, syllabus design is a key component of their course preparation. To start with, syllabus is defined as a statement of content, denoting what a particular programme is going to cover (Richards et al. 1985, qtd in Johnson K. 2008, pg.215), which means that a syllabus design involves planning course content.

David Nunan (1988, pg.8) comments on syllabus design by stating that: “A traditional syllabus design has been seen as a subsidiary component of the curriculum design. Curriculum is concerned with the planning implementation, evaluation management and administration of education programs, whereas syllabus focuses more narrowly on the selection and grading of context.”

Syllabus design procedures are required for deciding what is going to be taught in a language programme. A basic step prior to syllabus design is need analysis. Knowing exactly what to your students want, and why they want to learn English is a basic feature in a syllabus design. Generally, a right syllabus is designed into manageable chunks that can be followed and interact into each other. It is important that the effectiveness of the teacher’s class will be largely depending on how the lessons develop over time.

Then, the teacher has to decide the content of his syllabus. He needs to make sure what to include in the syllabus so that it is relevant to what the students need. When it comes to organize the syllabus, the teacher designs his syllabus based on his list of prioritized topics or areas of his study. He has to make sure that his selected topics build up on others, but also that he uses a broad variety of resources and activities. Furthermore, the teacher has to be sure on which of the four skills (listening, speaking, writing, reading) to focus on, and which ones are the most important for his students.

As you have read above, there have been identified three main stages in the process of a language syllabus. The first one is the needs analysis, then content specification and then syllabus organisation.

There are two approaches to syllabus design. Product approach and process approach. Most syllabuses are based on product approach. In the product approach the teacher, teaches the students and then he tests them in order to evaluate them (evaluate their performance). A product syllabus focuses on what is going to be learnt at the end of the learning process (the outcomes) rather than the process itself. Some product-oriented syllabuses are the following: the grammatical syllabus, the functional syllabus and the lexical syllabus. On the other hand, a process approach on a syllabus concentrates on the skills and the processes which are involved in the learning process.

There are different types of syllabuses in TESOL and they are the following: the situational, structural, topical, functional, notional, skills-based, and task based and lexical syllabus.

Part B:

Description and rational of the syllabus items:

Having considered your needs, we have concluded to a relevant model of a syllabus designed especially for you. Obviously, what you are seeking for is the education of your receptionists for a better communication with your guests. Thus we are going to teach them those parts of English that are most relevant to them.

Our organising principle for the selection and grading of what is going to be taught in this two-week course are notional-functional categories. We have decided to take communicative categories as the main principle of our syllabus. Thus this specific course is based on a notional/functional syllabus as it is the most relevant type of syllabus for this purpose. This program needs to be practical and relevant to your receptionists’ jobs. They need to learn how to use language under those several situations they face every day. The communicative functions were very carefully selected and sequenced according their usefulness to the receptionist and the extent to which they will meet the receptionists’ communicative needs.

The syllabus is organised under the context hotel, which then is divided under a general heading (at the reception desk), with subheadings for specific activities. Within each situation, your receptionists will learn about aspects of that situation, and what language to use in order to communicate with the guests. We have ordered functions according to a chronological sequence because we think is more relevant to base the syllabus on the sequence of each action (what happens first, second, etc.), rather than grading them based on the associated language or grammar, as we are going to teach them how to use the relevant language under each situation.

Hotel:

At the reception desk: