Academic English course design for PHD program: principles and content

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Academic English course design for PHD program: principles and content

Vasylenko I.

The article deals with NaUKMA experience in designing the course of Academic English for PhD programs using communicative approach. The principles of organization and content are substantiated. During the course students should acquire and practically apply the skills necessary for scientific communication - critical reading, academic writing, giving scientific presentations - combined with advanced grammar and academic vocabulary.

Keywords: Academic English, PhD program, communicative approach to learning, course design, academic writing, scientific presentations.

Зміст та принципи побудови курсу англійської мови для науковців на докторських програмах. Василенко І.В.

У статті розглянуто принципи планування курсу «Англійська мова для науковців» та її зміст. В основу покладено комунікативний підхід, що базується на передбачуваних результатах навчання, тобто орієнтований на практичні навички та їхнє застосування в реальній науковій комунікації. Відповідно до цього обґрунтовується пропонована структура та зміст курсу, який охоплює критичне читання, академічне письмо, наукові презентації, граматику та загальнонаукову лексику.

Упродовж майже двох десятиліть існування програми для аспірантів у НаУКМА, курс англійської мови постійно розвивався і вдосконалювався, враховуючи потреби молодих науковців - вміння аналізувати прочитану літературу, писати різні типи наукових текстів, робити презентації на наукових конференціях, використовуючи при цьому відповідну академічну лексику та структуру. Впровадження нової системи організації докторських програм вимагає комплексного підходу до навчання, в якому поєднуються теоретичні основи організації академічних текстів та презентацій з конкретними практичними потребами молодих дослідників.

Програма курсу англійської мови для науковців передбачає написання різних типів текстів (анотація, огляд літератури, рецензія, тези конференції), що дає змогу підготувати аспірантів до написання статті для міжнародних наукових видань, роботу над якою доцільно зосередити в окремому спеціальному курсі. Значну увагу приділено також усним презентаціям та їхнім особливостям у науковому середовищі. Цей вид діяльності знаходить практичне втілення у виступах на щорічних аспірантських конференціях, які проводяться англійською мовою.

Ключові слова: організація курсу, англійська мова для науковців, комунікативний підхід, педагогічний досвід НаУКМА, докторські програми (PhD), академічне письмо, наукові презентації.

Introduction. Growing integration of Ukraine into European context and reforms of the educational system in the country bring about several issues that need careful consideration; teaching Academic English at PhD Program is among them. The history of post-graduate programs in NaUKMA is nearly 20 years long (since 1998). During all these years the program of Academic English has always been adapted to communicative needs of young researchers and included material and assignments that are closely related to postgraduates' research activity - the course of English for Postgraduates included all language aspects necessary for research: reading professional texts, academic writing, making presentations, with due attention to grammar and vocabulary. Thus, our experience might be useful to other educational institutions introducing this course.

Background and principles. Official transition to a new, PhD format, brings some changes in the distribution of time allotted for Academic English - now students have both mandatory and electives courses (8-10 credits overall). This makes it necessary to design a new course that will meet the requirements of the modern scientific world and challenges of the program.

The main challenges appear to be the following:

- initial level of English of the applicants (B1- B2);

- balance between different language skills (reading - writing - speaking);

- effective combination of language improvement and practical researchers' needs - writing certain types of academic papers (literature review, article, conference abstract) and making presentations;

- adequate balance of language material in mandatory and elective courses.

There is a lot of literature on course design with different approaches to the process of course planning [4]. We adhere to those that place the main emphasis on practical skills students should acquire by the end of the course. Some authors name such principle “backward design” [6], others use the notion of “intended learning outcomes” [2], but the concept is similar - the planning starts with identifying the final results (learning objectives), determining the content, and integrating them with appropriate assessment methods and learning activities.

The course in Academic English is based on the principle of communicative approach to the learning process - PhD students should be able to communicate in their scientific environment both verbally and in writing, hence they should develop different language skills to be able to meet the requirements of the modern scientific world. In determining the required language skills, we rely on the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages [3].

Any research usually starts with investigating previous achievements and ideas on the chosen topic. Consequently, critical reading should be included at the primary stage to provide students with tools to analyze the content of a scientific text, its structure, and stylistic devices used to state and support the author's point of view. It will also help them effectively select and evaluate material on the topic and compare different positions of researchers, which leads to writing literature review and critique. Thus, critical reading naturally combines with academic writing. academic english course communicative

Academic writing is the main skill to be developed in Academic English course, which means that PhD students should be able to clearly express their position on the investigated problem and deliver the results of their research using valid arguments, proper academic style, and organizing their ideas in a convincing logical way. This skill is indispensable for researchers as an important means of communication in scientific world. In addition to writing a dissertation (which is not necessarily in English), PhD students are supposed to publish several articles in internationally recognized journals, which means writing in English. However, one cannot start writing an article immediately. On the one hand, there is not always enough material for publication at the initial stage of research, and on the other hand, students need to know a lot about academic style and vocabulary, academic texts and requirements for them before they start writing an article.

Hence, academic writing involves both theoretical and practical aspects. Students learn special features of formal academic style in vocabulary and grammar, organization of various types of academic texts and write these texts basing on their own research. Students must submit several written assignments related to the analysis of literature on their research topic - summary, critique, literature review. This helps them both make their theoretical knowledge active and see the gaps in their ability to use it in practice. Moreover, these text types give an opportunity to practice making references, using the reference style appropriate to students' field of studies, and applying proper format (which, strange as it may seem, turns out to be a problem for many students). Writing an article for publication needs special attention, so it can be given as a special course after all the previously mentioned aspects are covered.

At this level grammar includes more advanced topics that deal with style, such as variety of sentence patterns, inversion, proper use of modifiers, and punctuation. In addition, students concentrate on paragraph structure, ways of paraphrasing and summarizing (to avoid plagiarism), quotations and in-text citations.

Another necessary skill is speaking, which includes clear and concise expression of ideas in a well-structured way, usually at conferences, debates, and in personal communication. The importance of developing presentation skills is well grounded [1]. First, students learn how presentations are organized, how visuals should be prepared and used, how delivery techniques should be applied, and then they make their own presentations. Usually, students start with topic presentations, giving the rationale for their research, its significance and novelty, the problem to be solved/research questions to be answered. Then they make poster presentations, which gives them the chance to practice using visuals and see how they work for their topic, learn how to comment on the data using specific vocabulary. And finally, they make a conference presentation at the annual PhD conference where they can also discuss their research matter with colleagues working in the same field. This makes a full cycle of learning about presentations and making them.

It is worth mentioning that preparation stage of presentations is accompanied by learning grammar and vocabulary connected with this skill. Special attention is paid to useful phrases indicating different parts of presentations, transitions, emphasis, dealing with questions and others.

It is important to design a course in the way that will help students to fulfill their practical research tasks: writing an article, a literature review, a conference abstract or taking part in an international conference. For this purpose, language assignments should be integrated with practical implementation, giving students a chance to use their language skills for scientific purposes. It is not always easy to combine these tasks because students do not have to submit a real article or give a real presentation in English at the beginning of the course in Academic English, so teachers could organize some mock- conferences to give them a chance to practice.

Thus, students must learn not only the peculiarities of academic style, the structure of scientific paper and other formal language aspects, but also lay more emphasis on practical use of their knowledge and skills in preparing their publication in English.

Another challenge is a reasonable balance between mandatory and elective courses. Ideally, mandatory courses should contain both necessary theoretical background and practical exercises, while elective courses should give students a chance to improve and polish their skills. Moreover, their specialization should also be considered (natural sciences, humanities, social sciences).

All the above-mentioned leads to the following course content (the given parts - Academic Presentations, Academic Writing and Critical Reading, Grammar and Style, Academic Vocabulary - are not linear but, in most cases, go parallel): Academic Presentations

1. Presentation formats

2. Purpose, audience, preparation

3. Organization of a presentation

4. Delivery

5. Visual aids

6. Handling questions

7. Conference abstract.

Plus, practical tasks:

- Topic presentation

- Poster presentation

- Conference presentation

I. Academic Writing and Critical Reading

1. Formal style

2. Paragraph structure

3. Definitions

4. Transitions

5. Paraphrasing

6. Summary

7. Critique

8. Literature review

9. Quotations and in-text citations

10. References.

11. Grammar and Style

1. Sentence structure

- Sentence fragments

- Dependent and independent clauses

- Run-on sentences

2. Subject-verb agreement

3. Pronoun-antecedent agreement

4. Pronoun reference

5. Solving modifier problems

- Misplaced modifiers

- Dangling modifiers

6. Variety in sentence patterns

- Combining into patterns

- Changing main clauses to relative clauses

- Reduced relative clauses

7. Constructions with infinitive, gerund and participle

8. Parallelism

9. Inversion. Emphatic structures

10. Punctuation

Students are supposed to know the fundamentals of normative grammar already, so at this stage grammar plays a supportive role for performing their communicative assignments with more emphasis on the stylistic aspect of writing and speaking. Traditional grammar (tenses, articles, conditionals, reported speech, non-finite forms, modal verbs) is also reviewed while dealing with related topics.

III. Academic Vocabulary

The content of this section depends on the level of PhD students and their specialization. Academic Vocabulary in Use [5] could be recommended as a general basic source.

1. Clear and concise writing/ Wordiness

2. Key nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs

3. Phrasal verbs, metaphors and idioms

4. Key quantifying expressions

5. Words with several meanings

6. Collocations

7. Ways of talking about sources, evidence, and data

8. Numbers

9. Commenting on graphs and diagrams

10. Degrees of certainty

11. Describing various functions (problems, methods, process, change)

12. Latin expressions.

The main emphasis should be laid on practical application of the given vocabulary topics in students' writing and presentations.

Conclusions. Practical tasks must be combined with advanced study of grammar and vocabulary; such organization of the program involves all language skills - critical reading of literature on the problem, writing various texts, speaking at the presentations, and listening.

A great advantage of the given course is that it has a clear pragmatic learning objective - it immediately leads to the fulfilment of communicative tasks young researchers face; it not only teaches students and prepares them for communication in academic environment, but also gives them the opportunity to participate in it.

Overall, the new version of the course must be adjusted to the real needs of students and involve more practical work.

Literature

1. Course Design Handbook. The University of Newcastle, Australia, 2015 [Electronic resource]. - 80 p. - Mode of access: ctl@newcastle.edu.au. - Title from the screen.

2. Wiggins Grant. Understanding by Design / Grant Wiggins, Jay McTighe. - 2nd ed. - Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Alexandria, Virginia, USA, 2005. - 383 p.

3. Biggs John. Teaching for Quality Learning at University / John Biggs, Catherine Tang. - 4th ed. - McGraw Hill, Open University Press, England, 2011. - 418 p.

4. Common European Framework for Languages: Learning, teaching, assessment [Electronic resource]. - Language Policy Unit, Strasbourg. - 265 p. - Mode of access: www.coe.int/lang- CEFR. - Title from the screen.

5. Bankowski Elizabeth. Developing Skills for Effective Academic Presentations in EAP / Elizabeth Bankowski // International Journal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education. - 2010. - Vol. 22, Number 2. - P. 187-196.

6. McCarthy Michael. Academic Vocabulary in Use / Michael McCarthy, Felicity O'Dell // Cambridge University Press, UK, 2008. - 178 p.

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