Class Blog: Theories and Practices of ESP

ESP Course Evaluation

Well, so far I have only commented on the posts made by others. So I suppose this is my turn to start one before AP Dr Normah starts giving marks for the entries..ehmm.. Anyway I personally feel that it's appropriate as this is the last stage in the course design but not necessarily means the least important one. Besides, I'm still struggling to finish this part for the termpaper.
Dudley Evans and St. John (1998) identify five key roles for the ESP practitioner:
*teacher
*course designer and materials provider
*collaborator
*researcher
*evaluator
Hence it's important for the course developer/ESP practitioner to assess and evaluate the effectiveness of the course from several aspects, explicitly and implicitly. This process is also recommended to be carried out at different phases of course execution. The common ones would be the mid-course and post-course evaluations. The information gathered is supposed to help the course developer to improve any weaknesses that the learners have encountered while the strengths are also highlighted and continued. The evaluation can take in many forms ranging from formal distribution of questionnaire and interview to informal discussion and class observation. Learners are also encouraged to voice their opinion at any point during the course and it should be noted so that all this information is utilized in improving the future course. Students may express their attitude towards the subject matter, instructional methods, activities, teacher's role and so on. Evaluation of the course is a brave step for the teacher because the evaluation will also include the teacher herself/himself. Students' feedbacks on the teacher/instructor is vital so that "dia tak syok sendiri" while executing the lesson in class. As the saying goes - The best 'mirror' for a person is his/her bestfriend and the same also goes for teachers...their students are their 'mirror'. (But not many will be happy if the comments tend to be negative ones, right?)
This subject somehow made me wonder if the present PPSMI policy which is still debatable did go through an ongoing evaluation in order to ascertain its effectiveness in improving students' command of English. If the policy did get reviewed periodically since it was first introduced in 2003, I personally believe the findings should be made public and any necessary measures that have been taken should also be informed so that the policy will not be blamed for the lack of motivation to do science courses among the students esp. malays. So now it's the job of the DPM to decide within the next 14 days, whether to continue.. or not to continue.. this 'controversial' policy.