English for Specific Purposes (ESP) has been considered as an efficient approach in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) and English as a Second Language (ESL) settings, when compared with English for General Purposes (EGP).

According to Dudley-Evans and St. John (1998), absolute characteristics of ESP is stated as “to meet specific needs of the learner”. Likewise, Brown (1995) places needs analysis (NA) as the base of the systematic curriculum development. Thus, NA is indispensable to set an appropriate goal of the curriculum, and to develop materials for the courses as well as to decide teaching method.

In this talk, the theoretical framework of NA by Brown (2009), and discussion on methods of NA by West (1994), Brown (1995, 2001, and 2009), and Long (2005) are introduced. Following these theoretical aspects, specific examples of NA conducted at engineering universities are discussed to show the difficulties and benefits of NA.

Even though the number of people who actually use English in their lives is rather small in Japan, there is a certain demand for training of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) in such fields as engineering, medicine, and business, where communication in English is sometimes unavoidable. An increasing number of universities are offering ESP courses to accommodate the future needs of their students. One way to design an ESP course is to adopt task-based language teaching (TBLT). TBLT is a goal-oriented approach to language teaching, and is therefore compatible with ESP, which is by definition goal-oriented.

In this talk, I will report on an ongoing attempt to design and implement task-based syllabi at my workplace, where students learn English for business purposes. I will first introduce theoretical and empirical bases for task-based syllabus design, and show the actual process of syllabus and material design for two of the business English courses I teach, one for business email writing and the other for business presentation.

In this talk, we will introduce an EMP project designed with the main aim of creating a word list embedded in pedagogical materials. We will discuss (1) the evolution of the project, consider (2) materials design, development, and delivery, including (3) the creation of a glossary for students, then (4) consider the link between general English and EMP.

Regarding (1), we originally planned to use corpus analysis of medical articles to create a word list, from which we would build materials. However, after conducting interviews with senior medical staff, analysis switched to medical reference books. We also decided to run corpus analysis and materials development in parallel, using the analysis to sharpen the materials and ensure the inclusion of key terms. In addition, we strengthened links with medical specialists to obtain advice on content.

In relation to (2), we will look at the actual process of materials development, the use of flipped learning, and how we slowly integrated courses so that a broad EMP syllabus was developed. We will also discuss how current research on case reports will be integrated into the syllabus. Regarding (3), we will describe the glossary being produced to accompany the materials, and discuss how the interlocking nature of the teaching materials is reflected at the level of medical terminology. Finally, in light of the above research, we will (4) discuss the connections between general English and EMP.