Use of Genres: Classroom Teaching Frequency and Usefulness in the Workplace.
Description
As part of the needs analysis to design an ESP writing course, classroom teaching frequency and professional usefulness of writing genres for engineering students were matched and correlated. The four groups comprising students, teachers, and operational and managerial engineers were compared in terms of their responses to the teaching and usefulness of genres. Hypothesis 1. There is no significant difference between the different groups in terms of the frequency of writing tasks/ genres in the ESP classroom. 2.There is a significant difference between the different groups in terms of the frequency of writing tasks/ genres in the ESP classroom 3. There is no significant difference between the different groups in terms of the perceived usefulness of writing tasks/ genres in the ESP classroom. 4.There is a significant difference between the different groups in terms of the perceived usefulness of writing tasks/ genres in the ESP classroom. Students from six colleges, teachers and professional engineers were chosen as respondents. Data acquired were analyzed using tests like ANOVA, Tukey’s post hoc using SPSS software and Kruskal- Wallis, rank correlations using R (4.0.5.) to arrive at accurate and acceptable conclusions. The current university course revealed a mismatch with both the students’ perceptions of what was needed and also with what the professional engineers wrote at their workplace. The analysis of variance showed wide variations in the perceptions of the managerial and operational engineers, students, and teachers on the frequency of tasks under various writing genres and their relative professional importance. The rank correlations between the perceptions of managerial and operational engineers on the frequency of tasks, as reflected by their grading of the various writing genres were quite high (0.872) and the teachers, too, had high correlations with each of them (0.930) and (0.833), respectively). Interestingly, it was observed that the coefficients of regression were high and significantly higher than zero for all writing genres among the students. The coefficients were also high and significantly higher than zero for most of the writing genres (nine of thirteen) among the operational engineers. But the coefficients were significant for very few writing genres among the managerial engineers (four of thirteen) and teachers (three of thirteen. Any ESP course design would need to incorporate the genre- based needs of the professionals. If any genre- based writing course in designed for engineering students, this data will assist the course framer to take note of industry requirements. Hence it is recommended that all subsequent studies on needs analysis and course design, particularly in ESP contexts, should include all the stakeholders and this would make the course more effective and relevant to the workplace needs of the students.