Motivation in multimodal ESP practice

Resumen

AH-CO-21125Ciencias PolíticasIV JORNADAS DOCTORALES DE LA UM125Artes y HumanidadesMOTIvATIONIN MUlTIMODAl EsppRACTICEArancha García1 1Departamento de Idiomas, Centro Universitario de la Defensa-UPCT, arancha.garcia@cud.upct.esABSTRACTGlobalization has brought the need to communicate in foreign languages to the fore and the ability to be fluent in at least two languages has rapidly become a basic need for the world’ population (Graddol, 2006). English is the language widely acknowledged as the global language. The extent of its diffusion geographically; the extensive cultural diversity of the speakers who use it; the wide and diverse domains in which it is found, and the vast number of purposes it serves are compelling reasons to consider English, the ‘international language’. The role of English in the field of engineering has also been on the increase to the point that nowadays it is looked upon as a ‘must-have’ basic educational skill (Ushioda 2012). 21st century engineers, are expected to gain mastery in an extensive number of interdis-ciplinary and interpersonal competencies, like teamwork, critical thinking, decision ma-king, and communication skills. (...) Engineers need to possess a combination of technical knowledge and non-technical skills to be effective members of the professional engineering community’. It follows then that engineers, who are commonly assumed to be technically proficient, and display creativeness and inventiveness, are also expected to master the diverse skills which comprise a foreign language: reading, writing, listening, and speaking. Scientific papers and journals are for the most part written in English. The global competiti-ve workplace also demands engineers to communicate effectively with their counterparts across the globe. Accordingly, they are required to have proficient communication skills that allow them to understand and disseminate technical information to a specialized and to a non-specialised public. Engineering undergraduates at the Polytechnic University of Cartagena (UPCT), Murcia (Spain), study the subject of Technical English during one term of their four-year degree. In less than four months, the course is designed to ‘improve students’ communication skills and to enhance students’ knowledge of specialized language. The course focuses on te-chnical vocabulary and on language functions of professional and academic contexts. It covers different topics which are common to different engineering fields. It includes tasks based on daily engineering contexts to practice oral and written skills. It also entails oppor-tunities of self-learning’.From this general description of the course, it can be inferred that the course gives prio-rity to writing and oral practice. Whilst a considerable number of students show some di-fficulties in their writing skills, most undergraduates admit that they struggle when they have to give the technical oral presentations the course requires. Reasons that justify the widespread reluctance to public speaking are varied. Thus, many students admit to having stage fright, others show lack of confidence in their speaking skills and still others complain that they were hardly required to talk in public during their years in secondary education