English for Specific Purposes
Wrld

NEWS & IINFORMATION

MATERIAL DESIGN FOR COMPUTER SCIENCE

Maria Cristina Quisbert Quispe, EL ALTO PUBLIC UNIVERSITY, EL ALTO, BOLIVIA

Nowadays to learn English is a key that opens many doors for any professional. More and more groups of people who havent learned this language before require to know it to be updated with the continuous changes. We see that many English teachers around the world are called on to teach in career-related settings. These courses are generally integrated by adult students joined with a common professional interest in learning English. This is English for Specific Purposes.

Although there are books designed for different areas I consider it is also necessary for ESP teachers to develop our own material. For this we have to think in the reality of our teaching situation, the number of students, the level of general English knowledge, the social situation, the availability of texts and others factors. These factors are being taken into account in order to develop a set of lessons for students of Computer Science at El Alto Public University. This institution is located in an Aymara area, one of the biggest indigenous groups in Bolivia. In this university, most of the students are bilingual in a local and national language, Aymara and Spanish. Most the courses are integrated by groups of seventy or eighty students. To start the technical English course they study one year of the language. There are books but they are not available due to their high cost.

In relation to the structure of the material we consider not only the content of the material to be used but also the tasks. Its objective is to develop the ability to read authentic texts with an adequate comprehension level. It is structured in three parts as some authors suggest; prereading, while reading and post reading It is organized on a thematic basis that comprises related topics that link the units. For this we plan to use the following reading activities. Guessing vocabulary through context, recognition of connecting words, establishing the relationship of cause and effect, comprehension of main ideas, and others.

We consider it important to develop this project is important because we will have the possibility to offer our students materials according to their specific needs.