Needs Analysis Of Medical English For Medical Students

This study is an outcome of the increasing application of English inscience and technology and rapid development in the area of acquisitionof English as a second and global language. As an important branch ofEnglish for Specific Purpose (ESP), an increasing attention has been paidto teaching Medical English (ME) at university level. Unfortunately, asfar as the analysis of the requirement of the medical students is concerned,very little has been done home and abroad. Any ESP course designshould be based on the precise needs analysis. However, course designersprefer to establish ME courses from the academic perspective, as a result,such course arrangements are in the confliction with students’ needs andrequirements of their future job.This dissertation applies Hutchinson&Waters’ analyticalframework of needs analysis. On the one hand, this paper investigatesmedical students’ practical needs in ME, target needs and learning needs.Target needs refers to the knowledge and abilities and learners require inorder to be able to perform to the required degree of competence in thetarget situation, while learning needs means what the learner needs to do in order to learn. On the other hand, the dissertation focuses on makingspecific analysis to find the existing drawbacks in Medical English courseon the basis of the learners’ needs analysis. The research focused on thefollowing questions:(1) What are the medical students’ target needs?(2)What are the medical students’ learning needs?(3) Compared with theresults of students’ needs analysis, what does the current Medical Englishcourse fail to meet in regard to the target needs and learning needs?The questionnaire is conducted among one hundred and fiftymedical students, eight medical practitioners and five ME teachersparticipated in the interview with a purpose of gaining in-depthinformation. Results of the data analysis reveal the following findings:most of students hold a positive attitude toward ME learning. Theyperceive ME as important for their future career. Besides readingcomprehension, medical students express greater needs forcommunication skills, especially speaking and listening for medicalpurpose. They are generally satisfied with course difficulty and courseintensity, while they believe ME should be arranged in the first semester.It is their expectation that the lessons should be taught and explained inEnglish and more interactive class activities should be adopted. Other dissatisfactions go to the materials, which are believed to be a barrier forstudents’ autonomous learning, lacking scenario and communicativepractice. The textbook should be added up some tasks based on realsituation and some multi-media materials as the supplement of textbookto arouse the interests of learners.In practice，on the one hand，this needs analysis can provide reliableinformation about students’ learning needs for English program designers.On the other hand，it offers teachers suggestions for setting teaching goals,choosing teaching materials. It is hoped that this study will provide ESPlanguage instructors with a clearer picture of ME teaching and offer someuseful data for successful practice of ME teaching.