從教師與學生的觀點探討博士生之英語需求

Abstract

英語已經成為國際間各項交流的共通語言，學術研究領域自然也不例外。為了追求學術研究上的發展，非英語系國家的研究者也須具備足夠的英語能力。事實上，以台灣的現況來看，博士班學生的英語能力不足，一直是十分嚴重的問題，甚至可能因此而限制了學生在學術研究上的成就與表現。儘管如此，在英語學習上，目前教育單位所提供給博士生的幫助似乎非常有限。為了能有效增進博士生的英語能力，首先我們必需了解他們的英語需求為何，以進一步針對學生的需要，提供適當的協助。因此，這份研究旨在深入了解博士班學生英語上的需求，並以聽、說、讀、寫這四項語言技巧分別討論。須註明的是，本文中所謂的「需求（needs）」，研究者將它定義為：需要（necessities）、不足（lacks），以及個人期望（wants）。這三者也就是所謂的目標需求（target needs），或稱為結果導向需求（product-oriented needs）。在本研究中，研究者採用問卷調查的方式，蒐集量性與質性資料。研究對象為國內一所研究型大學的一百四十八位博士班學生與五十六位專任教師。問卷內容大要如下：（一）英語能力的重要性；（二）學生使用英語的情境；（三）博士生英語能力的評量；（四）對英語課程設計的期許；（五）其他英文方面的協助。研究者採用描述性統計、t考驗、變異數分析，和卡方考驗來分析量性資料；質性資料則由研究者詳細檢視後，加以分類整理，以供進一步的分析與討論。研究結果顯示，讀、寫能力在博士生研究生涯中，較常被使用也較為重要；而聽、說能力則在學生未來的工作上，扮演較為重要的角色。此外，由於學生一般在英語聽、說技巧上的能力較弱，這兩項語言能力是他們所急於增進的。學生們所建議的課程中，有大半都與聽、說能力有關。最後，設定英語畢業門檻與專業課程以英語授課這兩項議題，在文中也有相關的討論。總而言之，研究者期盼這份研究能對提升博士生的英語能力有所幫助。課程設計者或可根據研究中的發現，修訂目前的英文課程，或提供其他學生所需要的協助。

As English has become the lingual franca for international communication, in order to pursue academic achievements, nonnative-speaking researchers are required to have adequate communication competence in English. In Taiwan, doctoral students’ deficiency in English has been widely considered as a serious problem, which might hinder their academic development. However, limited English courses or related resources have been provided for them. To bridge the gap, a well-conducted needs analysis should be necessary and helpful. Therefore, the present study aims to investigate doctoral students’ English needs in terms of listening, speaking, reading and writing skills. Needs here are defined as necessities, lacks, and wants, which have been conventionally referred as target needs or product-oriented needs. This study surveyed 148 doctoral students and 56 teachers in a research-oriented university in Taiwan, regarding: (1) importance of English, (2) contexts of English use, (3) evaluation of doctoral students’ English ability, (4) expectations of curriculum design, and (5) other help on English. The quantitative data of the questionnaires were analyzed through descriptive statistics, t-test, ANOVA, and Chi-square analysis, while the qualitative data was examined by the author, and categorized into proper groups for further analysis. Results show that reading and writing skills were more important and more often used in doctoral study, while listening and speaking ability were in greater demand in students’ future career. In addition, due to doctoral students’ relatively poor performance in listening and speaking, more training on these two skills were highly suggested by the students. The issues of graduation requirement in English and lecturing content courses in English were also discussed. To conclude, findings of this study should help academic institutes design new or modify the existing English curriculum and learning resources for doctoral students.