Identifying In-Service Support for Lecturers Working in English Medium Instruction Contexts

EMI Lecturers’ Training Needs: Towards the Construction of a Measurement Instrument

“…Fenton-Smith et al's (2017) study of Taiwanese EMI professional development, revealed that lecturers seemed to show willingness to develop pedagogical and interactional competence (e.g., foster engagement and communication in the classroom). Beaumont (2020) explored teacher educators and lecturers' views on what aspects should be covered in EMI training courses. The main aspects that it was felt should be included in such courses were pedagogical and language support, along with lecturers having opportunities to share knowledge and experience with peers and receive feedback on practice.…”

“…The importance of teaching methodology in EMI training courses is also emphasised by Fenton-Smith et al (2017), who also argue for addressing interactional competence, different ways of providing students with support (e.g., scaffolding, multimodal resources, and translanguaging), and giving attention to students with diverse abilities and backgrounds. Drawing also on research outcomes, Beaumont (2020) suggests that EMI training should centre on the provision of pedagogical support (e.g., techniques for delivery of content) and language support (e.g., classroom discourse). The author adds that the inclusion of needs analysis and diagnostic assessment would be beneficial in developing effective training courses, while also praising the potential of creating spaces for peer support to enhance lecturers' pedagogical and professional skills as well as personal growth.…”

“…EMI programmes should preferably be designed drawing on lecturers' needs (Fenton-Smith et al 2017;Beaumont 2020) and on the sociolinguistic context of the HE institution. Bearing in mind those aspects and assuming that lecturing in EMI contexts may involve methodological and pedagogical changes, this study seeks to examine:…”

“…It is also possible that, when answering this question some lecturers may have considered that potential trainers, as non-content specialists, might not be able to offer them advice in this regard. To overcome this, it would be advisable to have EMI trainers that can focus on the specific requirements of the lecturers (Beaumont 2020). Nevertheless, further research would be required to find out the reasons why lecturers did not consider material design so essential.…”

“…Thus, to lecture successfully in EMI contexts, it is important to provide lecturers with specific training. Against this backdrop, the present study addresses EMI lecturers' training needs, a relatively unexplored aspect (Fenton-Smith et al 2017;Beaumont 2020). This study reports on the adequacy of a survey to explore lecturers' EMI training needs and on the preliminary results derived from its administration to a group of EMI lecturers at a Spanish university.…”