Iberica 13 Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-34 ISSN: 1139-7241 / e-ISSN: 2340-2784 Abstract Given the varied roles Language for Specific Purposes (LSP) teachers typically play and the demanding nature of LSP teaching, the literature on teacher education for LSP is surprisingly limited. This paper examines the literature on LSP teacher education including literature on teacher education in English for Specific Purposes (ESP) and English for Academic Purposes (EAP). The Introduction discusses the needs of LSP teachers, whose work typically involves investigating needs and specialist discourse, developing courses and materials as well as classroom teaching. It is argued that teacher needs are an important basis for determining content for LSP teacher education programmes and that further research is needed to identify these needs. Section 2 identifies themes in the existing literature. It focuses on two themes in particular, the role of specialised knowledge and suggestions for the content of the teacher education programme. Section 3 discusses models of teacher education with particular reference to LSP in-service contexts. Section 4 identifies gaps in the literature and suggests topics for the research agenda to develop understanding of the nature of LSP teaching expertise. Keywords: teacher education, teacher needs, teacher expertise, research topics. Resumen F or ma c ió n d e l pr of e s o ra do de L F E : Re v i s ió n b ib l io g r áf i c a y s ug e re nc ia s p a ra p ró xi ma s i nv e s ti g a c io ne s Dado que los profesores de lenguas para fines específicos (LFE) suelen ejercer roles muy variados y la profesión docente es de por sí misma exigente, la LSP teacher education: Review of literature and suggestions for the research agenda Helen Basturkmen University of Auckland (New Zealand) h.basturkmen@auckland.ac.nz 17 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 17 Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-34 HELEn BASTuRkmEn bibliografía sobre formación del profesorado es sorprendentemente limitada. En este artículo se estudia la bibliografía existente sobre formación del profesorado de LFE, incluidas las referencias relativas a la formación del profesorado de inglés para fines específicos (IFE) e inglés para fines académicos (IFA). En la introducción se tratan las necesidades de los profesores de LFE, cuyo trabajo suele conllevar la investigación de necesidades y el discurso especializado, el desarrollo de cursos y materiales así como tareas de docencia en el aula. Las necesidades del profesor conforman una base importante gracias a la cual es posible establecer el contenido que han de tener los programas de formación del profesorado en LFE y es necesario investigar más para lograr identificar dichas necesidades. En la segunda parte de este trabajo se identifican los temas recurrentes en la bibliografía y se presta especial atención a dos asuntos: el papel que juega el conocimiento especializado y las sugerencias para dotar de contenido los programas de formación del profesorado. En la tercera parte se estudian los modelos de formación del profesorado haciendo hincapié en los contextos de formación permanente. En la cuarta parte se señalan las carencias existentes en la bibliografía y se sugieren temas para continuar la investigación y comprender mejor la naturaleza de la experiencia docente del profesorado de LFE. Palabras clave: formación del profesorado, necesidades del profesor, experiencia docente, temas de investigación. 1. Introduction According to Hall (2013: 5537): The well trained language teacher knows how to introduce new language structures, to get his or her learners to practice language items, to focus on accuracy, to exploit language points as they arise, to use language within fairly controlled parameters and all the other things that language teachers routinely do. LSP teaching, however, forces teachers to go beyond their own levels of expertise and, in effect, to become researchers as well as teachers. As described above, teaching LSP often makes considerable demands on teachers. Dudley-Evans and St John (1998) identify five roles involved for the LSP practitioner, namely, teacher, course designer, materials provider, collaborator (with subject specialists), researcher and evaluator of courses, materials and student learning. Additional roles suggested recently are that of advisor on content and language integrated learning (CLIL) programmes in English-medium university teaching contexts (Taillefer, 2013) and as 18 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 18 intercultural mediators and mentors for lifelong learning to aid the implementation of the European Space for Higher Education reform (Bocanegra Valle, 2012). LSP teachers therefore generally face an array of work needs, all of which require knowledge and skills and presumably some form of teacher education. Yet, as argued by Richards (1997), the LSP literature has tended to foreground the needs of the target situation and tended to background the needs of the LSP teacher. Although some description of the needs of LSP teachers is given in the literature, empirical investigation might shed further light on the nature of these needs. The literature shows how LSP teachers often not only teach lessons and courses, but are also involved in course and materials development. As described by Hall (2013) the role often requires research (such as, researching needs or specialist discourse). The literature contains numerous reports of LSP teachers investigating needs (for example, Cowling, 2007; Fielder, 2011) and specialist discourse (for example, Gimenez, 2001; Forey & Lockwood, 2007). In addition the role can require considerable skill and knowledge in terms of curriculum and materials development (Basturkmen, 2010). In teaching language for general purposes, teachers can often make use of the many high quality commercially available course books and materials that are published, many of which often now appear in sets including DVDs, web-site resources, self-study materials for learners and teachers’ guide books. This is much less often the case in LSP where courses are developed to meet the specific needs of a group or groups of students (Dudley-Evans & St John, 1998; Basturkmen, 2006 & 2010). Even published materials that appear to have some relevance since they concern areas of interest, such as, English for nursing, medical English or Academic Speaking, are likely to only have certain overlaps with the needs of the students in the class, the needs for which the class was established in the first place. Generally LSP teachers draw on published materials only selectively (Belcher, 2009) and they can rarely base an entire course on them as is sometimes possible in general language teaching. The work of teachers is described by Belcher (2006: 135): Like other educational endeavours, ESP assumes there are problems, or lacks, that education can ameliorate, but unlike many other educational practices, ESP assumes that the problems are unique to specific learners in specific contexts and thus can be carefully delineated and addressed with LSP TEACHER EDuCATIon Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-34 19 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 19 tailored-to-fit instruction. ESP specialists are often needs assessors first and foremost, then designers and implementers of specialised curricula in response to identified needs. In other words, LSP (ESP) teachers are involved in research and in curriculum and materials development tasks as well as teaching. This leads to the present topic, namely, given the varied roles and the demands of LSP teaching, what topics might LSP teacher education usefully involve? In this paper the term teacher education is used to refer to both initial or pre-service teacher education and the on-going professional development of teachers already involved in teaching languages for specific purposes. The topic of teachers and teacher education has not attracted much interest by researchers in LSP to date. master (2005) reports an analysis of topic areas covered by articles from 1980 to 2001 in the journal English for Specific Purposes. The analysis shows the relative infrequency of articles on teacher training compared with all other topics listed (discourse analysis, program description, needs analysis, and materials). I recently searched the same journal using the word teacher or teachers in the search function. The search revealed that although a limited number of articles included these words in their titles, the main texts of the articles were generally not centrally concerned with teacher education. Given the demanding nature of LSP teaching it is somewhat surprising that the topic of ESP teacher education has received limited attention in the literature published in English to date. It would seem that the community “ESP professionals know the least about is their own” (Belcher, 2013: 544). There has been a plethora of studies into specialist discourse and the language needs of LSP learners but research into “teaching” in LSP has been very limited (Richards, 1997; Watson Todd, 2003; Basturkmen, 2006). In the remainder of this paper I argue that further understanding of the needs of LSP teachers could be useful to the field of LSP and that this understanding can be used to inform decisions about topics in teacher education programmes. I also argue that this understanding can draw, at least in part, on findings from empirical studies of LSP teacher expertise. I also suggest that the reflective model of teacher education seems particularly suited to in-service LSP teacher education. HELEn BASTuRkmEn Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-3420 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 20 2. Themes in the literature Although the literature on teacher education in LSP is not extensive, a number of themes can be identified. There has been discussion of the role of specialised knowledge in LSP teacher education (Dudley-Evans, 1997; Ferguson, 1997; master, 2005; Hall, 2013) and strategies teachers can use to compensate for gaps in their subject knowledge (Wu & Badger, 2009). Writers have suggested topics for ESP teacher education in general (Ewer, 1983; Strevens, 1988; Hall, 2013) and for pre-service ESP teachers in particular (master, 1997; Hüttner, Smit & mehlmauer-Larcher, 2009). Further topics include the choice of linguistic theories to inform pre-service ESP teacher education (Dudley-Evans, 1997 & 2009; master, 1997; Hüttner, Smit & mehlmauer-Larcher, 2009), the role of culture and context knowledge in LSP teacher education (Dudley-Evans, 1997; Hall, 2013), teacher beliefs (Alexander, 2012), teacher decision making (Basturkmen, 2006; kuzborska, 2011), teacher development initiatives in particular settings (maclean, 1997; Palmer & Posteguillo, 1997; Thompson & de Silva Joyce, 2013), teacher education programmes in a specific geographic context (Howard, 1997; master, 1997), the role of LSP teachers in light of particular policies and educational reforms (Bocanegra Valle, 2012; Taillefer, 2013) and the infrastructure of professional associations and conferences supporting LSP teachers’ professional development (Lafford, 2012). Empirical studies of ESP teachers or teaching appear limited (Richards, 1997; Basturkmen, 2006; Wu & Badger, 2009; kuzborska, 2011) although studies of this nature could be a useful source of information for LSP teacher education. The limited provision of LSP teacher education has been noted by writers. The inadequacy of ESP teacher education in the uS context was highlighted by master (1997) who commented that while most methodology courses on mATESoL programmes mentioned ESP, there was an overall lack of emphasis on ESP and very few programmes offered courses on ESP. This limited provision is noted again by Belcher (2013) who comments that very few language teaching programs offer ESP as a specialisation although some offer elective classes. Howard (1997) surveyed mA programmes in the united kingdom. The survey found only three programmes specialised in ESP. It also found a number of mA programmes offered one module on ESP/EAP. The introduction to a focus issue on LSP of the journal Modern Language Journal (Lafford, 2012) includes two sections particularly relevant to LSP LSP TEACHER EDuCATIon Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-34 21 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 21 teacher education. The section titled “Professional Infrastructure” (page 13) suggests ESP teachers and researchers have been much better served by conferences and associations compared to teachers and researchers of other languages for specific purposes. A further section titled “LSP Researchers/Practitioners” (pages 13-14) reports literature and personal correspondence indicating that a number of LSP teachers in uS and European contexts originally come from degree programmes in traditional language or literary studies, rather than degree programmes in applied linguistics, TESoL, or second language acquisition. 2.1. Role of specialised knowledge Some writers have considered the extent of knowledge of the specific discipline or profession in question that is needed by LSP teacher. one initial description (Early, 1981: 85) pointed out the relatively limited nature of the teacher’s knowledge: The ESP teacher, for the most part, does not in any straightforward sense conform to the image of a knower. It is true that he or she possesses specialist knowledge of the target language which the learner is interested in acquiring; he or she may be fortunate enough to possess some familiarity with the subject matter relevant to the learner’s area of study or concentration. It is more likely, however (…) that the learner will possess far more knowledge in depth in his or her own specialist field than the teacher. Although the LSP teacher of during or post-experience learners may have less knowledge of the specialist field than his or her students, this is far less likely to be the case with teachers of pre-experienced learners (learners who have not yet started studying their target discipline or entered their target workplace role). The question of how much specialised knowledge the teacher needs may thus be a topic that is context-dependant. When teaching pre-experienced learners, the teacher may also be teaching subject content. This was the case described by Hutchinson and Waters (1987) who were working with pre-experience students of technical subjects, which led them to suggest a role for the ESP teacher in teaching subject concepts alongside language. A number of views have emerged over the years on the topic of how much subject knowledge the LSP teacher requires and who is the best person to help the LSP learner (the LSP teacher or the subject specialist). one writer HELEn BASTuRkmEn Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-3422 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 22 believed ESP teachers needed a good attitude towards and interest in the subject area rather than subject matter expertise and such teachers were better able to help learners compared to content experts who tend to take “linguistic and content knowledge for granted” (Taylor, 1994: 14). Ferguson (1997: 84) distinguishes “specialised knowledge”’ and “specialist knowledge” or knowledge of the content of the student’s discipline or subject. Specialised knowledge, on the other hand, Ferguson argues involves three inter-related forms of knowledge: knowledge of disciplinary cultures and values, knowledge of the epistemological basis of different disciplines and knowledge of genre and discourse including genre and discourse-analytic skills. This writer also considered that although specialist knowledge was very desirable, it was not something that could feasibly be provided on LSP teacher education programmes. Discussion of the ESP teacher’s “subject-matter knowledge” is provided in master (2005). This writer reviews differing views with reference to a continuum. At one end of the continuum are views that teacher knowledge of content is a potential obstacle to the true role of ESP teaching and at the other end of the continuum are proposals for a content-based curriculum in which linguistic knowledge is subordinate to subject content instruction. master’s own view was that ESP teachers are usually better prepared to deal with the needs of the ESP student than subject specialist except in highly technical contexts (such as, air traffic control). The team teaching approach developed at Birmingham university (Dudley- Evans & St John, 1998: 152) arose in response to the demands of teaching English to students from highly specialised fields. It was an attempt to avoid the situation in which: The EAP teacher (…) with a smattering of knowledge in the subject area, and a view of himself as an expert on communication (…) comes to regard himself as an expert – or the expert – on how the subject ought to be taught, and even what the subject ought to be. In this approach, instruction involves three parties – the ESP teacher, the subject specialist and the students. The ESP teacher acts as a mediator between the language and subject knowledge by providing language needed to express the content. An example instructional sequence is provided in which the subject specialist (an engineering lecturer) records a lecture, the ESP teacher devises a worksheet of questions on the lecture content and a LSP TEACHER EDuCATIon Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-34 23 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 23 team-taught session is held (students, the engineering lecturer and the EAP teacher). The session focuses on the responses of the students to the question items on the worksheet with the subject specialist providing information as needed on points of content and the language teacher helping with any language points arising. The rationale for the approach was explained in terms of needs – “The student needs to know how his performance is measuring up to the expectations of his teachers and to have immediate assistance with the difficulties as they arise” (Johns & Dudley- Evans, 1985: 141) – and the subject specialist needs to know how effectively he communicates with his students so that communication is improved. The language teacher needs to understand the conceptual matter of the subject so that she/he can fully understand how language is used to represent that structure and where difficulties arise. Further developments on the approach (Dudley-Evans, 2001) describe a shift away from team teaching on lecture comprehension to a focus on writing. The instruction for master level students in engineering described in this work focused on two written genres, the organisation of responses to a particular type of examination question and the writing of a professional genre, the compact specification. Benefits were reported in terms of student learning (they learned the most effective way organising their writing) and for the teachers. The subject specialist was able to see first-hand the kind of difficulties students could have in the writing and the language teacher had the opportunity to use authentic content without getting out of depth. 2.2. Content for the teacher education programme Some suggestions have been made in the literature for content in teacher education programmes. Discussion in the early years suggested teachers of ESP would require additional training compared to teachers of general English language (Strevens, 1988). They would need a grounding in Applied Linguistics, practical experience with the population they would teach, experience in working with subject experts and a willingness to familiarise themselves with some subject matter of the area of ESP (Ewer, 1983). master (2005) suggests two options for ESP teacher education for new teachers, a general ESP track or ESP education for a special category. Topics for the general ESP track (pre-service) option suggested by master included, history and development of ESP, major sub divisions of ESP, ESP skills (such as, writing, reading), materials assessment and development, HELEn BASTuRkmEn Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-3424 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 24 curriculum, assessment and evaluation, administration and an “in-depth focus in at least one area of ESP” (master, 2005: 35). Topics for LSP teacher training suggested by Hall (2013) include language (for example, “How can it be specific?” “What kinds of analysis will be useful?”), specificity (for example, “How specific can we be?”) and purpose (for example, “Whose purposes?”). This writer also suggests teaching and management skills as further topics and that the curriculum can be grouped into three areas, namely, pedagogy, context-embedded language and discourse, and management. A description of the LSP teacher education curriculum offered on the three mA programmes that specialised in ESP in the united kingdom in the late 1990’s (Howard, 1997) found a number of core (non- optional) papers across the programmes. These were discourse analysis, linguistic varieties, methodology, course/syllabus design and materials production. In new Zealand (where I live and work), five universities have mA programmes in Applied Linguistics/TESoL and two of these currently offer an elective course in ESP. “Language Teaching 754 English for Specific Purposes”, I convene at the university of Auckland as one of the course offerings on the mTESoL and Postgraduate Diploma in Language Teaching programmes in the Department of Applied Language Studies and Linguistics. In this context, only a very few of the course participants have had prior experience of teaching ESP or EAP, although a number of them have had some experience of teaching general English language. most expect to teach ESP or EAP at some point in the future. The course can thus be categorised as pre-service or pre-experience teacher education. The aims of “Language Teaching 754” are for participants to develop an understanding of theoretical, empirical and practical aspects of ESP including EAP, and of issues and debates in this field. Specifically it aims to enable participants to develop their theoretical knowledge and skills relating to needs analysis, developing descriptions of specialist discourse and developing courses and materials. A further aim is for participants to become familiar with critical perspectives, current issues and debates in ESP and EAP. The course is organised into four main topic areas: theoretical bases of ESP, investigating needs, researching specialist discourse, issues and procedures in course design. As discourse analysis and corpus linguistics are offered on other papers on the programme, only some attention to these important topics is given in the ESP course (many of the students have studied topics, such as, genre analysis and pragmatic description in their LSP TEACHER EDuCATIon Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-34 25 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 25 other courses). An overview of topics on “Language Teaching 754” is shown below. Theoretical perspectives Branches, characteristics & rationale of ESP key concepts (language varieties, discourse communities, specificity) needs analysis Aims, procedures and approaches Views of language Critical perspectives Researching specialist discourse Aims and procedures Genre, corpus & ethnographic-based approaches Approaches & issues in course design From needs analysis to course aims and objectives Types of course objectives Debates on critical/pragmatic, wide/narrow-angled, study skills/academic literacy approaches Teaching methodologies materials development Issues concerning teacher subject-matter knowledge & collaboration with subject specialists Perspectives on learning and assessment Issues in LSP testing Future trends As the overview above shows, the course focuses on issues and debates in the field as well as areas of knowledge and skills. Although it is hoped that the course would serve the needs of course participants who go onto teach ESP and EAP in the future, the course is essentially academic in nature. As such, the overall goal is for participants to develop an understanding of the field as an area of research and knowledge in applied linguistics. 3. Models of teacher development The teacher education literature distinguishes between pre-service and in- service teacher education. The term teacher development is used to refer to the ways teachers continue to develop beyond initial stages of teaching. Terms such as “learning to teach” (Pachler & Paran, 2013: 692) and “learning teaching” (Scrivener, 2011: 38) refer to teachers’ on-going endeavours to develop a deeper understanding of teaching and learning. HELEn BASTuRkmEn Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-3426 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 26 most suggestions for LSP teacher education programmes described in section 2 of this paper have concerned pre-service LSP teacher education. However, many of the LSP initiatives, courses and projects reported in the literature are written by experienced LSP teachers who faced a specific challenge or need in their teaching context. A number of reports of this nature can be seen in LSP specialist journals, such as English for Specific Purposes, Ibérica and Professional and Academic English: Journal of the English for Specific Purposes Interest Group. The reports by practitioners in the field describe a particular aspect of their work, often in terms of pre-course investigation or course/materials preparation (see for example, Cowling, 2007; martinez, 2011; and Tsuda, 2012). Different models, or conceptualisations, of teacher education have been proposed in the literature on teacher education (Pachler & Paran, 2013). These models include the craft (or apprenticeship) model, the applied science model and the reflective model. The applied science model offers a perspective of education based on received knowledge, that is, knowledge derived from research. In this model the researcher and the teacher are conceptualised as separate and the teacher as the consumer of research (in our case – Applied Linguistics research). The third model, the reflective model, suggests teachers draw on two types of knowledge: received or theoretical knowledge (of Applied Linguistics) and experiential knowledge. The latter is based on experiences from teaching practice. It evolves over time through a recurring cycle of practice and reflection on practice (nunan & Lamb, 1996; murphy, 2001; Pachler & Paran, 2013). In practical terms, reflective teaching involves teachers collecting information and on their teaching and using it as a basis for “critical reflection about their efforts on a language course” (Richards & Lockhart, 1994: 1). The aims are for teachers to gain awareness or insights into their teaching and to take action on what is learnt for the purpose of enhancing teaching. The action might involve exploring instructional innovations, trying out alternatives, and modifying or changing routines in teaching based on what is learnt (murphy, 2001). Teacher decision making is one topic for reflection, although this topic has been relatively unexplored (murphy, 2001). As suggested above the LSP literature includes reports of individual teachers’ initiatives in response to particular situations in their teaching. The reports tend to show how the teachers drew on received knowledge in the LSP literature but went beyond that to create a solution to a particular problem in their own teaching context. These published accounts of have LSP TEACHER EDuCATIon Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-34 27 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 27 made an important contribution to knowledge in LSP. Presumably many other LSP teachers similarly take action on their teaching and create solutions but do not publish reports. It would seem that experienced LSP teachers do explore innovations and try out alternatives based on what they learn from reflecting on their teaching and integrating it with the cumulative body of knowledge from the LSP literature. For example, Cowling (2007) developed a syllabus for intensive modules for a Business English communication course for new employees at an industrial company in Japan. Cowling wished to investigate needs but the new employees did not yet have positions in the company and did not know which positions they would be given. Determining needs was thus particularly difficult and the writer reports how he set about devising multiple methods and drawing on multiple sources for information. A further example, (Tsuda, 2012) reports the development of a course and materials for an ESP course for dieticians in a postgraduate college. Tsuda could not find previous research or existing course descriptions and materials relevant to English for dieticians, which was not an established branch of ESP. The writer therefore had to conduct an initial stage of needs analysis just to gain an overall understanding of the work and communicative needs of dieticians. The report describes this initial stage and collaboration with subject specialists to design the course and project-based instructional tasks. ESP has been described as an essentially teaching and materials-led movement Dudley-Evans & St John (1998). The examples above show ESP teachers reflected on their teaching situations and took the kinds of actions for the purposes of enhancing teaching described by murphy (2001). The reflective model of teacher education appears to provide one way of conceptualising the route by which many innovations and practices in LSP have come about. 4. Suggestions for the research agenda In this section a number of suggestions are made for the research agenda. The suggestions are made with reference to the literature on LSP teacher education. 1. The literature has suggested the set of knowledge and skills (Dudley- Evans & St John, 1998; Hall, 2013) needed by LSP teachers. As suggested HELEn BASTuRkmEn Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-3428 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 28 above, identification of such skills and areas of knowledge (teacher needs) can be used as a basis for determining topics for teacher education. However, to date most suggestions appear to have been informed on the basis of the cumulative body of knowledge of LSP teaching that has evolved historically and which is reported often on a case by case basis in the literature. There have been relatively few “empirical studies” investigating the work of LSP teachers. Evidence from empirical studies investigating teachers’ work, such as materials development and course development processes and decision-making (Basturkmen, 2010; kuzborska, 2011) could be used to inform or support decisions about course content for teacher education. This information could be elicited through self-report data, that is, by asking teachers to describe work tasks, or observational study, such as Johnson’s (2003) study of expert teachers working through the process of materials design. 2. The literature indicates LSP teaching often requires teachers to become researchers as well as teachers (Dudley-Evans & St John, 1998; Basturkmen, 2010; Hall, 2013). A cross-case study of ESP teachers/course developers in the new Zealand context (Basturkmen, 2010) revealed some of the challenges ESP teachers faced in conducting the research necessary for planning their courses, such as difficulties in locating existing descriptions or corpora of specialist discourse or findings previous analysis of needs in similar situations. In recent years ethnographic forms of enquiry in LSP have been proposed (Holliday, 1995; Gimenez, 2001; molle & Prior, 2008; Dressen-Hammouda, 2013) but how knowledgeable are LSP teachers with the methods typically involved in such enquiry? LSP teachers not only often conduct investigations themselves in preparation for course development but are also consumers of the research published in LSP specialist journals and thus may need understanding of the forms of research currently reported in the literature. However, relatively little is known about how LSP teachers transition into the role of researcher and the methods they use in their enquiries. A further suggestion for the research agenda is investigation of the research skills and knowledge needs of teachers of LSP. 3. Particular initiatives developed by individual teachers and programs feature in the LSP literature, for example, Cowling (2007) and Tsuda (2012). The reports of these initiatives and programs offer important insights for the field. The reports tend to provide information on the products (what was developed) and the reasons why they were needed. However, they tend not to describe how the developments came about. Research is needed to LSP TEACHER EDuCATIon Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-34 29 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 29 investigate how experienced LSP teachers continue developing their teaching practice. Researchers could consider the means or processes involved in LSP teacher on-going professional development, to better understand if and how they engage in reflective teaching (murphy, 2001) and other forms of on- going professional development. 4. It is generally recognised that specialised knowledge of the discipline or profession is important in LSP teaching. The literature has shown various viewpoints on what this knowledge should include. However, there has been little investigation into how LSP teachers come to acquire this knowledge. Team teaching is one avenue for the development of the LSP teachers’ specialist knowledge. What the language teacher learned from team teaching with a subject specialist in one setting was described by Dudley-Evans (2001). other options for cooperation and collaboration with subject specialists could be explored. Interviews with LSP teachers might bring to light the role played by collaboration and cooperation in developing their specialised knowledge. Empirical study could shed light on the ways teachers develop this kind of knowledge and the role that particular endeavours, such as collaboration or co-operation with subject specialists, can play. 5. It has been suggested that the opportunities for teacher development provided by the “professional infrastructure” for teachers of other languages is relatively limited compared to those available for teachers of ESP and EAP (Lafford, 2012). However, information on what opportunities there are appears scanty. more information is needed to identify the opportunities for professional development available for teachers of languages other than English for specific purposes. To what extent does this infrastructure serve their needs and interests? 6. The literature has suggested content for pre-experience LSP teacher education. In the paper I described the ESP course developed at the university of Auckland on the mTESoL programme. The course focused on skills and technical areas (analysing needs, ways of investigating specialist discourse, and course/materials design processes) as well as current debates and issues in the field. To the best of my knowledge, researchers have not considered the role or value such knowledge plays (or does not play) in early LSP teaching practice. 7. EAP teaching appears to be an expanding branch of LSP, spurred no doubt by the increase in the numbers of international students enrolling in universities in English-speaking countries, and the move towards English- HELEn BASTuRkmEn Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-3430 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 30 medium education in a number of European countries in recent years (kuteeva, 2011). master (2005) suggested two options: a general track LSP teacher education programme and for a special category. Researchers could investigate the needs of teachers working in EAP and findings could be used to inform decisions on content for EAP teacher education programmes as a special category. 5. Concluding comments The present paper aimed to contribute to the literature on LSP teacher education. It examined the literature on LSP teacher education and suggested that this literature is rather limited. A caveat to this is that although the literature with an explicit focus on teacher education is limited, a good deal of the general literature on LSP provides important information about teaching and thus implicitly addresses the topic. This paper identified themes in the literature explicitly addressing teacher needs or teacher education for LSP. The paper made suggestions for research topics to explore teacher needs and the forms and features of LSP teacher expertise in order to develop further understanding of these topics. [Paper received 3 December 2013] [Revised paper received 9 June 2014] [Revised paper accepted 15 June 2014] References LSP TEACHER EDuCATIon Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-34 31 Alexander, O. (2012). “Exploring teacher beliefs in teaching EAP at low proficiency levels.” Journal of English for Academic Purposes 11: 99-111. Basturkmen, H. (2006). 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(1997). “Five questions for LSP teacher training” in R. Howard & G. Brown (eds.), 58-67. Dudley-Evans, T. (2001). “Team-teaching in EAP: Changes and adaptations in the Birmingham approach” in J. Flowerdew & M. Peacock (eds.), Research Perspectives on English for Academic Purposes, 225- 238. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 31 HELEn BASTuRkmEn Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-3432 Dudley-Evans, T. & M. St John (1998). Developments in English for Specific Purposes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Dressen-Hammouda, D. (2013). “Ethnographic approaches to ESP research” in B. Paltridge & S. Starfield (eds.), 501-517. Early, P. (1981). “The ESP teacher’s role – Implications for the ‘knower-client’ relationship” in The ESP Teacher: Role, Development and Prospects (ELT Documents 112), 42-52. London: The British Council. Ewer, J.R. (1983). “Teacher training for EST: Problems and methods”. The ESP Journal 2: 9-31. Ferguson, G. (1997). “Teacher education and LSP: The role of specialised knowledge” in R. Howard & G. Brown (eds.), 80-89. Fielder, C. (2011). “An EAP course as preparation for academic study in English”. Journal of International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language ESP Special Interest Group 38: 15-23. Forey, G. & J. Lockwood (2007). “‘I’d love to put someone in jail for this’: An initial investigation of English in the business processing outsourcing industry”. English for Specific Purposes 26: 308- 326. Gimenez, J.C. (2001). “Ethnographic observations in cross-cultural business negotiations between non-native speakers of English: An exploratory study.” English for Specific Purposes Journal 20: 169-193. Hall, D.R. (2013). “Teacher education for languages for specific purposes” in C.A. Chapelle (ed.), Encyclopedia of Applied Linguistics, 5537- 5542. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. Holliday, A. (1995). “Assessing language needs within an institutional context: An ethnographic approach.” English for Specific Purposes 14: 115- 126. Howard, R. (1997). “LSP in the UK” in R. Howard & G. Brown (eds.), 41-57. Howard, R. & G. Brown (eds.) (1997). Teacher Education for LSP. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. Hutchinson, T. & A. Waters. (1987). English for Specific Purposes: A Learning-Centred Approach. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hüttner, J., U. Smit & B. Mehlmauer-Larcher (2009). “ESP teacher education at the interface of theory and practice: Introducing a model of mediated corpus-based genre analysis.” System 37: 99-109. Johns, T.F. & T. Dudley-Evans (1985). “An experiment in team-teaching of overseas postgraduate students of transportation and plant biology” in J.M. Swales (ed.), Episodes in ESP, 140-153. Oxford: Pergamon. Johnson, K. (2003). Designing Language Teaching Tasks. Basingstoke: Palgrave. Kuzborska, I. (2011). “Teachers’ decision-making processes when designing EAP reading materials in a Lithuanian university setting.” Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 10: 223-237. Kuteeva, M. (2011). “Editorial – teaching and learning in English in parallel-language and ELF settings.” Ibérica 22: 5-12. Lafford, B.A. (2012). “Languages for specific purposes in the United States in a global context: Commentary on Grosse and Voght (1991) revisited.” The Modern Language Journal 96: 1- 27. Maclean, J. (1997). “Professional participation: A technique for LSP teacher education” in R. Howard & G. Brown (eds.), 158-175. Martinez, I.A. (2011). “Capitalising on the advantages of the Latin American EAP situation: Using authentic and specific materials in EAP writing instruction”. Ibérica 21: 31-47. Master, P. (1997). “ESP Teacher Education in the USA” in R. Howard & G. Brown (eds.), 22-40. Master, P. (2005). “English for Specific Purposes” in E. Hinkel (ed.), Handbook of Research in Second Language Teaching and Learning, 99-115. Mahwah, N.J: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Molle, D. & P. Prior (2008). “Multimodal genre systems in EAP writing pedagogy: Reflecting on a needs analysis”. TESOL Quarterly 42: 541-566. Murphy, J.M. (2001). “Reflective teaching in ELT” in M. Celce-Murcia (ed.), Teaching English as a Second or Foreign Language, 499-514. Boston: Heinle & Heinle. Nunan, D. & C. Lamb (1996). The Self-directed Teacher: Managing the Learning Process. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Pachler, N. & A. Paran (2013). “Teacher education” in M. Byram & A. Hu (eds.), Routledge Encylopedia of Language Teaching and Learning, 692-698. Abingdon: Routledge. Palmer, J.C. & S. Posteguillo. (1997). “A teacher training approach to a degree in English in Philology: Implementing TESP” in R. Howard & G. Brown. (eds.), 202-209. Paltridge, B. & S. Starfield (eds.) (2013). The 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 32 LSP TEACHER EDuCATIon Ibérica 28 (2014): 17-34 33 Handbook of English for Specific Purposes. Chichester: John Wiley & Sons. Richards, K. (1997). “Teachers for specific purposes” in R. Howard & G. Brown. (eds.), 115- 126. Richards, J.C. & C. Lockhart (1994). Reflective Teaching in Second Language Classrooms. New York: Cambridge University Press. Scrivener, J. (2011). Learning, Teaching: The Essential Guide to English Language Teaching, 3rd ed. Oxford: Macmillan. Strevens, P. (1988). “The learner and teacher of ESP” in D. Chamberlain & R. Baumgardner (eds.), ESP in the classroom: Practice and evaluation, 39- 44. London: Modern English Publications in association with the British Council. Taillefer, G. (2013). “CLIL in higher education: the (perfect?) crossroads of ESP and didactic reflection”. ASp 63: 31-53. Taylor, M. (1994). “How much content does the ESP instructor need to know?” TESOL Matters 4: 14. Thomson, E.A. & H. de Silva Joyce (2013). “Language teacher professional development as a pillar of curriculum change”. Professional and Academic English: Journal of English for Specific Purposes Special Interest Group 41: 36-44. Tsuda, A. (2012). “Developing an ESP course and materials for dieticians”. Journal of IATEFL ESP Special Interest Group 39: 23-30. Watson Todd, R. (2003). “EAP or TEAP?” Journal of English for Academic Purposes 2: 61-70. Wu, H. & R.G. Badger (2009). “In a strange and unchartered land: ESP teachers’ strategies for dealing with unpredicted problems in subject knowledge during class”. English for Specific Purposes 28: 19-32. Helen Basturkmen is associate professor in Applied Language Studies and Linguistics at the university of Auckland where she teaches courses in languages for specific purposes, discourse analysis and research methodology. She has published two books on teaching languages for specific purposes (Erlbaum, 2006 and Palgrave macmillan, 2010) and articles in a number of international journals. 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 33 02 IBERICA 28.qxp:Iberica 13 22/09/14 19:19 Página 34