INTRODUCTION

In the teaching of languages, it doesn´t matter whether it is English, Spanish or

Portuguese (i.e. national or international), the most important aspect is the capacity that
people have to produce utterances or sentences and being able to communicate. Having
said this, people studying languages have to be as competent as possible in order to feel
inserted in a society. The focus of this research is on understanding how the Angolans
higher learning institutions of education, in Luanda, manage the English syllabus in use in
the referred institutions; the study investigates whether student´s poor speaking skills is
caused by poor management of the existing syllabus administered in the higher learning
institutions of education in Luanda city..

This dissertation comprises four chapters; the first chapter presents the theoretical
framework about the context of the research problem which is syllabus of English
language in three institutions of higher education, followed by its aims and objectives. In
the second chapter, the focus is on literature review with which several relevant
expressions related to our research are deeply discussed, finally its findings concerning the
research are revealed, such as: curriculum, teaching, syllabus, syllabus-design, at the end
of our literature review, six different types of language syllabus are presented and also
discussed.

Moreover, in the third chapter we move to the research methodology chapter in

which some aspects of qualitative are described, it is followed by the data collection
adopted such as: interview, questionnaire, and observation. In chapter four we provide our
data presentation and analysis of the items collected throughout the interview with
teachers, course coordinators, and head of teaching and investigation departments, as well
as to the questionnaire distributed to students, and observation carried out to some lessons.
Finally, we report the qualitative data of the research and present a conclusion of this
study, followed by its references. (Carlos this introduction should rigorously contain
rationale, the research problem, the object of study and the objectives and the structure of
the dissrtation).

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 CHAPTER 1 - RESEARCH BACKGROUND
1.1. -The context of the research
In the context of our research problems we came across with difficulties such as:
Language program designed without clear aims and objectives; language program designed
without needs analysis; no placement test is done to find out the real level of the students;
language program designed without studying material; large classes and mixed ability
classroom. Despite of all difficulties described above we´re going to work with syllabus
design because it is the one which we feel more comfortable with and consequently, the
only one that we would like to explore deeper because we believe we still can do
something useful to change the current setting and provide something useful and helpful
for our educational system improvement, concretely in the higher education sector.
1.2. - Identification of the research problem
From a previous contact with some teachers, we could find out that the syllabus
of the English subject used at a certain higher learning institution, was designed by a group
of Cuban scholars among teachers and professors. This syllabus was created and intended
for Cuban students of hotel and tourism, and pasted to Angolan students. In this case, no
needs analysis was carried out to find out the real needs, wants and lacks of Angolan
students of hotel and tourism;, such syllabus was something copied from Cuba and pasted
for the Angolan students. The course book used along with the syllabus is a book named at
your pace, which is part English and part Spanish and for this reason most of the times
students found it less helpful because they don´t speak Spanish at all. Many other times,
some teachers also faced a lot of troubles to use those study material because they haven´t
received any training or explanation on how to use that book. That´s why some teachers
avoided to use those materials and prefer to use headway books, face to face or any other
one which he found more comfortable to work with as being more convenient and
adaptable, to the reality of Angolan students of hotel and tourism.
In the second institution , a teacher from non-specialist courses was the one who
designed the syllabus, and according to him, under headway principles which is another
study material not designed according to Angolan student´s needs. So, these are the study
material that teachers use as a way of adapting because they teach in mixed ability classes
in which most students don´t have any background in English. However, they do what they
can not to let students out of English lessons. Finally, in the third institution the syllabus
used was designed by a teacher in the second year of teaching without taking into account
student´s needs and wants because according to him, they only have English lessons only
in the first year.
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1.3. Statement of research problem

This study investigates/seeks to study the role of syllabus in developing reading

skills to students with low language competences. In so doing, the study investigates
principles and techniques employed in designing syllabus for vocational purposes and how
to design study material for the target students. aspects related to a syllabus design of the
English subject which fit Angolans needs, as well as wants, in learners of English as a
foreign language of three higher learning institutions in which English is taught for non-
specialists students in graduation courses such as: tourism management, visual arts, theatre,
teaching of French as a foreign language, primary education, and nursery school teacher.
(Carlos, I think we had defined this clearly!) I am not convinced that build the statement of
research problem in this way! Check this, please!

1.4. Aims/Objectives of the research

Aims
This study follows the following aims and objectives:

To propose a syllabus that helps to elevate general language skills in social settings, to
learners of English as a foreign language of the given institutions of higher education in
Luanda. This is very specific; it cannot be regarded aim. Aim is more general than
objective.

Objectives
- Identify how far the syllabus used currently helps students of English in a foreign
language setting to acquire a solid background in English language;

- To understand how the Angolan institutions of higher education in Luanda manage

the syllabus of English for non-specialty courses.

-
- To Find out what syllabus of english best fits Angolan students needs and wants in
EFL context;

1.5. Research questions (Carlos, did we discuss this as the research question? They so
strange!)

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 Q1 – How far the syllabus of English currently used in the given institutions of higher
education, help students of English in a foreign language setting to acquire solid
background?

Q2 – How do the Angolan institutions of higher education, have managed the syllabus
of English as an optional language?

Q3 – What syllabus of English can best fit Angolan student’s needs and wants in an
EFL context?

Match your research questions with your four objectives.

1.7. - Delimitation of the research

Our research will be delimited in Luanda city, and our target population in this
research will be the students, teachers of English and head of teaching and investigation´s
departments as well as course coordinators from three higher education institutions in
which English is taught as a non-specialty subjects. So we’ll be working with two groups
of each classroom and each institution just to get a sample of how the English syllabus is
devised, designed and managed in each one of the three higher education institutions.

1.6. - JUSTIFICATION

This research has been undertaken because, while running our daily activities, we
´ve come across with many students presenting speaking problems, despite of having a
formal training in the previous grades of high schools and even at University. However, the
insatiate interest in understanding the causes that are on the bases of these attitudes in
speaking of English language awoke a great interest in working with the topic of syllabus
management. We wanted to understand how public higher learning institutions in Luanda
manage the syllabus of English language subject. Furthermore, discover the implications of
this management practices on student´s language performance to what extent or how far,
student´s poor speaking ability is a consequence of poor syllabus design and use this as a
starting point, in trying to come up with some useful measures that can minimize those
negative implications.

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CHAPTER II - LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1. - Curriculum
The expression curriculum has been defined by several scholars as follows:
Kruger (1978) describes curriculum as “the content of all subjects that learners follow
during a particular course” whereas;

Stern (1993) points out that curriculum is used to “indicate either a programme of
studies of an institution, or indicate the substance of what is taught in a given subject”;

Kattington (2010), curriculum or curriculum standards refers to “the standards,

benchmark, and outcomes that delineate the content to be taught and learnt in science
classrooms”;

According to wortham (2006) curriculum is “a planned set of course that is

presented to teachers to arrange teaching and learning in certain level of ages”;

According to Lake and Winterbottom (2010) in Kattington (2010), curriculum is

“a set of rules that benefits students by providing them with practice in both content and
social curriculum through the use of active learning, exploration of interests, civic
responsibility, character building, and recognizing and helping the community”;

Warwick (1976) says that curriculum consists in “the planned structuring of

educational ideals of a school in accordance with the psychological needs of the pupils, the
facilities that are available, and the cultural requirements of the time”.

The statements presented by above made us move to the following discussion: the
definition advocated by krugger in 1987 in which he emphasizes that the content of all
subjects that learners follow during a particular course is called curriculum, comparing to
the one by Stern in 1993 where he stresses that curriculum indicates two aspects which can
be a programme of studies of an institution or indicating the substance of what is taught in
a given subject, as well as the concept provided by Kattington in 2010 in which curriculum
refers to the outcomes that delineate the content to be taught and learnt in classroom

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science. However, we believe that these three scholars’ definitions overlap because it is
clear that in all those statements it is widely stated that the expression curriculum stands
for contents to be taught, these contents are certainly from a given subject and it is
intended for the science of classroom.
So, for those scholars the list of items for students to learn in a particular course
of study, taking place in a classroom is called curriculum, because in one why it is actually
what students follow during a course. On the other hand, it is what in fact indicates a
programme of studies from any type of school from any type of level, indicating the heart
of what is conveyed to students in any subject and finally it refers to the results that
describes the subject matter to be taught by teachers as well as those to be learnt by
students inside the classroom.
In the statements from Wortham in 2006, Winterbottom in 2010, as well as
Warwick in 1976 there is a complete divergence of opinions or ideas, taking into account
that for Wortham curriculum is a planned set of a course presented to teachers in order to
arrange teaching and learning in every or even in a defined level of age. Whereas for
Winterbottom in Kattington argues that for him curriculum is a set of rules designed to
benefit or in benefit of students by providing them with the practice of related not only
with content but also to social curriculum through the use of or practice of intensive
learning in which student´s interests should be deeply explored, bringing or creating on
their minds a civic responsibility; to build their character. In order to recognize and help
the community in which they are part of, on the other hand Warwick states that for him
curriculum consist in the planned structuring of educational ideas of a school in accordance
with the psychological needs of the students, as well as the facilities of school available for
the teaching activity to take place in all aspects without leaving aside the cultural
requirements of the time.
However, among those six authors statement´s presented above, there is a clear
contradiction of viewpoints concerning the definition of curriculum. For instance, Krugger
sees it as the contents of all subjects with which learners are supposed to follow during a
course. Wortham sees it in a different perspective because for him it is a set of classes or a
plan of study also called course that is normally presented to teachers in order to prepare
all the issues related to the teaching and learning process or activity in a given level which
can include form primary to university level. In one hand, Stern believes that curriculum is
used to show or demonstrate two things namely: a programme of studies of an institution
as well as the relevance of what is taught in a subject. On the other hand, Winterbottom in
Kattington argues that curriculum is a combination of rules whose aim is to benefit
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students while providing them with content and social curriculum through the use of active
learning exploring student´s interests; their civic responsibility; how to build a character
without failing to recognize and helping the community.

Another different way of looking at the expression curriculum is presented by

Wortham who sees it as a planned set of course which is normally presented to teachers in
order to arrange teaching and learning activity at every level but Warwick contradicts it
saying that curriculum consist of a planned structure of educational ideas of a school
containing the psychological needs of the students, bearing in minds the existing facilities
and at the same time the cultural requirement of time which is going to be used to carry out
this activity. So considering all those scholars viewpoint concerning curriculum, first we
have to acknowledge that in all statements there is something positive, and the fact of
siding with one definition as being the most suitable bearing in mind the relevance of our
work, as well as the reality of Angolan higher education system doesn´t necessarily mean
that this definition is better than the other ones but it is just the most suitable according to
the core of the study we´re undertaking.
However, after a deep analysis in all statements presented above, we have to say
that we side with the one presented by Winterbottom in Kattington (2010) in which he
stresses that curriculum is a set of rules that should be designed to benefit students by
providing them with practice both in content and social curriculum the use of active
learning, exploration of interests, civic responsibility, character building also recognizing
and helping the community. So, we´ve chose this because it the most complex and
complete definition taking into account the reality and difficulties existing in our
educational system as well as in our society and we believe that it is the one that better
matches the study we are undertaking which is syllabus design.
Another reason for us to side with Winterbottom´s statement is also the fact that
we believe that a curriculum should be fully designed containing a set of principles or rules
whose aim is to benefit students, owing to the fact that learners are the real ones who the
process of curriculum design should be based on taking into account that students are the
center of teaching and learning process, also because we feel that our students should be
provided with practice not only theory, or content but with social curriculum which we
believe to be one completely based on social aspects of a given society accompanied by the
use of active learning, also because we strongly defend that a curriculum should have the
exploration of students’ interests as one of the main aspects to be taken into consideration
while the syllabus is being designed. This curriculum should also contain student´s civic
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responsibility as well as character building so that our student be able to recognize and
help the community in which they are inserted, and certainly the same one which helped
them one day.

2.3. – Curriculum´s main findings data reflection in literature review

In the meantime, as a reflection of our data in our literature review concerning
curriculum, we have to say that in the running of this research. It was possible to realize
that most course coordinators and head of teaching and investigating departments’ in
public institutions of higher education supposedly have English language as the most
important international language in their course curriculum and supposedly their major aim
is that their students master the ability to communicate competently with anyone who
comes across them, but in practical terms it is also very pertinent to say that very few or
almost nothing is done by those responsible to achieve this aim.
This lack of attitude is demonstrated several ways as the ones previously
described along this main findings reflection in our literature review, but another pertinent
finding is that the study material that teachers use, in one way contains a clear language for
the students. Despite of it, it is not appropriate to develop speaking skills for the very
simple fact that the study material is not authentic, i.e. they contain a mostly selected and
academic rather than real world language, which is scientifically proven to be the most
adequate one to boost communication in language learners at any level as advocated by
scholars like Ur (1996) and Kilickaya (2004). However, observing all these difficulties, it
becomes a bit difficult for us to see our curriculum as a set of rules put together to benefit
our students in providing them with practice in content but also in social curriculum
through the use of active learning, in which student´s interests are deeply explored; their
civic responsibility; the building of their character; also recognizing and helping the
community in which they are inserted and make part of, as very well defended by
Winterbottom in 2010, in Kattington 2010 as well.
2.4. – Teaching
A number of different scholars have proposed several definitions for the
expression teaching, as follows:
Nilson and Albertaili (2002), teaching in its broadest sense is the process
whereby a teacher guides a learner or a group of learners to a higher level of knowledge or
skills.

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 Desforges (1995) defines teaching as the management of pupil´s experience,
largely in classrooms with the deliberate intention of promoting their learning;
Schlechty (2004) defines teaching as an art of inducing students to behave in
ways that are assumed to lead learning, including an attempt to induce students to so
behave;
Frimpong (1990) defined teaching as the process whereby a teacher imparts
knowledge, skill, attitudes and values to a learner or group of learners in a way that
respects the intellectual integrity and capacity of the learners with the aim of changing the
behaviour of the learners;
Melby (1994) states that teaching is not merely dispensing subject or lesson-
having, but an art which involves the student in the teaching learning process where the
student is given the chance to participate fully in the process, that the teachers accepts each
pupil and has a favorable attitude towards individual differences.
From the teaching definitions presented above, there is a wide range of clear
controversy but even though, very few scholars viewpoint on teaching definition still
overlap. For instance, Desforges 1995 believes that teaching is the management of pupil’s
experience, largely in classroom with deliberate intention of promoting their learning. So,
whenever the aim is managing pupil´s experience in classroom with a clear intention of
promoting the increase of their learning, consist the core point of Desforges understanding
of the expression teaching. As much in the same way, Schlechty in 2004 believes that
teaching is an art of inducing students to behave in ways that are assumed to lead to
learning, including an attempt to induce students to so behave. Schlechty believes that
finding a way to induce students to promote learning constitutes the heart of his concept
concerning the expression teaching.
Despite of all, Desforges and Schlechty agree at some extent because their
definitions have in common the expression ``learning´´, i.e. in one hand Desforges fights
for the promotion of student´s learning, and as much in the same way, the other one seeks
or searches for ways of inducing students to learning. So, it´s quite clear that both scholars
indirectly share the same ideals, despite of using different ways or methodologies to come
to an end. However, whether it is by promotion as argued by Desforges, or by leading them
to learning as advocated by Schlechty. Then, undoubtedly both ways lead us to the same
objective, which is student´s learning. Differently from those two scholars previously
presented, others also see it very differently, for instance: Nilson and Albertaili define it as
the process through which a teacher guides a learner or a group of learners to a higher level
of knowledge or skills. For them is very clear that teaching entails moving student´s skills
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or knowledge to a further stage or state of understanding, i.e. the ability, or capacity that
students acquire through their teachers, bringing in them the ability or learning state in
order to successfully perform a task at schools or in their community is gained through a
word called teaching.

On the other hand, Frimpong in 1990 used the sentence as the process whereby a
teacher imparts knowledge, skills, attitudes and values to a learner or group of learners in a
way that respect the intellectual integrity and capacity of the learners with the aim of
changing the behaviour of the learners, to refer to the expression teaching. In saying that
Frimpong meant to say that teaching is a process in which a teacher should be able to share
knowledge, abilities, actions and values to a learner or group of learners, in a way that the
intellectual integrity as well as the capacity of the learners, should aim at changing their
own behaviour. Whereas, for Melby, teaching is not merely dispensing subject or lesson-
having, but an art which involves the student in the teaching-learning process, where the
student is given the chance to participate fully in this process, bearing in mind that teacher
accepts each pupil and has a favourable attitude towards individual differences.
So, Melby takes teaching issues so seriously and does not side with a single
student high mark in order to dispense the subject, or simply the fact that they frequently
have lessons, instead, he sees it as an art which entails student´s full commitment and
involvement not only in the learning but in both i.e. in the teaching as well as learning
process, because he believes that teaching and learning process cannot be successful
without student´s entire participation. That´s why, he stresses that students must always be
given the chance to actively participate in this process. As it is teacher´s responsibility to
accept each and every student favourably, demonstrating a positive attitude before their
differences in classroom. For the reasons described we found lawful to side with Melby´s
definition, also because we see it as the most complete, reliable and appropriate definition
according our work, bearing in mind that student´s participation is not yet the expected
one, because most teachers in higher education system are still lesson monopolisers and
don´t allow, nor accept massive and active student´s participation in their lessons, and
consequently in the teaching and learning process as such and as well.
2.6. – Teaching´s main findings data reflection in literature review
As a reflection of our main findings data concerning teaching, we can dare saying that in a
universe of two hundred and forty five students inquired, one hundred and forty eight
agreed that the way their teachers act in classroom help them to improve speaking skills,
which at some extent may be a good indicative of how Angolan students of higher

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education are being given some relevance in the teaching learning process, where the
student as it is widely believed should be given the chance to participate fully in this
process, and for this to happen it is teachers full responsibility to accept each student and
have a favourable attitude toward their individual differences, as advocated by Melby
(1994).
However, we used the expression some extent as well as may be a good
indicative because; and finally are being given some relevance because we also come up
with some data that differs a lot from this information. For example, while using
observation in the classroom in order to triangulate the information previously described
concerning the way teachers act in classroom, it was very obvious to see that the way most
teachers act in the classrooms do not really help students to develop speaking ability, and
consequently it was very clear that students are not yet given the role of a key player in the
teaching and learning process, owing to the fact that in most cases they are not even given
the chance to fully participate in a lesson, needless to mention in the whole process as
such, because during the observation we it was possible to see that most teachers still
monopolise lessons having a speaking time of at about seventy percent of the entire
amount of time devoted to a lesson, creating very few opportunities for students to express
themselves in the target language.
This induces us to believe that our teaching is still face up by some teachers jus as
a mere dispensing subject or lesson-having, because it shows that they do not yet see it as
an art which entails full students involvement, as a sine qua non condition for its entire
success. It is also relevant to stress out that most teachers still don´t accept students
especially background problems as their task, and as a consequence they do not have a
favourable attitude toward those student´s individual differences. So, this behaviour
demonstrates that most teachers still assume themselves as absolute knowers instead of
facilitator, they assume a position of someone who knows everything but doesn´t share it
with their students, because it’s clear that they don´t impart most part of their knowledge,
skills, attitudes and values with their students in a way that respects the intellectual
integrity and capacity of the learners, aiming to change their behaviour as stated by
Frimpong (1990).

Another our research´s main finding that we would like to see reflected in our
literature review is the fact that in a sum up of 245 students, seventy eight elected reading
as their favorite way to learn English, followed by sixty eight who prefer learning English
by listening. Astonishingly, only fifty four like learning English trough means of speaking.

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Numbers are very clear, and they should not tell lies. This is just one way to say that the
way teachers act in the classroom do not help students to acquire neither improve their
speaking skills, otherwise they would certainly like more speaking above all, instead of
reading and listening. The fact of speaking appearing in the third place is just a good
demonstration of it.
However, for the own benefit of our teaching process, first we have to
acknowledge that very few is what we´ve done so far with our students, and that a long
way to go is what still have in front of us. Altogether, we have to assume that we not yet
face up the act of teaching as an art in which we induce our students to behave in ways that
are assumed to lead learning in them, we still don´t achieve this behaviour in our minds as
advocated by Schlechty (2004) . The very first step for our successful headway in this
teaching and learning process is to admit that it has not being going well, and work harder
than we´ve done so far. Another very relevant aspect that we would like to stress is that in
most not to say in every institutions of higher education, there is not a criterion to evaluate
the quality teachers, i.e. teacher´s performance in the classroom, which lead us to say that
we may have any type of people teaching broadly speaking, and English in particular.

The fact of having thousands teachers undertaking teaching activity for more than
fifteen, not to say twenty years, as it was agreed by four out of five teachers in the field of
teaching english as a foreign language but without any clear notion of a theory for the
teaching of english as a foreign language, as agreed by five out of five teachers is another
example of how teaching process is, and has been for a long time at about thirty five or
more. These issues clearly prevent teachers from managing students´ experiences in
classroom with the deliberate, single or simple intention of promoting their learning as
advocated by Desforges (1995). So, this may be an indicative that most teachers may not
deeply master what they think to know, it seems that many of us still don´t understand
what the teaching activity implies as such, and consequently teaching of a foreign
language, because the way we´ve been doing this, is not possible to guide a student nor a
group of students to a higher level of knowledge or skills as stated by Wilson and
Albertaili (2002). When it seems that most teachers undertaking this activity for many
years, still lack of some knowledge and skills on the English language teaching.

Another very important item to remark in our research´s main findings is the fact
that most higher education institutions normally hire people not graduated in english to be
teachers of english for non-specialty courses, and in those institutions lessons normally
take place only once a week. So, this poor quality in the teaching of english as a foreign
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language is also happening because and just like it was demonstrated in our research in
which one of our main findings is the fact that most course coordinators and head of
teaching and investigation departments don´t have any idea of the contents that teachers
provide to their students as it was agreed by six of them, this attitude clearly shows that
course coordinators do not control the contents that their students have been administered.

However, as it was described above, there is a sharing of bad practices among

teachers, course coordinators and head of teaching and investigation departments to say
that those people directly involved in the teaching and learning process should gather
together for the benefit of Angolan students because we´ve identified many reasons that
prevent the success of the teaching of english as a foreign language in our city. Then, to
end up this discussion we have to say that no quality can be expected if those who should
supervise the teaching and learning process are unaware of what´s really going on with
their students.

Another very peculiar feature of our higher education system that we clearly
noticed throughout our research and that we would like to reflect in our literature review is
the fact that most students of public higher education institutions in Luanda, despite of
being studying english for more than three years, as agreed by 104 (one hundred and four)
out of 244 (two hundred and forty four) students, they are still only at beginner level as
clearly defended by 157 (one hundred and fifty seven) out of 244 (two hundred and forty
four) students. So, this may happen due to the fact that they normally have english lessons
only once a week, as it was agreed by 165 out of 244 because it was also possible to find
out that these institutions provide english lessons according to the course specifications.

For this reason, among those three institutions in which english language is taught
as a non-specialty subject, only one of them provide english lessons more than two times a
week, because according to them, though english a not a specialty subject, it is closely
related to their students future work place professional activity, this idea is also supported
by the fact that most students in the three institutions agreed to be learning english for
professional purposes, as it was stated by 91 students, followed by 67 who indicated other
reasons such as: making friends, master the language, and so on.

However, as illustrated above, this is certainly caused by lack of solid

background knowledge foundations from our educational system to our students because it
´s not possible having a subject well administered by an institution during such a long time,

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without being well received by learners, if one of the reasons is undoubtedly students
background knowledge, another cause of this problem may also be the whole educational
structure as such, including teachers, course coordinator, head of department, etc. For this
reason, scholars like Souriyavongsa, Rany; Abidin & Mei (2013) advocated that lack of
proper English foundation background may pose a threat on the quality of education.

So, it is another opportunity for us to question ourselves on how important it is to

create in our students a solid preparation not only in English but in every subject, bearing
in mind that time does not stop and a not well prepared students today, may constitute an
imminent danger for the quality of our education. Whenever it happens, we have to
acknowledge that, it is because we as teachers or as institutions were not able to create on
our students a solid background to allow them to walk by their own. We strongly believe
that three years is time enough to build solid foundations or background knowledge on a
student at any subject which is well administered, that´s to say that if we had created this
knowledge to them, nowadays we would have our students shining brighter than simple
beginners.

It is also extremely relevant to mention that the fact of majority of students

having english lessons only once a week is extremely bad for language learners because it
is widely believed that practice makes perfect so as unfortunately noticed, for many of our
students schools is the only place where they have an opportunity to practice english and
exposure to the target language contributes positively to the raid acquisition of a foreign
language that´s why researchers such as: Pascual (2017) and Tonoia (2014) advocated that
exposure to language may help students in learning and acquiring the skills in the
language, with this being said, we can assure that the more exposure to the language being
studied, the better for the learner of that language especially in an english as a foreign
country setting like ours.

The dominant way in which students want to learn english because of their future
workplace is great because it is at some extent very motivating for our students and very
comfortable for them, knowing that they are learning today an instrument which will
certainly make their professional work easier tomorrow, from there the great enthusiasm
that this idea brings on them. That´s why researchers such as: Ypsiilandis and Kantaridou
(2001) advocated that EPP or English for professional purposes refers to the actual needs
of future professional at work. So, as we see our students deeply motivate to learn the
professional language that they will be using in their work is also stated by Gardner (1985)

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when saying that motivation plays an important role in the successful learning of a foreign
language, whereas Kormos added saying that it explains the reason for a person to invest
time and effort on learning.

2.7. - Syllabus
A number of definitions have been proposed for the term syllabus by different
scholars:
Hutchinson and Waters (1987) defined syllabus as “an expression of opinion on
the nature of language and learning; it acts as a guide for both teacher and learner by
providing some goals to be attained”;

Richards (2001) syllabus is “a specification of the content of a course of

instruction and lists what will be taught and tested”;

Widdowson (1990) interprets a syllabus as “the specification of a teaching

programme or pedagogic agenda which defines a particular subject for a particular group
of learners . . . a syllabus specification, then, is concerned with both the selection and the
ordering of what is to be taught”;

Wilkins (1981) syllabuses are “specifications of the content of language teaching

which have been submitted to some degree of structuring or ordering with the aim of
making teaching and learning a more effective process”;

According to Breen (1984) a syllabus can also be seen as “a plan of what is to be

achieved through our teaching and our students' learning”;

Nunan (1999) defines syllabus as “the subcomponent of a curriculum which is

concerned with the selection, sequencing and justification of experiential and linguistic
content”.

2.8. - Discussion on syllabus perspectives

The definitions provided by Hutchinson and waters in 1987 and the one defended
by Breen in1984 overlap in some extent because Hutchinson and waters despite of facing it
as an expression of opinion on the nature, not only of language but also of learning i.e. the
nature of learning a language. They see it as a guide for teachers and learners or students,
establishing some goals to be attained, as much as in the same way as Breen sees it. As a
15
plan of what is to be achieved which indirectly is or means the goals to be achieved or
attained by means of our teaching followed by the most relevant thing in this process
which is our student´s learning. Contrarily to these two scholars Richards in 2001 sees it
as a list or specification of the content or items of a course of instruction, listing or
mentioning exactly what will be taught or conveyed to students, as well as what will be
tested to them.
However, Wilkins in 1981 and Widdowson in 1990 overlap when saying that
syllabus is a specification of the content of a language teaching which have been submitted
to some degree of structuring or ordering with the aim of making teaching and learning a
more effective process, can certainly be an equivalent of the specification of a teaching
programme or a pedagogic agenda whose aim is to define a particular subject for a
particular group of learners. Another reason why they overlap is the fact that both of them
starting by Wilkins mentions the specification of language teaching content which have
been submitted to some degree of making a structure or order of these contents, intending
to make teaching and learning a more effective process, is similar to Widdowson´s idea of
syllabus in which he uses it as the specification of a teaching programme or pedagogic
agenda for a particular group of learners.

In one way, Wilkins argues that not only the structuring but also the ordering
aims to make teaching and learning process more effective. On the other hand, Widdowson
states that syllabus specification is related to the selection s well as the order in which
contents will be taught to students. So, far away from these two scholars Nunan in 1999
defends that syllabus is a subfield or an extract from a curriculum which is closely related
to the selection; sequence or ordering and the justification to select these contents. The
statement advocated by Hutchinson and Waters in 1987 comparing to the one presented by
Breen in 1984 overlap because both definitions have in common the fact of setting up an
objective, for example Hutchinson argues that a syllabus is a guide not only for teachers
but also for the students in which some goals are to be attained. Whereas, Breen defends it
as a plan of what is to be achieved through the exercise of teaching as well as learning.

Breen understands that a list of items to be achieved through means of teaching as

well as learning practice is called syllabus. In other words, for him these processes cannot
function properly or be successful if there are no clear objectives previously established by
a group of professional composed by stakeholders, teachers and students because this
activity is based on a clearly defined topics of what students whose aim is to improve the
quality of education because this activity is based on clearly defined topics of what
16
students are going to learn, and the ones with which teachers will use to teach with clearly
lesson´s objectives establish by teachers learning objectives by students not to mention the
institution organisation as such by stakeholders. The statements presented above clearly
overlap owing to the fact that both of them establish objectives to be achieved in the
language learning process involving the most important players in this process which are
undoubtedly teacher and students.

However, another definition provided by Wilkins in 1981 comparing to the one

by Widdowson in 1990, and the one by Richards in 2001there is also an overlap of ideas
when it is easily noticed that Wilkins sees syllabus as a specification of contents of
language teaching submitted to some degree of a way to organize these contents in order to
improve the teaching and learning process, making it more effective. As much in the same
way, Widdowson sees it as a specification of a pedagogic agenda defining a subject for a
group of learners. To sum up, this pedagogic agenda plays the role of a programme or a
list of contents whose aim is not different from making teaching and learning process more
effective and efficient, not simply to those professional who deliver the educative contents
(teachers) but also to those who receive it (students).

Finally, Richards in 2001faces it up as a list or specification of content of a given

course of instruction in which it is necessary to list contents not only to be taught but from
there derives a list of those ones that will be tested, though there is a lot of convergence of
view points, there is also so much divergence for example the scholars Hutchinson and
Waters see syllabus in a different perspective than Richards. For them it is seen as an
expression of their opinion about the nature of language, and the nature of learning,
functioning as a lead for teachers and students through the means of establishment of some
goals to be achieved. Referring to this, Richards has a different viewpoint because he sees
it as a specification of the contents of a course of instruction listing exactly what will be
taught and tested.

However, Nunan looks at syllabus as a part of a curriculum which is related to or

deals with selection; sequence and justification of experiential and linguistic content. So,
the linguistic contents which have to be selected accordingly, in which obeying a logical
sequence among them, it is also a must. Just like clear, simple and detailed explanation of
which contents to uses or select for a given group of learners and why it is selected
constitutes the core of Nunan´s definition. As we can see, Richards stresses the relevance
of pointing out or clearly define what contents will be submitted to students and among

17
those contents, also clarify what parts of them will be used to test students in a given
course of instruction or academic level, i.e. from primary, high school, bachelor, master or
even Ph. D degree.

Much controversy can still being evidenced in the definition provided by Breen,
in which he argues that syllabus is a plan of contents to be achieved by the end of a term,
and whole school year by means of teaching and learning practices. Whereas, Wilkins
takes it as a list of contents related to language teaching normally submitted or delivered to
a certain degree or level structuring or organizing it, aiming to turn, not only teaching but
also learning a more efficient and effective process. On the other hand, Widdowson argues
that for him syllabus should be based on a teaching programme which may also be called
pedagogic agenda which is nothing but a list of contents, defining a particular subject for a
particular group of students too. He went deeper saying that syllabus specification should
be concerned with selection of contents, as well as the order to be followed with them,
saying which contents should be taught, and then explaining clearly which ones should be
taught first, second, third and why.
After a long walk over the definitions of syllabus, first of all we have to say that
though we fully agree that a syllabus can also be seen as an expression of opinion on the
nature of language and learning, acting as a guide or lead for both teacher and student, in
which goals established are to be attained, as stated by Hutchinson likewise and at some
extent we see it as a specification of a course of instruction, listing what items should be
not just taught but at the same time tested just like Richards defended it. As much in the
same way, we agree that syllabus can be seen as a plan of things to be achieved through
teaching and our student´s learning, as been those to whom our teaching is intended to. As
Breen stated, it is also true that syllabus can be subcomponent of a curriculum whose
concern is selecting sequencing as well as justification of experiential and linguistic
content as it was defended by Nunan.
Acknowledging that syllabus is or are specifications of language teaching
contents to be submitted to some degree of structuring or ordering aiming to make teaching
and learning a more effective process. We believe that not being uncertain if we interpreted
the expression syllabus as a specification of a teaching programme or pedagogic agenda,
defining a certain subject for a specific group of students. Though in some or a certain

18
extent, we do believe that all of them contain some positive aspects that has helped up the
scholars. The development level that educational scholars in the field of syllabus design
has achieved today, and that we deeply thank of them for the contribution so, according to
the specificity of our topic, as well as Angolan education system of higher education, we
take the most positive aspects form two great scholars in syllabus design field. We care too
much about the quality of our teaching and most importantly what our student´s get from
this, that´s why for us a syllabus can off course be seen as a plan of what is to be achieved
through our teaching and our student´s learning, always aiming to make teaching and
learning a much more effective process because our country needs it.

2.9. – Syllabus´ main findings data reflection in literature review

Another great discovery in our research data that we would like to reflect in our
literature review section is the fact that most syllabuses used in higher education
institutions contain much more drawbacks than positive aspects, as described by five out of
five teachers, in which the fundamental one is absence of needs analysis. These mistakes
are worsen when we find out that most course coordinators and head of teaching and
investigating department do not follow the implementation of the syllabus used in their
institutions, as it was confirmed by one course coordinator and five head of teaching and
investigation departments, at the same time they also can´t estimate whether it helps
students developing speaking skills as defended by one course coordinator and four head
of teaching and investigation departments, so as teachers.

Head of teaching and investigation departments and course coordinators also do

not have any idea of the principles used in their institution syllabus of English design as
agreed by five of them. Due to all these stumbling blocks in the syllabus of our institutions,
is very difficult having quality in education, and this is just one more clear reason of
unsuccessful teaching process that we have. It´s true that it is possible to having a
specification of contents of a course of instruction, and listing what will be taught as well
as tested as argued by Richards (2001), but at the same time it´s also good to say that with
these practices we cannot look at our syllabus as a plan of what is to be achieved through
our teaching and our student´s learning as argued by Breen (1984), because surely we are
not going to achieve that much. As a consequence of that, our beloved students will not
learn as much as they should have learnt in a normal setting.

2.10. - Definition of syllabus design

19
 As much in the same way, a number of definitions have been proposed for the
term syllabus design by different scholars:

Richards (2001) syllabus design refers to “the process of developing a syllabus”;

Nunan (1999) defines syllabus design as “being concerned with selecting, and
sequencing linguistic content and methodology as being concerned with selecting and
sequencing pedagogical procedures”;

Richards and Schmidt (2010) also define the term syllabus design, as a phase in
curriculum development that deals with procedures for developing a syllabus.

Brown (1995) defines syllabus design as a selection and organisation of

instructional content including suggested strategy for presenting content and evaluation.

As we are fully aware that a syllabus derives from a curriculum, because it is

according to Richards and Schmidt it is nothing but a stage or phase in the process of
curriculum development. So, the statements concerning syllabus design provided by these
three authors namely: Richards in 2001; himself again in 2010 together with Schmidt
overlap because it is clearly stated that both definitions stand for processes, stages or
procedures undertaken by specialists in order to carry out a syllabus design development or
development of a syllabus. It is also extremely relevant to stress out that the concept by
Richards in 2001 as well as Richards and Schmidt in 2010, comparing with the definition
by Nunan in 1999 there is a complete divergence owing to the fact that: when 2001 as well
as Richards and Schmidt in 2010 defend syllabus design as a process of developing a
syllabus. Whereas Nunan defends it as being related to the process of selection of contents;
the sequence of contents and the methodology to be used in the teaching process, the
sequence to be obeyed because for him all of this should be based on a pedagogical
procedure that´s why there is a clear difference in these three definitions defended by these
syllabus design scholars concerning this issue.
Analysing deeply those concepts in which we lack some pedagogic items in great
part of our teaching also taking into account the reality of our educational system, we have
to say that though we agree that a syllabus may be or is certainly related to the process of
developing a syllabus. We are much more concerned with the statement defended by
Nunan 1999, in which syllabus design is seen as pedagogically select the accurate or the
most suitable contents to be taught in a given syllabus, also the sequence, link or relation
that they should have, as well as the methodology or methods to be used in order to

20
achieve this goal. Likewise we´ve decided to side with this theory because we believe that
syllabus design process cannot be successfully implemented out of well, careful or deeply
analysed pedagogic procedures, bearing in mind that all professional in the field of
teaching at any level should always base his actions in accordance with pedagogy.
Especially because this science works as a guide for the teaching and learning process, no
matter at what level we are talking about, it should always follow or abbey pedagogical
principals to be more faithfully undertaken this issues.
Another divergence consists on the definitions involving Schmidt in 2010 and
Brown in 1995, this divergence consist on the fact that for Schmidt, syllabus design is
understood as a phase in curriculum development that deals with procedures for
developing a syllabus. So procedures is too vague because an infinite number of them can
be implicit in these words, whereas on the other way, Brown argues that syllabus entails
selection, organisation of instructional contents including suggested strategy for presenting
contents. However, though we believe that every concept presented above contain its
positive as well as drawbacks, for this reason we agree that syllabus design can certainly be
used to refer to the process of developing a syllabus, and consequently being concerned
with selecting and sequencing linguistic content and methodology as being related to
selection and sequencing pedagogical procedures derived from curriculum development.

It’s widely believed that we take all positive points or aspects from all of those
definitions, but very respectfully we prefer siding with Brown 1995because we think that
this definition is the most complete one and which can be easily applied in our educational
system, bearing in mind that we defend having a syllabus designed with the principals of
selection, organisation of instructional contents without forgetting methodology and its
evaluation system. The concepts presented by Richards in 2001 as well as the one by
Schmidt in 2010 also overlap, especially because both scholars look at syllabus design as a
process of developing a syllabus as stated by Nunan, and also advocated by Schmidt when
saying that it is a phase in curriculum development dealing with procedures for developing
a syllabus.

The definitions presented by Brown in 1995 in which he sees syllabus design as a

selection and organisation of instructional content including suggested strategy for
presenting content and evaluation, comparing to the one advocated by Nunan in 1999
where he argues that syllabus design is being concerned with selection and sequencing
linguistic content and methodology as being concerned with selection and sequencing
pedagogical procedures. Both syllabus design scholars overlap because they sees the art of
21
syllabus design as an academic activity which entails selection or selecting, sequences of
linguistic contents based on a certain methodology concerned with pedagogical procedures
as stated by Nunan and agreed by Brown when saying that syllabus design can be defined
as a selection, organisation of instructional content, including the suggested strategy which
is not different from the methodology to be used to achieve this end, together with its
evaluation.
Richards in 2001 and Nunan in 1999 greatly diverge in their definitions of
syllabus design, taking into account that Richards see syllabus design as the process of
developing a syllabus though this process can be too complex nut the activity involved in it
are not clearly specified. So, the process of developing a syllabus may mean a lot, whereas
Nunan believes that syllabus design is just much more complex than that because it
involves a lot of activities such as selection of content to be taught, the logic sequence that
they should contain, and the methodology that teachers are going to use to teach with,
because this methodology is related to the activity done in this process such as the
selection and sequence of pedagogical procedures.

2.12. – Syllabus design´s main findings data reflection in literature review

As a reflection of our main findings concerning syllabus design, we can say that
in an overall of five out of five teachers, agreed that they were the ones who designed the
syllabuses in use in their institutions of higher education. Though they have been
undertaking teaching activities for years, five out of five teachers agreed that majority of
them still very few notion of syllabus design because they may have a program or a list of
contents, as well as the choice of which methodology to use with students, but they often
leave behind the most important aspect in syllabus design process which is the needs
analysis. Aiming to determine student´s wants and wishes, this means that most teachers
despite of designing the syllabus they use, is clear that they do it in an empirical way.

Teachers also can´t mention the principles used by themselves to design the
syllabuses they have been using in their institutions, as demonstrated by three out of five
teachers. So, this shows that most teachers have any notion of the required rigour
demanded in the selection and organisation of contents that will instruct our students for
future, certainly including the suggested strategy or methodology to present them and
grade them, as defended by Brown (1995). However, it´s quite certain that some teachers
are unaware that when designing a syllabus the selection, the sequence of linguistic
contents as well as the required methodology must be related to the selection and sequence

22
of a set of pedagogical procedures, bearing in mind that while teaching, following
pedagogical procedures is a must because pedagogy for teachers, works and is equivalent
to a bible for a christian.

Whatever we do in teaching activity, it must be based on pedagogy, for this

reason, it is always recommended that a professional designing a syllabus knows exactly
first what contents to select, and second why to select them, third what organisation
principle they would obey which is clearly another stumbling block for many of our
teachers, as it was made clear by three out of five who agreed that they do not follow any
principle organisation theory which in other words means that there is no logic
explanations for them to place one content after another one.
2.13. - Types of language teaching Syllabus

2.13.1 - Structural (or formal)

A structural (or formal) syllabus is one in which the content of language

teaching is a collection of forms and structures, usually grammatical, of the language being
taught. Examples of structures include: nouns, verbs, adjectives, statements, questions,
complex sentences, subordinate clauses, past tense, and so on, although formal syllabi may
include other aspects of language form such as pronunciation or morphology.

2.13.2 - Notional / functional

A notional / functional syllabus is one in which the content of the language
teaching is a collection of functions that are performed when language is used, or of the
notions that language is used to express. Examples of functions include: informing,
agreeing, apologizing, requesting, promising and so on. Examples of notions include size,
age, color, comparison, time, and so on.

2.13.3 - Situational
A situational syllabus is one in which the content of language teaching is a
collection of real or imaginary situations in which language occurs or is used. A situation
usually involves several participants who are engaged in some activity in a specific setting.
The language occurring in the situation involves a number of functions, combined into a
plausible segment of discourse. The primary purpose of a situational language teaching

23
syllabus is to teach the language that occurs in the situations. Sometimes the situations are
purposely relevant to the present or future needs of the language learners, preparing them
to use the new language in the kinds of situations that make up the syllabus. Examples of
situations include: seeing the dentist, complaining to the landlord, buying a book at the
bookstore, meeting a new student, asking directions in a new town, and so on.

2.13.4 - Skill-based
A skill-based syllabus is one in which the content of the language teaching is a
collection of specific abilities that may play a part in using language. Skills are things that
people must be able to do to be competent in a language, relatively independently of the
situation or setting in which the language use can occur. While situational syllabi group
functions together into specific settings of language use, skill-based syllabi group linguistic
competencies (pronunciation, vocabulary, gram-mar, sociolinguistic, and discourse)
together into generalized types of behavior, such as listening to spoken language for the
main idea, writing well formed paragraphs, giving effective oral presentations, taking
language tests, reading texts for main ideas or supporting detail, and so on. The primary
purpose of skill-based instruction is to learn the specific language skill. A possible
secondary purpose is to develop more general competence in the language, learning only
incidentally any information that may be available while applying the language skills.
2.13.5 - Task-based
A task-based syllabus and a content-based syllabus are similar in that in both the
teaching is not organized around linguistic features of the language being learned but
according to some other organizing principle. In task-based instruction the content of the
teaching is a series of complex and purposeful tasks that students need to perform with the
language they are learning. The tasks are defined as activities with a purpose other than
language learning, but, as in a content-based syllabus, the performance of the tasks is
approached in a way that is intended to develop second language ability. Language
learning is subordinated to task performance, and language teaching occurs only as the
need arises during the performance of a given task. Tasks integrate language (and other)
skills in specific settings of language use.
They differ from situations in that while situational teaching has the goal of
teaching the specific language content that occurs in the situational predefined product
task-based teaching has the goal of teaching students to draw on resources to complete
some piece of work a process. The language students draw on a variety of language forms,
functions, and skills, often in an individual and unpredictable way, in completing the tasks.
24
Tasks that can be used for language learning are, generally, tasks that the learners actually
have to perform in any case. Examples are applying for a job, talking with a social worker,
getting housing information over the telephone, completing bureaucratic forms, collecting
information about preschools to decide which to send a child to, pre-paring a paper for
another course, reading a textbook for another course, and so on.
2.13.6 - Content-based
A content-based syllabus is not really a language teaching syllabus at all. In
content-based language teaching, the primary purpose of the instruction is to teach some
content or information using the language that the students are also learning. The students
are simultaneously language students and students of whatever content is being taught. The
subject matter is primary, and language learning occurs incidentally to the content learning.
The content teaching is not organized around the language teaching, but vice-versa.
Content - based language teaching is concerned with information, while task-based
language teaching is concerned with communicative and cognitive processes. An example
of content-based language teaching is a science class taught in the language the students
need or want to learn, possibly with linguistic adjustments to make the science more
comprehensible.
2.14. - Discussion on the types of language teaching syllabus
Among those six types of syllabus described above, there is a very remarkable
divergence of perspectives or way of looking at the teaching and learning process, owing
to the fact that when a structural or formal syllabus mostly concerns with the content of
language teaching as a collection of forms and structures, certainly grammatical ones
related to the language which is being taught. A notional functional syllabus deals with the
content of a language teaching as a collection of functions that are performed when
language is being used, or notions that language is being used to express. On the other
hand, a situational syllabus entails mostly a collection of real or imaginary situations in
which language occurs or is used. As for a skill based one, the content of the language
teaching is a collection of specific abilities that may play a part in using language. Then,
for a task based syllabus which is the one much more concerned with a series of a
complete and purposeful task as that students need to perform with the language they are
learning. Finally for a content-based syllabus whose objective is to teach some content or
information using the language that students are also learning.
In the mean time, as illustrated before, all syllabus presented clearly differ in
terms of main idea because they stand for completely different principles of language
teaching or beliefs, but it is also extremely relevant to stress out that if we take careful look
25
at the examples on how each one of them act individually we will reach the conclusion that
they also have something in common, i.e. slight parts in which they overlap. For example,
in structural syllabus activities are performed by means of grammatical functions of the
language being taught; such as nouns, verbs, statements, adjectives, questions, complex
sentences, etc. including pronunciation and morphology.

Whereas in notional activities are done through a series of functions performed

when language is used which include: informing, agreeing, apologizing, requesting and
even size, age, color, comparing time, etc; on the other hand, in the situational deals with a
collection of real and imaginary situations; such as: seeing the dentist, complaining to the
landlord, buying a book at a bookstore, etc. whereas in a skill-based it is developed
thorough a collection of specific abilities that may play a part in using language such as:
listening to spoken language for the main idea, writing well formed paragraphs, taking
language tests, etc. while in a task-based a series of complex and purposeful tasks that
students need to perform with the language they are learning such as: applying for a job,
talking with a social worker, setting housing information over the telephone, etc. Finally
for a content-based syllabus, activities are done by teaching some contents information
using the language that the students need or want to learn, possibly with linguistic
adjustments to make the science more comprehensible.

So, respecting all the differences mentioned above, we´re saying that those
syllabus still overlapping in some aspects because the forms and structures in structural as
well as the functions in notional, the real and imaginary situations in situational, likely the
collection of specific abilities in skill-based, and even the series of complex and purposeful
tasks in a task based, until the teaching of some content or information are all developed
through grammatical items or forms such as: nouns, verbs, adverbs, adjectives, and so forth
and so on, because it is widely believed that we cannot operate a language properly without
its grammatical structure.

Though for some syllabuses design or language teaching theory or method that
they may not play the same role or have the same amount of relevance, for example,
despite of the forms and structures in structural syllabus which are directly assumed to be
grammatical ones, we also have to mention that the functions in notional such as agreeing,
apologizing, size, color and so on. Are undoubtedly grammatical functions because all of
them have a grammatical name and cannot work alone in a sentence without the auxiliary
of other grammatical components for example: agreeing and apologizing are verbs, the

26
words size and color are nouns, the real or imaginary situations in situational in situational
syllabus cannot be performed completely out of grammatical structures.

Moreover, whether it is a real or imaginary situation grammar is always present

there, the collection of specific abilities in skill-based also cannot be undertaken without
using grammar, the series of complex and purposeful tasks in a task based also entails
using grammar. Finally in the teaching of any content or information grammar is also
present so, we cannot completely separate grammar from language, because it´s widely
believed that they walk together i.e. hand by hand, though for some language teaching
principles, methods or theories they may not be given the same relevance or role, but it is
and will always be present in language.
On the other hand, it´s crucial to acknowledge that no syllabus type is better than
the other one, but instead, each one of them undoubtedly contains strong as well as weak
points, with this being said, we mean that whoever is designing a syllabus must
automatically bear in mind and take as much as advantage as possible of the each
syllabuses strong aspects in order to design a syllabus that best fits the reality of the setting
in which the syllabus is to be applied, but especially taking into account student´s needs,
wants or preferences, in terms of contents, without looking down on other relevant aspects
such as their age, class size, and fundamentally the methodology to be used in order to
achieve the objectives and aims previously established for that syllabus.
To sum up, taking into account the reality lived by the Angolans students of
higher education in which lack of massive speaking activities, certainly motivated by
inexistence of in as well as out, classroom speaking activities, we think that the most
adequate syllabus for our type of students is the one which lays in the principals or features
of communicative language teaching approach as its fundamental core such as: the
emphasis on learning to communicate through interaction in the target language; the
introduction of authentic texts into the learning situation; the provision of opportunities for
learners to focus, not only on language but on the learning process itself; an enhancement
of the learners own experience as important contributing element to classroom learning; as
well as a clear attempt to link classroom language learning with language activities outside
the classroom, as advocated by Nunan (1991).(Carlos, you might have packed too much
information, or you need to prone much of your information to make it meaningful)

27
CHAPTER III
Research methodology
3.1 - Research methods
A systematic and rigorous way of collecting and analyzing information,
quantitative researchers use a wide variety of instruments to gather data, including test,
questionnaire, and rating scale. In qualitative research this includes, for example,
participant observation, interview, verbal report, diary study, and discourse analysis as
stated by Heigham & Croker (2009).

3.2 - Research methodology

As advocated by Kothari (2008), Heigham & Croker (2009), a theory of how inquiry
should occur;, Research methodology defines the kinds of problems that are worth
investigating and frames them, determines what research approaches and research methods
to use, and also how to understand what constitutes a legitimate and warranted explanation.
Research methodology involves such general activities as identifying problems, review of
the literature, formulating hypotheses, procedure for testing hypotheses, measurement, data
collection analysis of data, interpreting results, and drawing conclusions. Researchers need
to understand the assumptions underlying various techniques and they need to know the
criteria by which they can decide that certain techniques and procedures will be applicable
to certain problems and others will not. For example, an architect, who designs a building,
has to consciously evaluate the basis of his/her decisions, i.e., s/he has to evaluate why and
on what basis s/he selects particular size, number and location of doors, windows and
ventilators, uses particular materials and not others and the like. Similarly, in research you
have to expose the research decisions to evaluation before they are implemented. You have
to specify very clearly and precisely what decisions you select and why you select them so
that they can be evaluated by others too.
Research methodology has many dimensions and RESEARCH METHODs do
constitute a part of the research methodology. The scope of research methodology is wider
than that of research methods. Thus, when we talk of research methodology we not only
28
talk of the research methods but also consider the logic behind the methods we use in the
context of our research study and explain why we are using a particular method or
technique and why we are not using others so that research results are capable of being
evaluated either by the researcher himself or by others. Why a research study has been
undertaken, how the research problem has been defined, in what way and why the
HYPOTHESIS has been formulated what data have been collected and what particular
method has been adopted, why particular technique of analyzing data has been used and a
host of similar other questions are usually answered when we talk of research methodology
concerning a research problem or study. Thus, research methodology consists of all general
and specific activities of research.

3. 3 - Qualitative research
A RESEARCH METHODOLOGY that places primary importance on studying
small samples of purposely chosen individuals; not attempting to control contextual
factors, but rather seeking, through a variety of methods, to understand things from the
informants’ points of view; and creating a rich and in-depth picture of the phenomena
under investigation. There is less of an emphasis on statistics (and concomitant attempts to
generalize the results to wider populations) and more of an interest in the individual and
his/her immediate context. By definition, qualitative research is synthetic or holistic (i.e.,
views the separate parts as a coherent whole), heuristic (i.e., discovers or describes the
patterns or relationships), with little or no control and manipulation of the research context,
and uses data collection procedures with low explicitness.

Qualitative research has roots in a number of different disciplines, principally

ANTHROPOLOGY, sociology, and philosophy, and is now used in almost all fields of
social science inquiry, including applied linguistics. Qualitative research is the primary
example of HYPOTHESIS-GENERATING RESEARCH. That is, once all the data are
collected, hypothesis may be derived from those data. The ultimate goal of qualitative
research is to discover phenomena such as patterns of behavior not previously described
and to understand them from the perspective of participants in the activity.

3.4. – Research Instruments

In our research we´ve decided to use three methods or techniques for data
collection such as: Interview; Questionnaire and Observation. This research study was
conducted in three institutions of higher education located in Luanda city. Teaching
English subject as a non-specialty subject in the courses of tourism management; visual

29
arts; theatre; teaching of French as a foreign language, primary education; and finally
nursery school teacher.

3.5. - Interview
The first technique used was interview, which is a method in which an
interviewer asks questions to an interviewee. So, in order to collect the data from the
interviewee, who provides the required information, we´ve carried out open-ended
interviews to five teachers of English as well as to one course coordinator and four head of
teaching and investigation department, teaching and coordinating non-specialty courses in
three institutions of higher education in Luanda. In one way because just like we are
working with a qualitative discourse analysis, we´ve decided to use qualitative interviews,
which consist of open-ended questions and provide qualitative data. Qualitative interview
also called depth interviews were chosen because they can be used to provide in-depth
information about a participants thoughts, beliefs, knowledge, reasoning, motivations, and
feelings about a topic. Concretely in this case qualitative interview helped us to obtain in-
depth information about syllabus design related issues, seen that we entered the inner
world of each participants in the interview process and with that, we gained an
understanding of those people’s perspective on how syllabus is managed in higher
education institutions of Luanda city.
On the other hand, we´ve undertaken structured interviews also called
standardized open-ended interview which is the one in which the organization and
procedure of the interview, as well as the topics to be asked about, the questions, and the
order in which they will be presented, have all been determined in advance. They were
used with these group of people first because, they are a very limited number of people,
and second because we wanted to have a face to face conversation with those people that
are directly involved and in charge of the English language syllabus implementation in
higher education institutions of Luanda city. So, in order to collect the required
information according to the questions prepared, we´ve conducted a twenty minutes
interview to each one of the professional described above, in accordance with their
availabilities. The disadvantages of this type of interview is that it involves a prescribed set
of questions which the researcher asks in a fixed order, and which generally require the
interviewee to respond by selection of one or more fixed options, leaving little or no

30
freedom to make modifications. Whereas the advantageous are that this type of interview
ensures rapid data coding and analysis, easy quantification of data and consequent
comparability of responses and guaranteed coverage of the area of interest to the research,
in addition to be used in situations where a questionnaire would not be feasible as
advocated by Tavakoli (2012).
3.6. – Questionnaire
T he second instrument of data collection chosen was questionnaire. A
questionnaire is a self-report data-collection instrument that each research participant fills
out as part of a research study. By choosing this method whose targets were the students,
was due to the fact that questionnaires are easy to construct, extremely versatile, which
means that they can be used successfully with a variety of people in a variety of situations
targeting a variety of topics, and also because it is the uniquely technique capable of
gathering a large amount of information quickly in a form that is readily processable.
Moreover, accordingly with what we wanted, which is obtaining the largest amount of
information as possible in a row from students, bearing in mind that they were a big
number of people and because we believe that it wouldn’t certainly be possible if we had
adopted another instrument to achieve such a big number of students, also because of the
amount of time that we could have taken if we had chosen another one. So, questionnaires
were applied to two hundred and forty four (244) students from three different institutions
of higher education in Luanda city, attending lessons in seven different courses. Another
reason for us to choose this technique with students is because trough questionnaire we can
obtain information about the thoughts, feelings, attitudes, beliefs, values, perceptions,
personality, and behavioral intentions of research participants. In other words, we can
measure many different kinds of research participant´s characteristics using questionnaires.
However, we´ve used a mixed questionnaire, mixed because it was composed
by two types of questions, namely: open and closed ones. First we´ve used Open-ended
questions because it is a type of question that allows participants to respond in their own
words, that´s why in order to allow students to respond freely, i.e. accordingly to their
understanding of the situation which was being investigated, in this case syllabus design
management issues. We decided to give them a certain freedom in responding those
questions. Whereas, on the other hand, we used the Closed-ended questions because we
wanted to limit our participants to choose from a set of predetermined responses, taking
into account the ones that we had already prepared, in order to facilitate us in the data

analysis and codification. Then, students were submitted to a thirty minutes structured

31
questionnaire, containing seven open-ended questions, as well as seven closed-ended
questions, making a sum up of fourteen questions, extracted from a well structured
questionnaire, which is the one which is used when researchers have a clear idea about the
range of possible answers they wish to elicit.
There are a number of advantages of this approach to asking questions. Firstly,
respondents could fill in the questionnaire themselves, which means that it could save the
researcher’s time both in interviewing and in travelling to where the respondent lives.
Secondly, a standard format can minimize the effect of the way in which a question is
asked of the respondent and on his/her response. A third advantage of this technique is that
the responses are more immediately quantifiable. However, questionnaires have also some
limitations such as: simplicity and superficiality of answers, respondent literacy problems,
and little or no opportunity to correct the respondents’ mistakes as argued by Tavakoli
(2012).
3.7. - Observation
The last method used was observation which is a data collection method of
generating data which involves the researcher immersing himself in a research setting, and
systematically observing dimensions of that setting, interactions, relationships, actions,
events, etc., within it. We have chosen this technique because while collecting data using
observational techniques, we provide a careful description of subjects’ activities without
unduly influencing the events in which the subjects are engaged. In addition to it, one of
the distinctive features of observation as a research process is that it offers the opportunity
to gather live data from naturally occurring social situations. Moreover, in our field which
is applied linguistics, this can include a classroom or teachers’ room, or any environment
where language use is being studied, such as a bilingual family home or a work
environment that is bilingual or has nonnative speakers. Another advantage of observation
is that the researcher can look directly at what is taking place in situ rather than relying on
second-hand accounts.

The reason of choosing to undertake observation sessions was also motivated for
the objective of triangulating some information obtained from other instruments of data
collection such as: interview and questionnaire. At first, we wanted to confirm some
teacher’s interview responses concerning syllabus design; management of the English
lessons; as well as other classroom management aspects. On the other way, we tried to
confirm the information provided by students throughout their responses while they were

32
filling up the questionnaires, in which we wanted to check some learning aspects, for this
reason we´ve undertaken some observation sessions to accomplish it.

Triangulation which is a procedure which refers to the generation of multiple

perspectives on a phenomenon by using a variety of data sources, investigators, theories, or
research methods with the purpose of corroborating an overall interpretation. The reason
for us to use triangulation is because it has been considered as an effective strategy to
ensure research validity by cross-checking the validity of findings, bearing in mind that in
case a finding survives a series of tests with different methods, it can be regarded as more
valid than a hypothesis tested only with the help of a single method.

However, four out of five teachers from three different institutions of higher
education participating in this research process had their lessons observed during two
weeks. Structured observations sessions took place in each one of the three institutions and
aimed at analysing four classroom management aspects owing to the fact that structured
observation will know in advance what it is looking for, and will have its observation
categories worked out in advance. For this reason, we´ve organised our agenda as follows:
first to check the general level of students, i.e. whether they speak some English or not;
second to check whether the lessons are student-centered other than teacher, i.e. the ones in
which students are mostly provided with real opportunities and situations to produce
language, increasing their general as well as academic language background; third to check
whether the methodology teachers of English use, is the most suitable for students in an
English as a foreign language context; and finally, to check whether these methods in fact
help students to develop their speaking skills.
Our observation sessions were based on two fundamental aspects namely:
qualitative and quantitative. In one way it stood for qualitative observation because it is
usually done in natural settings; develop hypotheses and theoretical explanations that are
based on the interpretations of what we observe. In our case we preferred to study the
world as it naturally occurs, without manipulating it. Though there was also an option to
develop hypotheses and theoretical explanations that are based on the interpretations of
what we observe. Yet, in this concrete case, we´re not focused in developing any
hypotheses, rather, it is our intention to develop theoretical explanations that are based on
the interpretations of the phenomena that we´ve observed. Owing to the fact that, as it is

33
qualitative researcher´s main features, we prefer to study the classrooms which is our
world as it naturally occurs, without having the necessity to manipulate it.

On the other way, our observation stood for qualitative or structured observation
because it involves the standardization of all observational procedures in order to obtain
reliable research data. It often involves the standardization of each of the following
aspects: who is observed, i.e. what kinds of people are to be studied, such as teachers or
students. In our case, it´s quite clear that we´ve observed teachers and students; what is
observed, i.e. what variables are to be observed by the researcher, such as time on task or
out-of-seat behavior, for this case we´ve observed items such as: the general level of
students; the type of lessons if they are student or teacher-centered; the methodology
teachers of English use for English as a foreign language learners; and finally check
whether these methods in deed help students to develop their communication abilities;
when the observations are to take place i.e. during the morning hour, during break time.
In our concrete case our observation sessions, took place during the afternoon i.e. from
twelve to six p.m; where the observations are to be carried out (in the laboratory, in the
classroom, in the lunchroom, in the library, on the playground), In this case, our
observations were undertaken in the classroom of three different institutions of higher
education placed in Luanda city as in Tavakoli (2012).

34
CHAPTER FOUR - DATA PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS

You may need introductory remark here, to establish the bridge between
the previous chapter and this one
4.1.1 - QUESTIONNAIRE WITH STUDENTS

We found it really interesting submitting what? to students to fill up questionnaire sections

first, because we wanted to collect the largest amount of information possible from those
whose teaching and learning process is all about, i.e. students. Taking into account that it
wouldn´t be possible with another data collection technique, such as interview due to the
short amount of time available to carry out this research project. So, we´ve decided to do it
because improving methods on how well students can learn the English subject is our top
priorities, from time to time. This process focus on how to improve the way teachers
perform in classrooms, as well as the way learners acquire the information conveyed. That
´s why, we wanted to have a direct contact with learners i.e. try to understand their view
point, difficulties, preferences, on the way our higher education works in the teaching of
the most international language which is undoubtedly the English language (Carlos, what
is your focus here?).

4.1.2 - Student´s language background

This thematic aimed at finding out the students’ linguistic competence in English,
since they have been learning English for more than three years. In order to better devise
and then design a syllabus, it is always vital to know the background that students have, to
help us in designing study material and classroom management related issues. According
to the results, one hundred and fifty seven (157) students agreed that their level of English
is beginner whereas thirty five (35) agreed to be at elementary level; thirty one (31)
students said to be at intermediate level; eleven (11) students assumed to be at pre-
intermediate; five (5) students provided invalid answers, and only three (3) students are
advanced and finally two (2) are upper-intermediate.(this is the part of presentation of
finding for this question).

35
 Student’s answers do not go in line with the researcher´s purpose, because their
answers has demonstrated that the majority of learners in the three institutions, learners
who have been exposed to English lessons since secondary school, today at university, but
they are still are still at beginner level because most of them still have serious language
background problems. This fact leads us to say that despite of having English lessons
during all this time, students still have so many background problems, that´s why ``Lack of
proper language background may pose a threat for the quality of education as well´´, just
as in (Souriyavongsa, Rany, Abidin, & Mei, stated 2013).
Students are still struggling to succeed in obtaining better performance in English
language learning; this situation may be caused by several classroom management related
problems such as: low lesson quality; lack of study material; lack of qualified teachers;
lack of teaching experience; inappropriate study material because it was not designed
according to according to Angolan student´s reality such as needs and wants; monopolized
lessons; lack of authentic teaching material; lack of equipped classrooms with audio and
video material, providing students with real language learning environment, and so forth
and so on. However, all these elements described may certainly pose a threat on the student
´s formation background knowledge, because they constitute a clear stumbling block for
our student´s best achievements in English as described above.

4.1.3. - Period of which they have been learning English

This theme intends to find out the period of which the learners have been
studying English According to the results, one hundred and four (104) students agreed that
they have been studying English for more than three (3) years. Whereas seventy four (74)
have studying English for only one year; thirty three (33) have been studying it for two (2)
years; and at about twenty three (23) have been studying this language for three (3) years.

Student’s answers go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has

demonstrated that learners who have been exposed to several English lessons since
secondary school still find it difficult to communicate in the target language. That´s why
we can say that most of the students in public institutions of higher education in Luanda
have been studying the English language for more than three years, but still find it difficult
to communicate in the target language, for this reason, in 2006 Bueno, Madrid, & Mclaren
Many suggested that learners state that they have spent so many years studying English
language but cannot speak it appropriately and understandably.

36
 The figures described above are clear and they suggest that sometimes
performing a task for several years may not mean master it, i.e. doing it correctly, a good
example of it, is the more than three years with which our students have of been studying
English in levels such as secondary and high school without favourable results. At the
same time, we also strongly believe that whenever the background is very well established
there is no way for you to take such a long time performing a task or the same activity
without mastering it. For us, in normal situations studying a subject for three years should
be enough for students to acquire solid background knowledge because practice makes
perfect so says the old saying, with this being said, believe that there may have a flaw in
the teaching process which prevents students from learning the English language
competently.

4.1.4. - Reasons for studying English

This topic aimed at finding out the reason why students learn English as a foreign
language. We believe finding out our student´s real language level or background, is very
crucial for the success of our syllabus design and classroom activities development. ninety
one (91) of students agreed that professional purposes, is one of the reasons why they learn
the language, whereas sixty seven (67) indicated other reasons such as: to make friends, to
master the language, to interact with tourists, to increase knowledge and so forth and so on;
forty four (44) do it by academic reasons; thirty two (32) for communication purposes and
finally we´ve also had ten (10) invalid answers.

Student´s answers go completely in line with the researcher’s objective because it

has demonstrated that most of the students in public institutions of higher education in
Luanda have as their goal, the learning of the English language for professional purposes.
That´s why Ypsilandis and Kantaridou (2007) say that English for Professional Purposes
(EPP) refers to “the actual needs of (future) professionals at work”. The spread of science
and technology all over the world, together with the internationalization of the university
world and the globalisation of the world economy has made the English language the
current lingua franca of international communication. Specialised languages and
professional jargons usually refer to the specific discourse used by professionals in order to
communicate and transfer information and knowledge. It is widely believed that employed
people no matter if in a public or private company tend to spend much more time at their
work places rather than home.

37
 So, they are highly motivated in mastering the learning of English for
professional purposes as their future work place language rather than learning the English
language for other objectives. We know that motivation plays an important role in the
successful learning of a foreign language as advocated by Gardner (1985); Kormos &
Csizér, in (2008), they also say that this is the reason because it explains a person's reasons
to invest time and effort on learning. Moreover, the expected outcomes make the learning
process more rewarding as stated by Ryan & Deci, in 2000. The results demonstrated
above show that students are very motivated in learning the tool with which they are going
to use daily in their work places, one of the reasons is because it will guarantee some
professional success, using an internationally recognised instrument which is the English
language. This will certainly make them invest more time for the learning of English for
professional purposes.
4.1.5. - Admission criterion
This topic intends to find out whether the higher education institutions undertake
an admission test for students of English studying in non-specialty courses, bearing in
mind that very frequently, students with very low background and students with no notion
of English language are admitted to universities. The number of people with very low
background in English was one of the main reasons for us to be curious about finding out
the student’s admission criterion for institutions administering English for non-specialty
courses. One hundred and ninety three (193) agreed that they don´t sit for any admission
test in English. Whereas, forty nine (49) answers are invalid and two (2) students said that
they do sit for an admission test.
Student’s answers go in line with the researcher´s purpose and at the same time,
they responded faithfully the research question who intended to know whether there was
any criterion for admittance of students in English as an optional language, because it has
demonstrated that the public institutions of higher education in Luanda undertake or carry
out their admission tests, according to the specialty of the course, with this being said; we
can safely ensure that public institution of higher education in Luanda do not require
English tests for non-specialist courses. This fact lead us to believe that TOEFL test could
be done in our country, in order to bring some improvement on EFL teaching, not to be an
exception, the way it happens in many most developed higher education systems and
countries in many parts around the world in which English is taught as a foreign language,
English proficiency tests is necessary as a valid test to measure student’s English
capability. However, TOEFL (Test of English as Foreign Language) is the most popular
test used in many countries in all over the world.
38
 Clark (2014) stated that according to ETS (Educational Testing Service), the
TOEFL test is used by more than 9.000 colleges, universities and agencies in more than
130 countries to help them make admissions decisions, making it the most widely accepted
English-language test in the world. A reported 27 million people had taken the TOEFL test
in the world. We believe to be very pertinent that our country´s authorities could take
serious and extremely urgent measures to implement an admission criterion test intended
for students of non-specialty courses, bearing in mind that lack of non-specialty student´s
admission test means inexistence of best student´s selection method, which certainly
implies having all type of students in these courses because there is no way to select the
best ones. So, receiving multi-low abilities students in which we have students with very
low backgrounds in English and even students with any notion of the language, so an
application of an English test as an admission criterion would be great for the quality of
our education too.
4.1.6. - Student´s number of lessons per week
This thematic aimed at finding out the frequency of which they have lessons per
week. In making this question we wanted to find out the number of times students have
English lessons, in order to match it with the syllabus to be created, it must state clearly the
number of times that students are going to have English lessons during a week. One
hundred and sixty five (165) agreed that they have English lessons only once a week.
Whereas seventy four (74) said that they have it twice a week and four (4) students have it
three times a week.
Student’s answers go in line with the researcher´s purpose because, it has been
demonstrated that whenever learners are less exposed to English lessons i.e. taking place
only once a week, this lack or short amount of time, causes them to face a lot of difficulties
in communicating in the target language. On the other hand, we could see that the public
institutions of higher education in Luanda, have English lessons according to the
specificity of their courses that´s why among those three institutions inquired, having
English as non-specialty course, only one of them have English lessons, twice a week
because according to them, though the language is not part of the specialty subjects, it is
closely linked to their future daily work activity. Whereas the other two institutions have
English lessons only once a week, which they recognize is not enough even if the nature of
the course and future professional activity doesn´t demand them to be using English very
often. For this reason, exposure to the language may help students in learning and
acquiring the skills in the English language, as evidenced by a number of researchers such
as Ferdous (2013); Olmedo (2015); Pascual (2017); and finally Tonoian (2014).
39
 Very limited number of hours which learners are submitted to in English lessons
may certainly pose a threat in the student´s achievements in this subject as describe by the
scholars above. Then, we know that there are institutions in which English lessons take
place ounce a week, and a ninety minutes lesson for an EFL context is undoubtedly very
short amount of time. By anecdotal evidence we can say that the majority of our students
only have some opportunity to practice English during the lessons, so, judging from this
reason, we easily reach the conclusion that for learners in an EFL setting, the minimum
exposure to English lessons per week should be one hundred and eighty hours per week,
which means, they should have lessons at least twice a week. It could be more but, taking
into account other subjects that are also essential for the instruction of a student we have
this suggestion. Though two lessons per week is not that much, but it is completely
acceptable because students would have the minimum amount of time to learn something.

4.1.7. - Student´s length of lessons per day

This topic aimed at finding out the target population´s length of lessons during a
day. We found relevant to make this question because we wanted to find out whether
students are submits to enough number of hours per lessons during a day. According to the
results obtained, in this topic, one hundred and forty four (144) out of two hundred and
forty four (244) students agreed that their English lessons per day take ninety (90) minutes.
Forty eight (48) students said that their English lessons take two (2) hours; forty three (43)
students have it in one (1) hour, finally we´ve had eight (8) invalid answers.

Student’s answers go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has

demonstrated that whenever learners are exposed to very few English lessons, lasting only
ninety minutes, this very low amount of time devoted to lessons may also cause students to
find a lot of difficulties in producing language. Brown (2001, p.149) claims that the term
“lesson” is popularly considered to be a unified set of activities that cover a period of
classroom time, usually ranging from forty to ninety minutes. So, we can say that the
public institutions of higher education in Luanda are unanimous in devoting ninety minutes
in a lesson composed of forty five minutes each. Therefore, it is not enough time to be
devoted to subjects related to language teaching and learning, because they´re one of those
who require more amount of time.

Though a forty five minutes lessons is acceptable because it seems to be an

international format, we humbly believe that a forty five minutes lesson multiplied by two
is not that much to achieve faithfully all the lessons objectives. Unfortunately we believe
40
that not much can be done to change the number of minutes devoted to a single lesson, if
we could provide our opinion and suggestion, it would be having a sixty minutes lesson i.e.
increasing fifteen minutes in the current forty five ones. We believe it would best fit the
demanding of the English teaching language of the modern world, like it is today.
Exposing EFL learners to real language environment added to the most possible amount of
hours, could be very advantageous and very fruitful for learners taking into account the
other subjects they have and also because classroom is for great part of them, the only
place in which they get in touch with English language, meeting classmates to practice
with. Unless, in addition to public school lessons students are also attending lessons at an
English course that normally is a very reduced number of students. Then, lessons should be
longer and fruitful for learners at the point of creating real language learning opportunities.
4.1.8. - Student´s frequency for speaking exercises
This thematic intended to finding out the target population´s number of times
devoted to classroom speaking activities. We found interesting making this question
because we wanted to understand the frequency with which students are submitted to
practice the English language in the classroom, in order to create the most suitable practice
load exercises in the classroom. So, according to the results obtained, one hundred and
twenty two (122) out of two hundred and forty four (244) students inquired agreed that
they practice speaking exercises sometimes; forty five (45) students said that they practice
English often; twenty three (23) students said they practice English usually, twenty (20)
students said they never practice English in the classroom; only fourteen (14) said they
always practice English and finally, we´ve had twenty (20) invalid answers.
Student’s answers go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has
demonstrated that learners who are not frequently exposed to speaking activities in the
classroom such as pair works, group works, or free conversations over a topic and student
´s centered lessons, etc. that´s they have major difficulties in developing their
communication abilities or speaking skills in the target language. We can say that in a scale
from zero to one hundred, teachers of English in this city, only provide practice speaking
exercises to students in their English lessons at about twenty five percent, meaning
sometimes, very rarely, very few times or hardly never, if we measure it in terms of
adverbs of frequency, we are going to see that. So students hardly never practice speaking
exercises in the classroom, becoming completely impossible for them to develop speaking
skills in a foreign language, just like it is the case of English language in our country.

41
 We can say that there is no need for teachers to act this way because Pair-work is
one of the interaction patterns used in the modern languages classroom, such as English as
a second language (ESL) or English as a foreign language (EFL). According to Phipps
(1999, p. 1), pair-work is “for any form of pupil-pupil interaction without the intervention
of the teacher”. Consequently, pair-work interactions are when students work
independently, face-to-face and communicate to one another with minimal involvement
from the teacher. Many researchers have proven that students are much more ready to
interact with each other with more complex responses than with their teacher Tsui (1995).

Recounts from previous studies illustrate that students feel comfortable working,
interacting and making mistakes with their partners rather than with their teachers, and
corrective feedbacks from peers are found to be less daunting than the correction by
teachers Westbrook (2011). As reported by Phipps (1999) “working with a partner is much
less intimidating than being singled out to answer in front of the class, and it brings a
realistic element into the classroom by simulating the natural conversational setting”. It has
been found to be motivating and effective since students interact and communicate with
each other using the target language Richards (2006). This gives greater opportunity for
students to communicate and practice their English more contentedly with each other to
construct a vibrant classroom atmosphere.
4.1.9. - Student´s favourite skills
This topic is aimed at discovering the target population´s best dexterity to learn
the English language. We found relevant making this question because we believe that
discovering student´s favourite skill is vital in the designing of our syllabus, making us to
boost this type of activity in classroom. Observing the results: at about 78 seventy eight out
of two hundred and forty four (244) students have reading as their favourite way to learn
English; whereas sixty eight (68) like learning this language by listening; only fifty four
(54) prefer learning it by speaking; thirty four (34) students said they like doing it by
writing and finally we´ve had ten (10) invalid answers.
Student’s answers do not go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has
demonstrated that reading is the majority of learner´s favourite skills in English. So, as
most of the students in public institutions of higher education in Luanda have reading as
their favourite skill in English, some Scholars have confirmed the essential role of reading
motivation, particularly where comprehension stands as the main stake in the reading skill.
In his outstanding review article, scholar Ahmadi (2017) establishes sufficient cause and
effect relationship between reading and motivation, especially comprehension. Seymour
42
and Walsh (2006) express the critical impact of motivation on the processes in the reading
comprehension. In a similar analysis, Hairul et al. (2012) portray that reading motivation
substantially affects reading comprehension. Guthrie and Wigfield (2000) denote how
reading motivation is affected by the amount of self-motivation every learner invests in the
skill and the effect or ineffect the individual learner takes into account.
Studies conducted by Gottfried (1990) and Gottfried et al. (2005) manifest the
existence of relationship between reading comprehension and intrinsic motivation. On the
other hand, Perfetti (1994) conceptualizes comprehension failure from the premise of
psycholinguistics. Accordingly, Perfetti postulates that a reader’s deficient acquaintance
with the formation and arrangement of the text might occur as a consequence of inadequate
encounter with reading (1994). The numbers obtained from this topic give us good
indicators to apply in our material design bringing authentic material to the lessons; to our
syllabus design as a whole; as well as to our classroom management activities in which
student´s centered lesson´s are the main focus for the learning of English through reading
activities to boost communication in an EFL country should be strongly promoted in the
classroom during the lessons in, bearing in mind that it is student´s preferences and great
motivation to learn the language.
4.1.9.1. – Our research results´ versus other authors´ related researches
The results of our research study concerning management of the syllabus of the
Eenglish language in three institutions of higher education in Luanda city, in which, one of
the key questions aimed at finding out Angolans student´s favorite skill in Eenglish
language. Revealed that, seventy eight (78) out of two hundred forty four (244) have
reading as their favorite skill in English, whereas sixty eight (68), elected listening, only
fifty four (54) chose speaking, and writing appears in the last place with thirty four (34).
The results presented clearly show that the dominant or student favorite skill among
Luanda EFL learners, comparing the widely known English skills such as: listening,
reading, speaking and writing. In the three higher education institutions, reading is the
favorite one contradicting categorically scholars such as: Richards (1999); a group of
scholars namely: Eno, Kumar, Hamza (2018), Ali, Shamsan, Guduru & Yemmela (2019).

First of all, our research contradicts Richards in his book headed

``conversationally speaking: approaches to the teaching of conversation´´, cited by Mei
(2017) in his article entitled an analysis of factors influencing learners’ English speaking
43
skill. In which Richards argues that the learning of English speaking skill is a preference
for a lot of English as foreign or second language (EFL/ESL) learners, because language
learners sometimes evaluate their success in language learning based on how well they
have improved in their spoken language ability. That´s why, teachers and textbooks use
either direct approaches that concentrate on particular aspects of oral interaction such as
turn-taking and topic management or indirect approaches which make situations for oral
interaction by group work, task work and other strategies.

Secondly our research also contradicts a research conducted by Eno (2018) in his
article entitled ´´ researching ESL motivation: which skill is leaner´s favorite motivator´´,
whose objective was to investigating EFL student´s perceptions of what they consider as
more motivating or most motivating skill among the four second language acquisition
(SLA) skills: reading, listening speaking and writing also revealed that learners do not
perceive more listening as a very motivating factor compared to more speaking identified
as the most motivating skill and ahead of more writing in the overall ratings. With very
low results on the whole, more reading, on the other hand, is much below both speaking
and writing in significance, through ahead of listening as a potential motivator.

Finally, the third work contradicted by our researched is a study undertaken by a

group of Kenyan scholars namely: Ali, J.M., Shamsan, M.A., Guduru, R., & Yemmela
(2019) in their article entitled `` Attitudes of Saudi EFL learners towards speaking skills
also revealed that in an English as a foreign language (EFL) context, among all other
language skills; listening, Speaking, reading and writing (LSRW), Speaking is considered
to be not only important but also most immediately sought after by all sections of people.
Adding that there could be numerous reasons for this, such as personal interest, changes in
curriculum, new socio-economic plans, more future job opportunities, and revised national
development plans, they also say that on many occasions, it was mentioned that english
language plays a key role in enhancing job opportunities and all effort will be made to
teach and improve english language skills of the students at all levels of education.

To sum up, we can say that sometimes it´s normal to exist a break in the normal
trend of happenings and likely our research has proven it against three international related
researches in the field of teaching of English as a foreign language. The result of our
research clearly demonstrated that most of the Angolans students have reading as their

44
favorite skill in English, with this being said, they like reading activities best, other than
any other activity in the teaching process. this research undertaken in Luanda city, Angola
has shown a very different reality in EFL teaching and learning process which may be
mostly motivated by the way teachers act in classroom, or simply a new trend in EFL
teaching and learning process but taking into account that languages are first of all spoke
then written, from this view point, our research result may be a bit strange or abnormal
from the normal tendency of learning a language, doesn´t matter if it is a national or
international one, the main focus still resides in the ability to communicate it freely. So if
this is a result of teachers attitude in classroom, it´s our responsibility as teachers to change
this scenario.
4.1.10. – Teacher´s method of improving student´s speaking abilities
This thematic aimed at discovering whether teachers in higher school of higher
education, use a suitable teaching methodology in order to help their students improve their
abilities and strategies in English. so that they can be able to produce language, as well as
improving their speaking abilities in the target language, as much in the same way, this
question seeks to find out if students get on well with this teaching way used in the
classroom by their teachers. By making this question, we wanted to understand whether the
methodology used by teachers is really helpful for students to acquire solid background
knowledge, and whether it is suitable to learn English as a foreign language context.
According to the results, one hundred and fifty eight (158) out of two hundred and forty
four (244) students inquired agreed that the way their teachers teach them, helps them to
improve speaking skills. Whereas seventy eight (78) students said that the way their
teachers teach doesn’t help them and finally we´ve had eight (8) invalid answers.
In this case, student’s answers didn´t go in line with the researcher´s purpose
because it has demonstrated an unreal situation. However, despite of the results shown
above in which the way the majority of teachers in public schools of higher education in
Luanda teach help students to improve their speaking skills. It is also extremely relevant to
stress out that, in order to triangulate the information and checking the veracity of the facts
in the questionnaire results, we’ve used the observation technique, to say that observations
undertaken in the classroom, illustrated very clearly that the majority of students in those
three public institutions of higher education can´t speak English which is very
contradicting to their answers in the questionnaires, at the same way, the way their teachers
act in the classroom, doesn´t really help them to develop communication abilities for the
following reasons:

45
 First: most of the lessons are teacher centered, the (TTT) teacher talking time is
extremely high and as an anecdotal evidence we can say that sixty five or seventy percent
of the amount of time devoted to the English lessons are monopolized by teachers, it means
teachers talk much more than what they were supposed to, that´s to say that there must be a
balance between teacher talk time and (STT) student talk time, starting from the lesson
plan devising, and finishing in the classroom with the lesson as such, which means that
teachers must not dominate the class, because students also must be given chance to talk in
order to produce language and even initiating to share ideas in a given topic. Brown (2001)
he add saying that in speaking class, teachers are required to create communicative and
interactive activities by giving students a great deal of opportunities to practice the target
language. Essentially, the class manifests student-centred backdrop rather than teacher-
centred. Long and Porter (1985, cited in Tsui, 1995) observed that the lack of opportunity
to practice the target language which is only thirty seconds of a fifty-minute lesson in a
public secondary classroom leads to low achievement of second language learners. For this
reason, teachers are to prepare classroom activities that are devoted and best facilitate
speaking exercises. The benefit from speaking English in the class must be pinpointed to
the students that “using only the target language in the classroom helps mimic the ‘real
life’ use of that language” Westbrook (2011)
Involving EFL learners to participate actively in the classroom is one of the most
teachers’ challenges. Various learners’ background knowledge and needs must be
considered. It is in line with what Dornyei (1998) who said that motivating students in the
English as a foreign language (EFL) classroom is often a complex and difficult task that
involves a multiplicity of psycho-sociological and linguistic factors. Therefore, teacher
needs to provide an authentic material and interactive activity to engage learners’ attention
and create communicative classroom atmosphere. Moreover, teachers must deal with time
and the material stated by the curriculum. This English teachers’ dilemma comes up to as a
serious problem especially in undergoing the teaching and learning process. Active
involvement in the learning process is vitally important in two areas: (a) for the mastery of
skills, such as critical thinking and problem-solving and (b) for contributing to the
student’s likelihood of persisting to program completion as advocated by scholars such as:
Braxton, Jones, Hirschy, & Hartley (2008); Prince (2004).
Second; because lessons are not conducted in the target language, i.e. they are
conducted in L1, to be more specific English lessons are taught in Portuguese language, so
too much or much more Portuguese is used instead of English. Teachers explain many
issues in Portuguese and on the other hand, whenever a student had a doubt, he questioned
46
his teacher in Portuguese. Unfortunately at the end of the lesson no single effort was seen
from students, and at the same time no benefit from lesson was obtained, and likewise
from teachers, no visible effort in helping students to produce language was seen. So as it
is stated by Souriyavongsa et al. (2013), the majority of English teachers are not well-
trained; for instance, they use the native language when teaching, because they cannot
perform so well to attract the interest of the students;
Third; students hardly-never practice speaking exercises nor pair work activities
in the classroom as illustrated by the results of student´s answers in question seven, but
while teaching English, teachers can use short questions and short dialogues in the
classrooms to develop their students’ speaking skills as argued by Bashir, Azeem, & Dogar
(2011). Besides, some teachers do not plan their lessons and while talking to one of them
and questioned about the whereabouts of the lesson plan, he replied simply saying that: I
know what I teach that´s why I don´t need a lesson plan. When indeed it is known that
every person must have a plan when doing activities especially formal or academic
activities including teaching. For a teacher, teaching is not only an activity that emphasized
in the classroom, but a teacher must have a plan before begin a lesson. As stated by Brown
(2001), Brown continued his statement saying that those lessons, from the point of view of
teacher’s own and students’ time management, are practical, tangible units of effort that
serve to provide a rhythm to a course of study.
According to Brown, there are variations of a lesson plan format, but experienced
teachers generally agree on what the essential elements of a lesson plan should be, as
follows:
1. Goals
A teacher must be able to identify an overall purpose or goal that he will attempt
to accomplish by the end of class period. This goal is usually a general goal that
implemented in a focused theme, for example “understanding telephone conversation”.
2. Objectives
Objectives are most clearly captured in terms of stating in what students will do.
A teacher also must try vague and unverifiable statements. In stating objectives, a teacher
must also distinguish between terminal and enabling objectives. Terminal objectives are
final learning outcome that teacher will need to measure and evaluate. Enabling objectives
are interim steps that build upon each other and lead to a terminal objectives.
Having no significant differences with Douglas Brown’s theory, the other experts
also state that lesson plan could organize and arrange the lesson to be more effective and
accomplish the goals. Planning is a concrete process involving the enactment of particular
47
routines or recipe Furlong (2000) cited in John (2006). It means that planning is important
for teachers even it has a same importance with the practice of teaching itself. As Carlgren
(1999: 54) points out, the practice of planning is as important as the practice of teaching.
Harmer (2007) explains the reasons to make a plan for teacher and students. For
teachers, a plan gives a lesson a framework, an overall shape. For students, a plan shows
that the teacher has devoted time to thinking about the class. In addition, Harmer (2007)
states that plan helps teachers identify and anticipate potential problems. He added that
plan is proposal for action rather than scripts to be followed slavishly, whether they are
detailed documents or hastily scribbled notes. It means that teacher has prepared what they
are going to teach by writing all needed aspects in a document or note.
So, considering all those aspects described above in which the development of
speaking activity takes place as such, we can say that it is completely impossible to
develop student´s speaking skills under those classroom environments and conditions,
that’s why we consider that the student´s answer concerning this issue are not real, leading
us to say that the way the majority of teachers in public schools of higher education in
Luanda teach, doesn´t help students to develop speaking abilities at all.
4.1.11. - Current syllabus amount of language
This topic aimed at finding out whether the syllabus of English in the target
institutions provides the learners with sufficient general as well as academic linguistic
competence. In doing so, we wanted to find out whether the current syllabus of English
used in the referred institutions, gives students with real foreign language learning
opportunities to boost communication. According to the results obtained, one hundred and
fifty five (155) students agreed that the current syllabus, provide them with enough general
and academic language abilities. Whereas seventy two (72) students said that their syllabus
doesn’t provide them enough general and academic language skills, and seventeen (17)
were invalid.

In one hand, student’s answers don´t really go in line with the researcher´s
purpose because it has demonstrated a not completely real situation owing to the fact that
through analysing the current syllabus in all of those institutions, we could find out that
they provide some general background to the target population which of course is not
enough; another aspect encountered was that syllabuses used in most of those institutions,
give very few and in most cases any academic linguistic abilities to their target population.

48
 Otherwise, or if it really did, we wouldn´t have so many people studying English
for more than three years and who are still at beginner level and most of them with very
serious difficulties as described in responses from question number three. During our
analysis it was also possible to find out that there is an institution that uses a syllabus
designed in Cuba taking into account Cuban students of tourism and hospitality, i.e. their
reality was copied there and pasted in Angola, which is another clear fact that student´s
answers can´t be completely true because most of those syllabuses were not designed
taking into account their wants and needs. That´s why these needs must be clearly
researched as different subjects at different levels in different institutions or countries may
have different needs just like Hyland, advocated in 2000. However, some general
statements can be made.
On the other hand, the analysis of the situation completely mirrors the real
situation, responding one of the researcher’s objectives which is identifying how far the
current syllabus helps students in a foreign language context to acquire solid background
knowledge in English. So, from the aspects described above we can say that the current
syllabuses used at most institutions of higher education in Luanda do not reflect student´s
wishes, wants, needs and preferences but they provide a minimum or very weak
background knowledge in terms of general English and in terms of academic English, it
provides quite nothing to them as well.
4.1.12. - Developing student´s speaking skills
This thematic aimed to learn whether the current syllabus promote activities that
help them develop speaking skills. . According to the results, one hundred and sixty one
(161) students agreed that the current syllabus of English help them to develop speaking
skills. Whereas sixty six (66) said that the syllabus, doesn´t help them improve speaking
skills, seventeen (17) were regarded invalid.
Student’s answers do not go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has
shown that the syllabus of English used in the majority of institutions of higher education
in Luanda help students to develop speaking skills to students. However, during the
interviews carried out to teachers of those higher education institutions. It was possible to
realise that among the sample of five teachers interviewed; only two were trained in
English, which means that the rest of them are being adapted as teachers of English. So,
teachers assigned to the area in which they are certified have been found to have more
influence on student learning than uncertified teachers (Darling-Hammond, (2000);
Darling-Hammond, Berry, & Thoreson, 2001; Goldhaber & Brewer, 2000; Hawk, Coble,

49
& Swanson (1985); Laczko-Kerr & Berliner (2002). For example, in a study comparing
certified teachers who were licensed to teach mathematics with those licensed in another
area, students taught by teachers instructing in their licensed field had higher levels of
achievement Hawk et al., (1985). That´s to say that it clearly demonstrates that the public
higher education institutions normally employ teachers not graduated in English for
teaching in non-specialty courses, giving us several reasons to believe that they will never
design a syllabus accordingly in order to match student´s needs and be helpful for the
students concerning the development of speaking skills.
Communicative language teaching approach changes the view of syllabus
designers toward English subjects, from just a language to be learned like other subjects in
the school, to a very important tool of communication inside and outside the classroom.
Hence, the syllabus designers are advised to take into account the learners’ needs and
provide them with the chance, to be able to communicate the learned language in real
situations. In short, it can be synthesized that the authentic material is material which
consider students’ need adjusting real situation. It is widely believed that syllabus
themselves can´t develop student´s speaking skills, but they can develop this ability on
people through the aid of a well trained professional in the field. Unfortunately here we can
´t even dare talking about well qualified professionals when it is already known that the
majority are not even trained in the teaching of English language. Finally my position is
also supported with some head of department remarks in which one says that the syllabus
in use in his institution doesn´t promote speaking at all; whereas a teacher says that the
syllabus in use in his institution promotes writing and reading rather than speaking.

In 1997 Porto and Omar indicated that developing oral skills is a real challenge
for many ESL teachers since the students do not live in an English speaking environment.
In order to enhance the speaking competence of our students in the oral communication
classroom, language learning strategies must be linked to meaningful communicative
activities in the classroom. Therefore, language teaching activities in the classroom should
aim at maximizing individual language use. This requires the teacher not only to create a
warm and humanistic classroom atmosphere, but also to provide each student with a turn to
speak or play a role.
English language learners’ benefit when more opportunities are given for
practicing English language skills. Vogt and Short (2006), say learning is more effective
when students have an opportunity to participate fully, actively discussing ideas and
information rather than teachers talking and students listening. A learning environment
50
should be constructed in a way that allows students to interact freely. This paper focuses on
using strategies in the communicative activities such that the students may be trained in
participating effectively to accomplish the task. Hence, in this paper the researcher
identifies seven strategies that can be employed in the classroom. So, through this, we can
say that most syllabuses used in public institutions of higher education in Luanda don´t
help students to develop speaking skills because, and if in fact it did, we wouldn´t have
classrooms full of people who can´t even develop a basic conversation.

4.1.13 - Teacher´s course book

This thematic aims at finding out whether the study material used by teachers,
contains a clear and simple language which facilitates comprehension to the target
population, taking into account that they were not designed for our reality and not intended
to the specific students. According to the results obtained, two hundred and eleven (211)
students agreed that the current study material that teachers use have an easy language for
them to comprehend, whereas twenty six (26) students said that the study material used in
English lessons doesn’t contain a clear language, in addition to that seven (7) students
provided invalid answers.

Student’s answers go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has

demonstrated that most of course books used by teachers in the public institutions of higher
education in Luanda contain a clear and simple language to be understood by students.
However, it is also important to mention that in all institutions, there isn´t an authentic
study material, i.e. a study material designed for Angolan students needs, taking into
account their wants and wishes. So, teachers use adapted books designed according to
other realities such as headway, English for speakers of other languages and at your pace
which is a handout designed for Cuban students of hotel and tourism and implemented in
one the institutions. Trough these issues, Hyland (2000) suggested that these needs must be
clearly researched as different subjects at different levels in different institutions or
countries may have different needs.
That´s why we can say that the majority of the study material used in Luanda´s
institutions of higher education, have been used to cover a hole named lack of Angolan´s
self and authentic study material. They have and can be used just to remedy the situation,
not to solve the problem of our higher education system completely. Because the use of
authentic materials in an EFL classroom, brings a positive effect on learner motivation;
51
provides an authentic cultural information, as well as exposure to real language, in addition
to support a more creative approach to teaching, as stated by (Kelly, Kelly, Offner, &
Vorland (2002); Kilickaya (2004); Tamo (2009). It´s time to take serious actions in order
to change the current picture of the teaching of English as a foreign language in our
country, for the improvement of the teaching and learning process itself.

4.1.14 - Student´s favorite classroom activity

This topic aims at finding out the target population’s best classroom activities,
bearing in mind the four traditional language skills namely: speaking, reading, writing and
listening. As providing students with the best teaching environment is our goal, we believe
to be extremely important identifying student’s favourite classroom activities in order to
improve our classroom management and material design as well. According to the results
obtained, eighty two (82) out of two hundred and forty four (244), students inquired,
elected reading as their favorite classroom activity, whereas seventy seven (77) described
speaking as their best one, thirty nine (39) students prefer writing; and thirty five (35) have
listening as their favourite one, in addition to that, we also have eleven (11) invalid
answers.

Student’s answers don´t go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has
demonstrated that the most of the students in public institutions of higher education in
Luanda have reading as favourite classroom activity, when in fact it should be speaking
which appears on the second place. Every language’s first and main objective is speaking
then other skills are revealed and should be promoted. For this reason Ur in 2000 suggested
that of all the four language skills called listening, speaking, reading, and writing, speaking
is the most important one that is very necessary for the effective communication. Learning
the speaking skill is the most important aspect of learning a second or foreign language and
success is measured based on the ability to perform a conversation in the language as
defended by Nunan (1995).
Reading may increase student´s verbal repertoire because whenever we read a
text, we are likely to learn new words or expressions which can be useful to develop our
communication abilities. That´s why in 2017Arianie introduced Jigsaw Reading as an
activity in which students practice summarizing information and work on oral
communication skill, which is a great way to cover large amounts of reading material in a

52
short period of time. Students collaborate and interact with their peers as they check their
understanding of the reading with one another, and they also practice teaching information
to their fellow group members. Jigsaw reading can be used with any topic and entails
reading article or text book chapter with distinct sections that can be divided among
students, because it is easily adapted for different levels and areas of study.
With this being said, reading is certainly one of the ways that can be used to boost
communication practices judging by the quality of words which can be acquired in an
everyday reading section, no matter whether it is undertaken with an authentic or non-
authentic text. Reading activities expands our vision of the world and it is a concrete
powerful weapon to a university student and students in general because, in addition to
languages being first of all spoken, then read and later written. Study material as well as all
teaching related bibliographies entails the activity of reading, it stresses undoubted and
clearly the unquestionable relevance that reading plays in the process of teaching and
learning, taking into account that this process cannot exist without this very peculiar
activity.
4.1.15 – Student´s learning style
This topic aims at finding out the target population’s preferred manner to learn
the English language, taking into account some existing ways such as: through reading
exercises; speaking exercises; writing exercises; listening exercises; and finally through
video. We strongly believe that taking into account student´s favourite learning style is
vital for syllabus design, material design and classroom management itself, because all
these aspects turn around providing students with the best teaching methodologies as
possible, from time to time. So, ninety five (95) out of two hundred and forty four (244)
students prefer learning English through speaking exercises. Whereas sixty (60) students
prefer doing it through reading activities, forty nine (49) like performing this task by video
activities, fifteen (15) students prefer learning it by listening exercises and finally fourteen
(14) like carry it out through listening. Besides, we also have eleven (11) invalid answers.
Student’s answers completely go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it
has demonstrated that majority of learners in public institutions of higher education in
Luanda prefer learning English language through practice of speaking exercises. Speaking
is one of the most important skills of all the four language skills because individuals who
learn a language are referred to as the speakers of that language (Ur, 1996). The main aim
of English language teaching is to give learners the ability to use English language
effectively and correctly in communication as argued by Davies & Pearse (2000).

53
It is clear that languages are mostly learned thorough speaking, i.e. whenever they are
taught by means of speaking exercises because people tend to acquire language lessons
especially when it is demonstrated through speaking activities developed in the classroom,
which can be pairwork activity, a free conversation in which students express freely their
opinions, as stated by scholars such as Lightbown & Spada, (1993), Davis, (2003); and
Ghaith, (2003), when saying that another significant dimension to language learning is
providing learners with opportunities to interact freely and learn from each others'
mistakes. In 2004 Morell found that Interactive activities for teaching English as a foreign
language to university students improves comprehension and communicative competence,
he compared conventional non-interactive methods with minimal student interventions
with interactive classes that use entertainment, students’oral presentation and student
interventions.
Findings indicate that in interactive classes, teachers are aware of their students’
needs to understand and improve their communicative competence and of the importance
of student involvement. In non-interactive classes, teachers felt pressured by time and
course syllabus and commented that more time and preparation would be needed if they
are to convert to interactive teaching methods. However, all activities involving
communication practices in the classroom raise great interest by students making them
prefer learning the English language through speaking activities. All type of activities that
students find fruitful because it boosts communication, becomes a highly motivating for
learners of English, learners are strongly attracted by activities in which they can practice
the language in the classroom among or between their classmates.
4.2.1. - INTERVIEW WITH TEACHERS
Just like we did with students, it was likewise our intention to maintain a direct
involvement with those who enter the classrooms to turn from theory to practice, in order
to make the teaching and learning process to take place or happen, bearing in mind that
teachers are the most directly persons involved in this process. So, we found it compulsory
to undertake an interview with five teachers of those three institutions talking to them and
understanding their thoughts in the teaching of English as a foreign language, and also how
they think about the English syllabus used in public institutions..
4.2.2 -Teacher´s background
This topic aims at discovering whether teachers at public institutions of higher
education in Luanda are really qualified in teaching English , because they have been
undertaking this activity for more than ten years. We found really important to discuss this

54
issue of teacher background because we´ve come across many situations in which teachers
were not qualified to teach English, that´s why we wanted to know whether student´s low
achievement in English is related to some teacher´s lack of background in English. The
results obtained suggest that, three out of five teachers agreed that in public schools of
higher education Luanda for non-specialty courses, most teachers are not graduated in
English, as it was made clear by one of them who resemble the majority´s answers.
A: I am Master in the teaching of French language.
Teacher´s answers do not go in line with the researcher’s purpose because it has
been demonstrated that only two out of five teachers were trained in English, they are
bachelors in it, but even those trained in this language were not trained in a specialized
school to train teachers of English, which means that they don´t have the required
pedagogical instruction to perform this task or activity. Whereas the other ones have
different qualifications which are very different from English, for example one is master in
French language but he teaches English. Between the two other ones, we have one master
in applied linguistics and one master in sociology of education and educative policies. The
picture describe above clearly mirrors that institutions of hire education in Luanda city
normally hire people graduated in other fields of knowledge to teach English in a non-
specialty course. When it is known that teachers assigned to the area in which they are
certified have been found to have more influence on student learning than uncertified
teachers just like Darling-Hammond, (2000); as well as Darling-Hammond, Berry, &
Thoreson, also advocated that in (2001); Goldhaber & Brewer, (2000); Hawk, Coble, &
Swanson, (1985); Laczko-Kerr & Berliner, (2002). In brief, teachers' effect on student
learning is increased when students are taught by well-prepared professionals who
integrate their knowledge of instruction with a deep sense of caring about the individual
students they teach. For this reason in Sizer (1999) stressed that, “We cannot teach students
well if we do not know them well”.
So, this action perpetrated by decision makers influences negatively in the
performance of students because teachers cannot teach things they haven´t learned or been
taught. The qualifications of those people graduated in different areas also influences in the
quality of students and education as such, because we could see institutions only use an
adaptation of teachers graduated in different fields to cover the lack of specialized and high
qualified professionals in the field of English language teaching.

4.2.3. -Teacher´s teaching experience

55
 This thematic aims at finding out the teacher´s period of time in which he has
been playing this role. We wanted to check if all the teachers were prepared for the
teaching activity as such, and at the same time we wanted to find out whether all of them
have English teaching experience in order to help us to achieve better student’s results. So
according to the results obtained, four out of five teachers agreed that they have been
developing this activity for more than fifteen years, as it was made clear by one of them
who resemble the majority´s answers.
A: I have been teaching English for more than twenty years.
Teacher´s answers go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has been
demonstrated that most of the times performing an activity for many years doesn´t mean
performing it correctly, because we´ve seen teachers exposed to teaching activity for more
than fifteen years but still struggling for not having the most suitable pedagogical training
for developing this activity. According to Covino & Iwanicki, (1996), experienced teachers
have increased depth of understanding of the content and how to teach and apply it.
Additionally, experienced teachers are more effective with students due to their use of a
wider variety of strategies Glass, (2001). One study found that “schools with more
experienced and more highly educated mathematics teachers tended to have higher
achieving students” Fetler, (1999). This quality indicator does not necessarily mean that
more years are better. Based on data from the Tennessee Value-Added Assessment
System, Sanders and Rivers (1996) found that teachers' effectiveness increased through the
first seven years of teaching and became flat by around year 10. (Note: The minimal
teaching experience in Sanders' original work was three years.)
So we can say that some teachers of English in public schools of higher education
in Luanda, especially those who teach in non-specialty courses, have been carrying out this
activity for many years. However, they do not have enough pedagogical training in order to
help them to obtain better results in the teaching field, as well as helping students to make
head way in the English language. That´s why by including task-based instruction in the
curriculum, for professors could develop language skills while performing a task, as Brandl
(2008) claims, to wit: "Language use is the driving force for language development".
4.2.4 - Institution´s syllabus design
This topic aims at discovering by whom the syllabus that has been used at certain
public institutions of higher education in Luanda was designed. By making this question,
we wanted to find out who was the person in charge of the syllabus design used in the
institutions of higher education, and also check whether these professional have some

56
experience in this type of activity. So, the results obtained, show that: five out of five
teachers agreed that they were the ones who designed the syllabuses in use in their
institutions, as it was made clear by one of them who resemble the majority´s answers.
A: the teacher himself designed the syllabus in use.
Teacher´s answers go in line with the researcher´s purpose for two different
reasons: first because it gives answer to his first research question, in which he tries to
know the authorship of the syllabus in use in the school of higher education, second
because it clearly demonstrates that though teachers are involved in this activity for years,
they designed the syllabus in use at their institutions without bearing in their minds the
fundamental criteria for syllabus design such as needs analysis which determines student´s
needs, wants and wishes. So we can say that most teachers in public schools of higher
education in Luanda have very few or no notions of syllabus design.
Nunan (1993) refers to Bell (1983) who claims that teachers are consumers of
other people’s syllabuses and their role is to implement the plans of applied linguists,
government agencies. While some teachers have a relatively free hand in designing their
own syllabuses on which their teaching programs are based, most are, as Bell (1983)
suggests, consumers of other syllabus designers. In line with this, Nunan (1993) agrees
with Bell and argues that few teachers are in the position of being able to design their own
syllabuses. Again Nunan (1987) reports that some teachers believe that syllabus
development should be carried out by people with specific expertise. But I believe that
classroom teachers should be given appropriate training to be equipped with necessary
skills and information to design their own syllabuses if they are to be successful teachers.
Meanwhile they should regard the syllabus open and negotiable. Indeed the syllabus
should be negotiated by teachers and their students on the basis of the learners’ needs
analysis as stated by Brindley, in 1984. In sum, we would suggest teachers of public
schools of higher education in Luanda and the whole country to follow Stern (1984) who
advises that:
The more we emphasize flexibility and negotiation of the curriculum the more
important it is for us, as teachers, to have something to negotiate about, and, surely, as
Brumfit, Widdowson, and Yalden have stressed, it is important for the teacher to define the
parameters, to provide direction, and to have the resources at our disposal which make up
ESL/EFL as learnable and worthwhile subject matter in general education Stern, (198).
4.2.5.-Application of placement test
This thematic intends to finding out whether teachers at public institutions of
higher education in Luanda carry out a placement test at the beginning i.e. in the first day
57
of the English lessons, in order to check the real level of the students, to deal with them
accordingly to their level in the classroom. We wanted to make this question because we
wanted to find out whether teachers in public schools of higher education in Luanda,
undertake a placement test for their students, bearing in mind that it helps teachers to deal
with students successfully and differently in the classroom, because of their mixed
abilities. So, the results obtained show that, four out of five teachers agreed that they
undertake an application of a placement test in the first day of lessons, to check the level of
their students, as it was made clear by one of them who resemble the majority´s answers.
A: teachers provide an application of a placement test at the beginning of the lessons.
Teacher´s answer goes in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has been
demonstrated that the syllabus itself, doesn´t preview the application of a placement test,
but the majority of teachers in public schools of higher education in Luanda city undertake
it in the first day of their English lessons, in order to check out the real level of their
student´s in the English subject. According to Liskinasih & Lutvinia (2017), the main
purpose of placement test is to place students based on different levels of competences, in
which students with the same proficiency level should be put in the same class, because
putting students in the same competence level of classes would ease the job of teaching. It
would be easier for the lecturers to manage class and to design the most suitable materials
and teaching method. If there is a problem in teaching and learning process, the lecturer
would be deciding the effective strategy that works for most students. Moreover, for
students, it reduces peer pressure, and students will be comfortable learning with
classmates who have the same competences.
Application of a placement test is vital for classroom management because it is
the instrument which tells teachers the real knowledge background from each of the
students in the classroom. For this reason, it is mandatory to check the level of the students
through the application of this test because you embark on an English teaching lesson. This
test gives you insights on how to deal with the students accordingly in the classroom,
because ounce you know their levels you start treating them differently and accordingly to
their level, needs and specificities. Reason why, a wise and careful teacher should never
fail to undertake this test in the first day of lessons, bearing in mind the results derived
from this test, will dictate the path, the way or direction to take with lessons. That´s why
every teacher who wants to be successful must act like this in the first day of lessons.
4.2.6.-Syllabus design principles
This topic aims at first; discovering whether teachers know any principle of
syllabus designing and second; whether they have used a certain principle while designing
58
the syllabus in use at their institutions. As syllabus design is our project´s central issue, we
wanted to find out who were the people involved in the designing of the syllabus used in
the institutions, and then checking whether this professional knows or took into account
any syllabus design principle for EFL context. The results obtained suggest that three out
of five teachers agreed that teachers of English in public schools of higher education in
Luanda have very few knowledge of syllabus design as it was made clear by one of them
who resemble the majority´s answers.
A: the syllabus is based on low level of students such as personal pronouns, greetings and
so on.
Teacher´s answers go in line with the researcher´s purpose first because it gives
answer to his third research question in which he tries to find out who designed the
syllabus used at public institutions of higher education, on the other hand it demonstrates
that majority of teachers in public schools of higher education in Luanda have no notions
of syllabus design, because from five teachers interviewed only two were able to describe
some aspects of syllabus design. Nowadays, for most fruitful outcomes by learners, it is
extremely relevant to base your syllabus design in these theories and principles of language
learning from communicative language teaching approach:
1- Communication, task, meaningfulness the communication principle: Activities that
involve communication promote language learning;
2- The task principle: Activities that involve the completion of real-world tasks
promote learning;
3- The meaningfulness principle: Learners must be engaged in meaningful and
authentic language use for learning to take place as stated by Richards and Rodgers
(1986).
Yalden (1983), indicated that there are different approaches of designing
ESL/EFL Syllabi and that all indicate similar conceptual poles: formal-functional,
structural- contextual, grammatical-communicative, linear-spiral, difficulty approach,
utility approach, synthetic-analytic, top-down versus bottom up. Difficulty Approaches to
the Syllabus - easier things are taught first, more difficult things are taught later. The
Linear Syllabus - content is sequenced one item after another. The Spiral Syllabus - the
same item is returned to repeatedly and treated in more depth on each occasion. Utility
Approaches to the Syllabus - based around what is needed, useful, and urgent for learners
e.g. should they learn how to hold a telephone conversation first, or should they
concentrate on managing transactions when shopping.

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 It is a fact that one of the crucial components of designing a course syllabus is
conducting a needs analysis survey. Needs analysis has been one of the important areas in
language teaching, especially with the emergence of various learner needs. For this reason,
to develop a better syllabus, classroom activities will not be applicable for the teachers if
they ignore the learners’ needs. In this respect, Long (2005) states that only dealing with
the linguistic analysis of the passages in course books will not always be effective for
avoiding the past mistakes or taking necessary precautions in teaching practices. Therefore,
the analysis which is done to collect subjective and objective information is named as
needs analysis which was originated in 1960s as a systematical means Richards, (2013) for
curriculum development. Determining the needs of the course using various components
such as learners, practitioners began to come into prominence with ESP (English for
Specific Purposes) Dehnad, Bagherzadeh, Shoaleh, Hatami & Hosseini, (2010);
Stufflebeam et al., (1985) as cited in İnceçay & İnceçay, (2010); Richards, (2001).
However, it is safe to say that it is for both learners and teachers to come across
possible difficulties when general content both in English courses and course books cannot
meet the needs of learners, which paves the way for ESP in English language teaching field
Cowling, (2007). That is to say, needs analysis provides true and concrete portrait of the
teaching environment, relating “learning as closely as possible to teaching” Grier, (2005)
as cited in Akyel & Ozek, (2010) and can be counted as the first step in curriculum
development Brown, (1995) as cited in Kusumoto, (2008).
Besides learner’s needs, teacher as a practitioner, being the centre of the
classroom, is the one who observes the learners, plans extra activities related to the
syllabus objectives and adapts the materials in accordance with the learners’ needs and
expectations. In this sense, teachers’ implementations for the processes of curricula are the
most effective. İnceçay and İnceçay (2010) highlight this fact that it is not true to separate
these two main elements of education namely; teacher and student when planning,
developing and implementing an education curriculum. Long (2005:26) also advocates that
when it comes to deciding the content of courses teachers are to undergo, ideally assessed
before classes begin, at their inception, and as they proceed.~
Despite its noteworthy position in English curricula, little importance has been
given to needs analysis in ELT field (Akyel & Ozek, (2010); Long, (2005). Learners are
mostly disregarded and their role in designing any instructional element is ignored.
Needless to say, as one of the main purposes in education is to enhance students’
performance Akyel & Ozek, (2010), evaluation of the curriculum will probably make
education process visible for teachers, principals, students and other stakeholders.
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Therefore, the reasons why teachers, curriculum developments and the other related groups
of people need determining the learners’ needs should be defined clearly. According to
Richards (2001) the purposes of needs analysis are:
 To find out what language skills a learner needs in order to perform a particular role,
such as sales manager, tour guide, or university student;

 To determine which students from a group are most in need of training in particular
language skills;

 To identify a change of direction that people in a reference group feel is important;

 To collect information about a particular problem learners are experiencing;

 To identify a gap between what students are able to do and what they need to be able to;
 To help determine if an existing course adequately addresses the needs of potential
students.
4.2.7. – Student´s place in the syllabus
This thematic aims at finding out if learners are dedicated special attention while
the syllabus is being devised and designed by teacher or other professionals, because it is
widely believed that teaching process cannot exist without students. So syllabus must be
designed thinking on students because they are the center of it. As all teaching as well as
learning process spins around improving methods, methodologies or ways to instruct or
guide our students, we wanted to find out the real place students are given by teacher or
syllabus designers, while designing their syllabus in public school. According to the
results, three out of five teachers agreed that students are the center of syllabus design
because they are the reason of the lessons as it was made clear by one of them who
resemble the majority’s answers.

A: Students are the center.

However, while observing some lessons the researcher could realise that most of
the teachers monopolise lessons, talking at about seventy percent of the entire amount of
time devoted to lessons, creating very few situations in which the students can express
themselves in the target language. So, with the aspects described above we can say that
most teachers in public schools of higher education in Luanda do not give students the
deserved or required role, which is a place of a key player in the process of syllabus
designing, participating actively in this just like the teacher, bearing in mind that syllabuses
are designed for students not for teachers, because teaching becomes mean less without
61
students, so during our research this feeling was not demonstrated by teachers in the
teaching and learning process. That´s why Candlin (1984) suggests a different perspective
implying that syllabuses are social constructions, produced interdependently in classrooms
by teachers and learners…They are concerned with the specification and planning of what
is to be learned, frequently set down in some written form as prescriptions for action by
teachers and learners. Finally, in simple words a language teaching syllabus involves the
combination of subject matter (what to teach) and linguistic matter (how to teach). It
actually performs as a guide for both teacher and learner by providing some goals to be
accomplished.

According to Yalden's Reformulation in syllabus design, the third school of

thought is called Toronto School. This school is a bridge Rahimpour, (2010) between
London and Lancaster Schools. As the representors of this school, Allen & Yalden identify
the theoretical basis of the syllabus content. Yalden proposes that the learner may have an
input in making curriculum. This school is primarily concerned with the question of the
learners' role in syllabus development. The main concern of this school is a question of
constructing a theoretically sound and practically useful curriculum. Salim, (2012)
2.3. Type A and Type B Syllabi

Another classification which is closely related to the previous one is White's

(1988) classification of type A and type B syllabi. Type A syllabus focuses on WHAT is to
be learned. They are interventionist in that someone presents the language to be taught,
dividing it up into small pieces, and determining the learning objectives in advance of any
consideration of who the learner is and how the languages are learned. They are external to
the learner, other-directed, and determined by the authority. Type B syllabus, however;
focuses on HOW the language is to be learned. They are non-interventionist because they
involve no artificial presentation or arrangement of language. Objectives of learning are
negotiated between teacher and the learners as the course evolves. Teachers and learners
are joint decision makers in the choice of the syllabus. The focus is more on learning rather
than the subject matter as advocated by Salim, (2012).

4.2.8. – Lesson´s teaching load weekly

This thematic aims at finding out what is the normal teaching load devoted to the
teaching of English during a week and for what reason it was adopted this criterion. We
believe to be very relevant to know the amount of ours that students are submitted to, in
English lessons during a day, because through this answer we can propose some betterment
in the current teaching load. So, according to the results three out of five teachers agreed
62
that in public schools of higher education the teaching load per week for non-specialty
courses is ninety minutes, which means lessons take place only once a week as it was made
clear by one of them who resemble the majority´s answer.
A: the lesson takes ninety (90) minutes.

Teacher’s answers go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has been
demonstrated that public schools of higher education in Luanda city distribute their
teaching load according to the specificity of the course, because from teachers interviewed
three of them have English lessons ounce a week, whereas the two other ones have it twice
a week because according to them, though the subject is not of a specialty of the course, it
is a fundamental tool for people graduated in that field also because this language will be
used very frequently in the student´s work place.

Teaching load allocation, that is, which teaching staff teaches which subject, is an
essential task that is carried out in all teaching and teaching/research institutions every year
or every semester McClure and Wells, (1985). Teaching load allocation has been well
recognized as a major contributing factor to the teaching quality McClure and Wells,
(1987); Partovi and Arinze, (1995); Shin and Jung, (2013). In teaching load allocation,
three objectives should be achieved. First, all subjects must be taught. Second, a teaching
staff should not be allocated a higher teaching load than that required by her/his role.
Third, teaching staff should teach subjects that they are proficient with; otherwise they
have to struggle with effectively managing teaching tasks and schedules to find time for
the many other activities, events, and responsibilities.
4.2.9. – Type of speaking activities that the syllabus contains.
This thematic aims at discovering how far the syllabus in use at public institutions
of higher education in Luanda city help the target ´s population to develop speaking skills.
We found relevant to make this question because we wanted to find out to what extent the
syllabus of English used by institutions of higher education helps students in providing
them with real language production opportunities. So, according to the results obtained,
four teachers out of five agreed that the syllabus they use in public institutions of higher
education in Luanda doesn´t help students to develop speaking skills, as it was made clear
by one of them who resemble the majority´s answer.
A: If you want students to able to communicate, it demands more time, ninety minutes a
week is not enough.
Teacher’s answers do not go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has
been demonstrated that the syllabus used at public schools of higher education in Luanda
63
city do not promote the development of communication ability which is language´s first
objective. For this reason we suggest using the communicative syllabus knowing that it is a
syllabus which specifies the semantic-grammatical categories (e.g., frequency, motion, and
location) and the categories of communicative function that learners need to express
Brown, (1995). The council of Europe expanded and developed this into a syllabus that
included descriptions of the objectives of foreign language courses for European adults, the
situations in which they might typically need to use a foreign language (e.g. travel,
business), the topics they might need to talk about (e.g. personal identification, education,
shopping), the functions they needed language for (e.g. describing something, requesting
information, expressing agreement and disagreement), the notions made use of in
communication(e.g. time, frequency, duration), as well as the vocabulary and grammar
needed. In short, it is centered on communication (i.e. meaning, convention, appropriacy,
interaction and structure). These are the information required in syllabus fully directed at
improving student´s communication abilities.
4.2.10. - Student´s admission criterion
This topic aims at finding out whether public schools of higher education in
Luanda city have adopted a criterion for admission of students for non-specialty courses,
concerning the English language. By making this question, we wanted to know whether
public schools of higher education in Luanda and even in our country, adopted a criterion
for the admission of students in English subject, studying in non-specialty courses. So
according to the results five out of five teachers agreed that there isn´t a criterion for
admission of students for non-specialty courses, as it was made clear by one of them who
resemble the majority´s answers.
A: there is no criterion for admittance of students for non-specialty courses.
Teacher’s answers go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has been
demonstrated that any public school of higher education in Luanda adopted a certain
criterion for the admission of students for non-specialty courses concerning English
language. This measure plays a negative role in student ´s admission because if an English
test was carried out, we would have had better students selected, and with no criterion
related to this, we are obliged to deal with students with mixed abilities i.e. students with
all types of background knowledge, and most of them with very low background in
English language.
So, language test is believed to be able to be valuable sources of information
about the effectiveness of learning and teaching. Brown (2003); Bachman (1995) in
Hussain (2015) A test is a method of measuring a person's ability, knowledge, or
64
performance in a given domain. Desheng and Vergese (2013) indicated that test evaluates
not only the progress and achievement of learners but also the effectiveness of the teaching
materials and methods used. English proficiency test in a country where English as a
foreign language is necessary as a valid test to measure one’s English capability. English
proficiency test is taken not only in attempting to pursuing study abroad but also as a
requirement to complete college, especially in institutions. TOEFL (Test of English as
Foreign Language) is the most popular test used in many countries in all over the world.
Clark (2014) stated that according to ETS (Educational Testing Service), the TOEFL test is
used by more than 9.000 colleges, universities and agencies in more than 130 countries to
help them make admissions decisions, making it the most widely accepted English-
language test in the world. A reported 27 million people had taken the TOEFL test in the
world.
4.2.11. - Subject teaching organisation principles
This thematic aims finding out whether teachers use a criterion on deciding which
contents they should teach first, second and so forth and so on. At the same time to know
the reason why they have adopted that method, or way of subject teaching organisation.
With this issue we wanted to find out whether teachers of public schools of higher
education in Luanda know any language teaching organisation principle which we believe
to be central for classroom management and language teaching as such. So, the results
obtained, show that three out of five teachers agreed that they use no special principle for
subject organisations and have no idea of what to teach first or second as it was made clear
by one of them who resemble the majority´s answers.
A: normally first I teach text, then grammar which comes from the text.
Majority of teacher’s answers do not go in line with the researcher´s purpose
because it has been demonstrated that some of the teachers in public schools of higher
education in Luanda have no idea of subject principle organisation. Therefore, for them
normally there is no logic sequence or a linking relationship in what they teach, so they
teach whatever they think is right to teach. When we think that they should follow Yalden
(1983) who says concerning the Difficulty Approaches to the Syllabus – easier things are
taught first, more difficult things are taught later. Concerning The Linear Syllabus -
content is sequenced one item after another. And finally, concerning The Spiral Syllabus -
the same item is returned to repeatedly and treated in more depth on each occasion.
In (2009), Pardo & Téllez, suggested that in materials development, both content
and activities could be structured in three distinct fashions known as the building, the
recycling, and the sequence and matrix approaches. The first one gradually moves from the
65
simplest to the most complex activities, from the general to the specific ones, and from the
concrete to the abstract. The second one provides students with a learning challenge in
terms of a new skill area, a different type of activity, or new focus. The third one follows a
consistent sequence to be fulfilled within a given period.

4.2.12. - Syllabus devising teaching theory

This topic aims at understanding whether teachers in public schools of higher
education in Luanda take into account any theory or principle related to the teaching of
English as a foreign language, bearing in mind that we live in a Portuguese speaking
country, having English language as a foreign one. By making this question we wanted to
check out whether teachers in public schools of higher education were aware of the
existence of EFL teaching theory while devising the syllabuses that they have been using.
The results obtained suggest that five out of five teachers in public schools of higher
education in Luanda agreed that they do not take into account any theory for teaching of
English as a foreign language, as it was made clear by one of them who resemble the
majority´s answers.
A: As I’m a teacher of French, I used the theory for the teaching of French as a foreign
language, because I don´t know any theory for the teaching of English as a foreign
language.
Teacher´s answers go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it answers one
of the research´s objectives, in which he tries to find out what teaching and learning theory
best fits students of English as a foreign language. Allowing the researcher to find out the
most suitable or appropriate theory for the teaching of English as a foreign language.
Second because it demonstrates that though the majority of teachers in public schools of
higher education in Luanda teach English in a Portuguese speaking country in which
English is obviously a foreign language, but many of them are not aware of any theory for
the teaching of English as a foreign language. Therefore, most of the times, students are
not trained using the most suitable theory or principle of teaching. Moreover, the three
principles which can inform language syllabus design, according to Yalden (1987), are (1)
a view of how language is learned, which could result in a structured-based syllabus; (2) a
view of how language is acquired, which would result in a process-based syllabus; and (3)
a view of how language is used, which would result in a function-based syllabus. By
integrating all three, Yalden proposes a proportional syllabus, with a semantic grammatical
organizational base, a linguistic component based on language functions, and themes based
on learners ‘interests.

66
 In the early stages of language learning, one might place more emphasis on
structure, before moving on to functions and then using tasks or topics to apply and
creatively use the language. Furthermore, as a main advantage proposed by Rabbini
(2000), proportional syllabus with its spiral method of language sequencing leading to the
recycling of language appeared to be the most appropriate for learners who lack exposure
to the target language beyond the classroom. This feature of proportional syllabus seems
to, make it a good alternative of syllabus design in EFL countries, in which the exposure to
the target language is rare in naturalistic settings and it is merely limited to classroom
contexts and private institutes practicing English language. Also in EFL settings due to the
lack of teachers who are communicatively competent, applying a hybrid proportional
syllabus seems to be an appropriate option providing the teachers with conditions to
conduct a teachers-learner negotiation and choosing how to implement the syllabus.
4.2.13. - Current syllabus advantage and disadvantage
This thematic aims at finding out whether teachers of English in public schools of
higher education in Luanda, can identify some positive aspects as well as some drawbacks
in the syllabus that they´ve been using. By making this question, we wanted to find out
whether the current syllabuses used by institutions of higher education contain more
advantages or disadvantages concerning the English language learning, in order to
strengthen the weak aspect as well as boost the strong ones. The results obtained show that,
five teachers agreed that current syllabus used at schools contain much more drawbacks
than positive points, as it was made clear by one of them whom resemble the majority´s
answers.

A: the disadvantage is the amount of time, there is not much time to help students; there
are no advantages in the syllabus.

Teacher´s answers go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it

demonstrates that most teachers in public schools of higher education in Luanda still face
serious problems in devising and designing a syllabus of English that fully fits student´s
needs, wants, and wishes, containing more positive aspects than negative ones, for the
benefit of the Angolan students. According to Munby (1987), syllabus design is seen as a
matter of specifying the content that needs to be taught and then organizing it into a
teaching syllabus of appropriate learning units.´´ to gain the maximum benefits of syllabus
in a limited time, it is imperative that syllabus must be designed taking into account the
learners needs and objectives, essential to require.

67
 Any type of syllabus is better than the other one! Moreover, each one of them
may be best applied according to the needs of the students; the context or reality in which
the situation is taking place, as well as the skills to be developed. In addition to this, no
syllabus undertaken accordingly should contain more negative than positive aspects; it
doesn’t matter whether it is in an EFL context or a second language learning setting, we
believe that this is the result of inexperienced teachers in syllabus design issues because
through our research we could easily realise that most of the teacher in public schools of
higher education in Luanda have no notions of syllabus design.

Our research suggested that many teachers don´t master elements such as needs
analysis which determine student´s needs wants or preferences. So, the current syllabus in
use in several institutions of higher education contains more drawbacks likely because it
was not designed according to our student’s needs and teachers’ lack of specific training in
these issues as well. Many teachers demonstrated lack of required qualifications and work
experience in effective English language teaching field; most of them demonstrated that
they still don´t look at student as a key player in the syllabus design because all the
teaching process entails having learners.

4.2.14. - Coursebook type of language to boost communication

This thematic aims at finding out whether teachers in public schools of higher
education in Luanda use a suitable study material to develop speaking skills in their
students. We found very relevant to make this question because we wanted to discover
whether the course book used by teachers in their English lessons contain a suitable type of
language to boost speaking skills. So, the results obtained suggest that, three out of five
teachers agreed that the study material they have been using in their English lessons,
promotes more writing and reading, rather than speaking, as it was made clear by one of
them who resemble the majority´s answers.
A: it is appropriate for developing writing and reading.
First of all, it is widely believed that our country doesn´t produce study material
to academically support our universities, that´s why we cannot say that the study material
is available for students and even for teachers. So, study material unavailability is the first
issue, for this reason, most of the times teachers see the adaptation of English books such
as face to face, head way and so forth and so on, in order to teach English. These frequent
68
adaptations carried by teachers concerning the study material do not guarantee that this
material is hundred percent suitable or appropriate for our student´s needs and abilities
development because they are used and were chosen for being the only solution left for
teachers to tech with, it is like a one way road in which the driver does not have another
options left such as turning right nor left but moving forward, owing to the fact that these
books are produced taking into account very different context and realities.
Bernardo, (2006) argues that Suitability of content indicates that the text should
interest the students as well as be appropriate to their needs and abilities. Bacon and
Finneman, (1990) add that the texts should be culturally relevant to the experience of the
students. This shortage of material selection may likely pose a threat in the quality of the
teaching of English as a foreign language, because there is no way for teachers to be more
selective, the other problem is that the selection requirements are not known. So, for these
reasons, in (1995) Lee stated that “a careful and wise selection of materials focused on
learners is a must if we want a positive response from them”.
Moreover, we cannot consider those books as authentic materials seen that they
contain a mostly classroom or academically selected type of language to be used in
schools, more concretely in classrooms while teaching, which off course differs a lot from
real world language. That´s why Ur 1996 argues that students usually have trouble
understanding texts outside of the classroom because classroom reading material do not
reflect the language of the real word. She also says that ʽʽWe want our learners to be able
to cope with the same kinds of reading that are encountered by native speakers of the target
languageʼʼ. In 2004, Kilickaya defined authentic materials as "the exposure to real
language and use in its own community." So, nowadays, preparing students for real life
situations is of utmost concern for English language teachers, especially in EFL classes.
Exposing students to such language forms will enable them to cope with genuine
interaction, whether it is inside or outside the classroom. That´s why, when authentic
materials are used with the purpose of students‘learning, students will have a sense that the
real language for communication is being learnt, as opposed to classroom language itself.
In contrast to the design of the text books, authentic materials are intrinsically more active,
interesting and stimulating Lee, (1995); Little, Devitt & Singleton, (1988); Peacock,
(1997); Shei, 2001).
Teacher´s answer do not go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has
been demonstrated that the study material teachers use in public schools of higher
education in Luanda doesn´t help students to improve their communication abilities at all,
but instead, it promotes secondary and tertiary language learning objectives such as
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reading and writing, etc. We know that whenever we learn a language our first objective is
always speaking and never writing or reading. However, we can dare to say that reading
can be learnt together with speaking, because while learning speaking we are most of the
times submitted to some reading sections, but even though, reading comes on the second
place because first of all, people tend to learn languages aiming to speak it, as rather than
reading or writing. Languages are first of all spoken then written in this case writing
always comes in the last position because writing is more difficult than speaking and
reading, so it is a more complex stage of language learning. For the reasons stated above
we consider reading and writing as the secondary and tertiary language learning objectives.
4.2.15. - Syllabus enhancement of a particular skill
This topic aims at finding out whether the syllabus of English used in schools of
higher education in Luanda promotes a particular language skill to the detriment of others.
We found very pertinent making this question because we wanted to find out whether the
current syllabus used by institutions of higher education promotes a single English
language skill, to the detriment of other, e.g. more reading than writing, or more speaking
than listening, and so forth and so on. So, according to the results, five out of five teachers
agreed that the syllabus they have been using do not promote a particular skill to the
detriment of others, as it was made clear by one of them who resemble the majority’s
answers.
A: the syllabus I use promotes writing and reading.
Teacher´s answer completely go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it
has been proven that the syllabuses used at public institutions of higher education in
Luanda are based on the philosophy of integrated-skills instruction which is based on the
concept that in natural, day-to-day experience, oral and written languages are not kept
separate and isolated from one another. Instead, they often occur together, integrated in
specific communication events Peregoy & Boyle, (2001). According to Finocchiaro and
Bonomo (1973), a good teacher recognizes the importance of integrating discrete language
skills in the communicative situations, which simulate or duplicate the real life situations in
which students will need to use the foreign language. According to Oxford, Lavine and
Crookall (1989), Savignon (1991) and Larsen-Freeman (2000), the principles of CLT
emphasize the importance of using a language to communicate in order to learn it. Hymes
(1971) stresses that being able to communicate requires more than linguistic competence; it
requires communicative competence. Whole language advocates, such as Goodman
(1986), Weaver (1990), Edelsky, Altwerger & Flores (1991), Schwarzer (2001), and

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Brooks-Harper and Shelton (2003), state that language (oral and written) functions to serve
authentic purposes by facilitating meaningful communication. In the language learning
process, listening, speaking, reading, and writing should be treated as integrated,
interdependent, and inseparable elements of language. No language process should be
separated from the whole teaching task.
Harste, Woodward, and Burke (1984) explain that each time someone reads,
writes, speaks, or listens, this language encounter feeds into a common data pool. In
subsequent encounters with language, the person can draw on this pool. Rather than
assuming that speaking, listening, reading, and writing should be kept separate, they stress
that all expressions of language support growth and development in literacy. Weaver
(1990) explains that when children engage in the complex processes of reading, writing,
discussing, and thinking, they simultaneously develop language and literacy, learning
about and through these processes. Krashen (1993) found that reading exposure or reading
for genuine interest with a focus on meaning provides language learners with written
comprehensible input similar to oral comprehensible input. He argues that reading
contributes to second language acquisition in the same way as listening does, and proposes
that reading contributes to competence in writing just as listening helps develop the ability
to speak.

Peregoy and Boyle (2001) conclude that the teacher should incorporate
opportunities throughout the reading for students to develop their own learning by
responding verbally as they read, write, and learn in English, because it is the integrated
use of oral and written language for functional and meaningful purposes that best promotes
the full development of second language proficiency. These researchers suggest that
reading and writing as well as speaking and listening should be integral parts of all
language classroom activities because all these processes interact with one another.
So, the syllabuses used at public institutions of higher education in Luanda do not
promote a particular skill to the detriment of others, i.e. they do not adopt the segregated-
skill approach, in which the mastery of discrete language skills such as reading and
speaking is seen as the key to successful learning, and language learning is typically
separate from content learning as defended by Mohan, (1986). Segregated-skill-oriented
courses “have language itself as the focus of instruction to the extent that excessive
emphasis on rules and paradigms teaches students a lot about language at the expense of
teaching language itself” Brown, (2000). Frequently, segregated-skill ESL/EFL classes
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present instruction in terms of skill-linked learning strategies: reading strategies, listening
strategies, speaking strategies, and writing strategies as presented by Peregoy & Boyle,
(2001).
4.2.16. – Syllabus general and academic language ability
This thematic aims at discovering whether the current syllabus of English used at
public schools of higher education in Luanda provide students with the required amount of
general as well as academic language skills to the target population (students ) in English
as a foreign language context. The reason why we´re making this question is because we
wanted to check out whether the current syllabuses used in public institutions of higher
education helps students to acquire solid background knowledge on general English as well
as academic one. So, the results obtained, demonstrated that three out of five teachers
agreed that syllabus they have been using in their institutions, promotes more general than
academic linguistic competence, as it was made clear by one of them who resemble the
majority´s answers.
A: the current syllabus promotes more general and not academic language skills.
Teacher´s answers go in line with the researcher´s purpose because despite of
demonstrating that current syllabus promote more general than academic language skills, it
will help the researcher to design a syllabus that promotes both general and academic
linguistic competence. So we can say that current syllabus in public schools of higher
education in Luanda promotes more general language skills to students than academic one,
when in fact it should promote both for a student learning English as a foreign language
because they study in an academia in which academic language skills should obviously be
promoted at the same level as much as general English.
Nowadays cooperative learning is applied in almost all school content areas and,
increasingly, in college and university contexts all over the world Johnson & Johnson,
(1989); Kessler, (1992), and is claimed to be an effective teaching method in
foreign/second language education by scholars abroad and at home .It is generally asserted
that cooperative learning is the best option for all students because it emphasizes active
interaction between students of diverse abilities and backgrounds Nelson, Gallagher, &
Coleman, (1993); Tsai, (1998); Wei, (1997); Yu, (1995) and demonstrates more positive
student outcomes in academic achievement, social behavior, and affective development.
Different researchers might define cooperative learning in different ways. The
working definition of cooperative learning in this study entailed the following features:
cooperative learning was a system of teaching and learning techniques in which students
were active agents in the process of learning instead of passive receivers of the product of
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any given knowledge. This system could increase students’ academic learning as well as
personal growth because (1) it reduced learning anxiety, (2) it increased the amount of
student participation and student talk in the target language, (3) it built supportive and less
threatening learning environment, and (4) it helped the rate of learning retention. The
embodiment of communicative language teaching through cooperative learning was not
new. Richards, Platt & Platt (1992) pointed out that cooperative learning activities were
often used in communicative language teaching. Kagan (1995) also claimed that
communicative language teaching and cooperative learning was natural match in foreign
language teaching.
4.2.17. – The language style in study materials
This thematic aims at understanding whether the study material used in public
schools of higher education in Luanda contain a clear and simple language taking into
account the level of the students. Bearing in mind the students low achievement in English,
has roused our interest in finding out whether study material used by teachers in public
institutions of higher education, is a stumbling block for students to learn English language
successfully. So according to the results obtained, five out of five teachers agreed that the
course books used by them in English lessons contain a clear and simple language, as it
was made clear by one of them who resemble the majority´s answers.
A: the course book contains a clear and simple language but the level of the students is
really low.
Teacher´s answer go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has been
demonstrated that teacher´s course book in public schools of higher education in Luanda
have a clear and simple language for the students level, in order for them to understand but,
unfortunately most of the times student´s level is even lower because most of them have
many background problems in English. According to Langer, (2001) the way a teacher
presents material influences how and how well a student learns it. Teaching is a complex
task in which educators must determine the means to instruct students on the essential
knowledge and skills to promote the acquisition of new knowledge and abilities. Though
teachers advocate that textbooks contain a clear and simple language, it is also very
important to stress out that what is easy or simple for teachers, sometimes or most of the
times may not be simple for the learners, we´re are sure that if those materials were
designed for Angolans students we would have different results on these issues. So, there is
a strong contradiction between them, if in one teachers consider the textbooks easy, on the
other hand learners find it difficult due to their lower level, in this case we can say that the
textbook language doesn´t match the level of the students.
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 Kilickaya (2004) define authentic materials as exposure to real language and use
in its own community. Peacock (1997) has another definition of authentic materials which
is”the materials that have been produced to fulfill some social purposes in the language
community”. Authentic materials are assumed as the important tools for teachers in class in
order to make his/her teaching effective in transmitting the necessary knowledge to all
students.
The supplementary materials are generally known as authentic materials. Morley
and Guariento (2001) claim that the purpose of using authentic materials is to prepare
students for their social lives. In other words, the authentic materials are used in order to
close the language gap between classroom knowledge and real life. Similarly, Spelleri
(2002) supports this analysis, she thinks that the language used in text books are only valid
in a classroom environment whereas the requirement of real life English is different and
this difference has not yet been closed by the use of text books because learners have to
deal with the language of brochures, office work, application forms and other cultural
products. In this case the role of the teacher is crucial; it is the teacher’s responsibility to
filter materials through selection of the learning objectives. It is the teacher’s responsibility
to identify the items and their adaptability as well.

In addition Lundahl as cited in Ling and Daskalos (2005) states that “Authentic
material” refers to e.g. books and articles where language and structure are not simplified
in any way, it should be introduced in the classroom. For teaching purposes this refers to
English books, novels or articles that have been written by an English speaking author to a
native audience or speaker; in these cases the language used has not been altered.
According to Nunan (1999). The term "authentic text" covers language samples drawn
from a wide variety of contexts, including TV and radio broadcasts, conversations,
discussions and meetings of all kinds, talks, and announcements [as well as] magazines,
stories, printed material and instructions, hotel brochures and airport notices, bank
instructions, and a wide range of written messages.

The idea of using authentic materials in teaching English has come long time ago
since the introduction of communicative approach in 1970’s. It is known that authentic
materials have advantages for teaching English to EFL students According to Phillips and
Shettlesworth (1978); Clarke (1989); Peacock (1997) as cited in Richard (2001), authentic
materials have some advantages. Firstly, they have a positive effect on students’
motivation. Secondly, they provide authentic cultural information about the target culture.
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Thirdly, they provide exposure to real language. Fourthly, they relate more closely to
students’ needs. And finally, they support a more creative approach to teaching. Otte and
Thanajaro as cited in Al-Rashid and Al-Azri (2014) noticed that learners' self-satisfaction
and motivation showed improvement after employing authentic texts in the classroom.
Authentic materials help motivate learners learn the language by making them feel that
they are learning the 'real' language.

4.3.1. - INTERVIEW WITH COURSE COORDINATORS AND HEADS

OF DEPARTMENTS
Precisely as it happened with other people making part of this research project, it
was a god idea having a face to face conversation with those who in strict collaboration
with teachers manage the English subjects in the public higher education sector of this city.
So, course coordinators as well as the head of teaching and investigating department from
distinctive institutions of higher education around the city, are the closest people to help
teachers to provide better teaching practices to their students and helping them to
overcome other daily school related issues. That´s why, it was also our objective to look at
those mangers in order to have a face to face interaction and try to hear and comprehend
from their experiences, difficulties and prospections concerning the syllabus of English
management, and the teaching of this foreign language as such.
4.3.2. – Relevance of the English language in course curriculum
This thematic aims at finding out the importance that this target language has in
the curriculum of the courses administered in public institutions of higher education in
Luanda. With this question, we wanted to find out how important the English language is
for the curriculum of different courses administered in public institutions of higher
education. So, the results, suggest that five out of six people distributed in one course
coordinator and four head of teaching and investigation departments agreed that the
English language is extremely important in the curriculum of their courses, as it was made
clear by one of them who resemble the majority´s answer.
A: English language serves as means of oral and written communication to apply to
different spheres of professional activity.
Course coordinator and head of teaching and investigation´s departments in
public institutions of higher education in Luanda, go in line with the researcher’s purpose
because it has been demonstrated that the English language plays a fundamental role in the
course curriculum of the majority of graduation school courses in Luanda.

75
As most of the literature in the field of science and technology, engineering, medicine,
pharmacy, information technology, business, trade and commerce and so on is English, it
is possible for the scientists and researchers to continue their research and get success in
their fields to get good name for their countries and put their countries at the top most
level. As many innovations are taking place in almost all the fields, it is the hour of the day
for all the students, professionals and researchers to learn English as it promotes their
learning and enhances their knowledge enormously. As English is widely spoken all over
the world and so many resources are available only in English, it is an added advantage for
those who want to refer to anything in order to get the right information about the subject
or topic they are searching for. Rao, (2019)
The numbers described above suggest that English language is faced by Angolan
higher education institution managers as the most important international language by
several reasons. That´s why in 2000 Nunan argued that University graduates are then
expected to master English, especially to become fluent in English speaking skill as, among
others, a means of international communication. There comes the urgent necessity of our
students to master this which is widely believed by thousand of people to be the most
important language in the world, taking into account the range of areas from scientific and
academic knowledge, which goes from engineering; social sciences; arts; health and so on,
and so forth.

4.3.3. – School objectives with English language

This thematic aims at finding out whether public institutions of higher education
in Luanda set up some objectives to achieve with the target population, concerning the
learning of English language. The reason of making this question is because we wanted to
check out whether public intuitions of higher education have established some semestral or
annual goals which they intend their students to achieve with this language. The results
obtained, show that five out of six people distributed in one course coordinator and four
head of departments, agreed that their institutional objectives with students, is that they be
able to communicate in the target language. So as it was made clear by one of them who
resemble the majority´s answers as follows:
A: our objective is that they master the four skills in English, such as: listening, speaking,
reading and writing.
Course coordinators as well as the head of teaching and investigation department
´s answers go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it was proven that schools of
higher education in Luanda, have as their primary objectives students capable of
76
communicating freely in English as well as in different scopes of study and professional
domains, making their students fluent in this language in order to increase their not only
academic but also professional success. English ability has become one of significant factors
in winning the very tight competition of getting a job in this globalization era and it is believed
that people who are fluent in English would tend to earn better jobs in the corporate world
because they would have a skill to communicate better with people from other countries
Jenkins, (2010); Seidlhofer, (2004).
Just like we´ve been defending during our research, the main objective of learning a
language whether it is a foreign or local one, it is because people want to have and master the
ability for communication because no one learns a language just for writing, reading or
listening but to have the pleasure of sharing ideas with others, and keeping in touch with
people near and far from us, doesn’t really matter whether national or foreign people. That´s
why, in a study undertaken by Nunan (2000) revealed that mastering the art of speaking is the
single most important aspect of learning a second and a foreign language, and success is
measured in terms of the ability to carry out a conversation in the language.
The results presented suggest that higher education institution management haven´t
established a goal with their students concerning the achievements or learning in the English
language which we think is too bad, taking into account that no one should live nor perform a
task without a clear objective previously established; otherwise, our living and professional
activities would have no reason to exist or to be done. Whenever we do things by doing,
normally the results is not important because in fact we don´t expect a concrete result, we don´t
expect anything from that. For this reason we think that the management of higher institutions
in which this subject is administered as a non-specialty subject, should define clearly their
objectives to achieve with their students in this subject at the beginning of the school year, for
the improvement of the teaching and learning process as such and particularly for the teaching
of english as a foreign language.

4.3.4. - Syllabus implementation

This thematic aims at understanding how the administration of different courses
in which English language is administered as a foreign language follows it´s syllabus
implementation. As it is already known that syllabus is this project´s central issue, then we
wanted to make this question to understand to what extent course managers follow the
implementation of the English syllabus in use in each one of their higher education
institutions. According to the results, six people distributed in five head of teaching and
investigation department and one course coordinator agreed that they do not follow the

77
implementation of the syllabus of English as it was made clear by one them who resemble
the majority´s answers as follows:

A: the course coordination of this institution doesn´t follow the implementation of the
syllabus and says that it is not accordingly to the course features.

Course coordinators and head of departments answers don´t go in line with

researcher´s purpose because it clearly shows lack of control of those who in collaboration
with teachers, manage the English syllabus implementation, and at the same time it
demonstrates that course coordinations in public schools of higher education in Luanda, as
well as head of departments do not follow the English language syllabus implementation. It
is known that a good management also depends on the control people in charge have about
it, so if managers of the course do not control it, then we have open doors for the service to
be done without the required quality, because no one is supervising the good or bad
implementation of the program which becomes a bit difficult for us to achieve quality in
education as such, and specially in the teaching of English as a foreign language in the
schools of higher education of our city.
According to Spolsky (2004), "Language-management efforts may go beyond or
contradict the set of beliefs and values that underlie a community's use of a language and
the actual practice of language use"; as a result, the real language policy of a community is
more likely to be found in its practices than its management, unless the management is
consistent with the language practices and beliefs and with the other contextual forces that
are in play, and likewise, when management disregards the community's real language
uses, control over people's language practices becomes an illusion Shohamy, (2006).
4.3.5. - Course administration concern on student´s results
This thematic aims at understanding how the administration of the different
courses in which English language is administered as a foreign language shows their
concern on student´s results in relation to the English language. In making this question we
wanted to find out the real value, or what value course management gives to their student’s
achievements in the English subject, because knowing these results may be a starting point
to take betterment measures in the process. The results obtained demonstrate that, six
persons divided into one course coordinator and five head of teaching and investigation
department agreed that they show some concern on student´s results, as it was made clear
by one of them who resemble the majority´s answers.
A: Our concern is shown by undertaking extra lessons.

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 Course coordinator and head of teaching and investigation department´s answers
go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it demonstrated that course coordinators
and head of departments show some concern on student´s results which of course we
believe that it is not enough because it is done in several ways such us: receiving semester
reports analysed in scientific meetings, we humbly believe that waiting for the end of the
term is too late to carry out a severe following of students progress, that´s why we think it
should be done at least in each fifteen days.
For us, it doesn’t show serious and complete delivery in wanting to change the
picture of our education. For instance, their concern should be shown surveiling the quality
of lessons; following the implementation of the syllabus; organizing pedagogical sections
to improve the quality of teachers and consequently also improving the quality of teaching
in public institutions of higher education in Luanda. According to Spolsky (2004),
"Language-management efforts may go beyond or contradict the set of beliefs and values
that underlie a community's use of a language and the actual practice of language use" (p.
14); as a result, the real language policy of a community is more likely to be found in its
practices than its management, unless the management is consistent with the language
practices and beliefs and with the other contextual forces that are in play and likewise,
when management disregards the community's real language uses, control over people's
language practices becomes an illusion Shohamy, (2006). Even if the policy is explicitly
stated, as Shohamy (2006) claims, the language behavior may not represent the policy or
contradict it. Furthermore, Shohamy argues that the community will "want to create their
own language agenda".
Effective teachers identify appropriate intended learning outcomes for their
students and develop means to assess students on these outcomes during the planning
process Gronlund, (2003); Marzano et al., (1993). The analysis of student assessment data
informs effective teachers about the degree to which students have acquired specific
understandings and skills, and guides them in setting instructional goals (Cruickshank &
Haefele, (2001); Gronlund, (2003). As teachers analyze student progress, they keep
students informed through timely and regular targeted feedback that can help students
improve and be more successful in future work Cotton, (2000); Hoy & Hoy, (2003);
Marzano, Norford, Paynter, Pickering, & Gaddy, (2001); Walberg, (1984).
The area of monitoring student progress and potential focuses on how a teacher
knows that students have acquired knowledge and skills in a manner that allows pupils to
demonstrate academic success. Effective teachers monitor student learning through a
variety of informal and formal assessments and offer timely feedback to students Cotton,
79
(2000); Good & Brophy, (1997); Peart & Campbell, (1999). They check for student
understanding throughout a lesson and adjust instruction based on the feedback Guskey,
(1996). These educators align assignments given to students, such as homework and in-
class activities, with the intended learning outcomes so they are meaningful to students in
developing or reinforcing a concept and meaningful to teachers in analyzing the process
and products Cruickshank & Haefele, (2001). Effective teachers review progress over time
using an accumulated body of work, such as a portfolio Haertel, (1999). The analysis of
student assessment data informs effective teachers about the degree to which students have
acquired specific understandings and skills, and guides them in setting instructional goals
Cruickshank & Haefele, (2001); Gronlund, (2003).
4.3.6. – Course coordination´s concern on contents
This thematic aims at discovering whether course coordination of different
courses in which English language is administered as a foreign language in Luanda city,
have an idea of the contents their students have been taught in this language. With this
question we wanted to find out whether and to what extent course managers follow the
contents that students have been submitted to by their teachers in different institutions of
higher education in which English is administered as a non-specialty subject. So, the
results obtained, suggest that: four out of six people distributed in one course coordinator
and five head of departments agreed that they have some notions of the contents that
students have been taught in the this language, just like it was made clear by one of them
who resemble the majority’s answers.

A: It does, because the contents are described in the study plan submitted to the direction
of the school.

Course coordinators and head of department’s answers go in line with the

researcher´s purpose because it has been demonstrated that course coordinations and head
of departments in public schools of higher education in Luanda, are somehow aware of the
contents teachers have been administered to their students in this subject. We have several
reasons to believe that it is not yet enough taking into account that some course
coordinators have no idea of what, type of contents their students have been administered.
Our research also suggests that many course coordinators do not follow the implementation
of the syllabus not only of English but also from other subjects. Effective teachers have
knowledge about their content area, common student misconceptions, and available
resources to use in the classroom Buttram & Waters, (1997). They possess a deep
understanding of the subject matter that facilitates their planning and instructional delivery
80
Rowan, Chiang, & Miller, (1997). Furthermore, they know how the curriculum relates to
the content within the educational landscape Educational Review Office, (1998).
Additionally, they review instructional standards to guide decision making Buttram &
Waters, (1997). These teachers use long-range planning to map where instruction will go
in combination with alignment of the curriculum to state and local standards McEwan,
(2001); Walker, (1998).

Theory is completely different from practice with this being said, we can assure
that though course coordinators answers say one thing. Our observation said another thing,
course management of higher education institutions do not follow the implementation of
the contents that students have been administered at all. Our observation and interviews
suggested that most course coordinators have never got in touch with the syllabus of
English. From this perspective it´s not possible to show great concern on the contents that
students have been submitted to. A very severe surveillance should be done by course
management if they are to change this picture, because it seems that no effective control is
done by them to the teachers, sometimes making students receive improper contents
according to their English background knowledge or level.

4.3.7 – Gradation of teacher’s performance

This topic aims at finding out whether there are criteria to evaluate teacher´s
performance in public schools of higher education in Luanda. In making this question we
wanted to find out whether the management of public institutions of higher education has
adopted a criterion for the evaluation of teacher´s performance in classroom. The results
obtained, demonstrate that, six out of six people distributed in one course coordinator and
five head of departments agreed that in public schools of higher education in Luanda, there
isn´t a criterion for grading the quality of teachers, as it was made clear by one of them
who resemble the majority´s answers.
A: there isn´t a criterion to evaluate the performance of teachers.
Course coordinator and head of teaching and investigation´s departments answers
in this section do not go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has been clearly
demonstrated that higher education schools management in Luanda and perhaps
throughout the country, so far haven´t devised a method for evaluating the quality of
teachers of higher education, and this does not contribute to improve the quality of
education because whenever we evaluate teachers from time to time, they double effort In

81
order to provide better teaching services to the community also because they like being
positively evaluated. It influences positively for teachers to grow up in their professional
careers.
Although research studies seek to isolate and identify specific characteristics of
effective teaching, it is the sum of all the factors that makes a teacher effective. For
example, high-quality teachers combine instructional strategies with clearly focused goals
and high expectations for both behavior and learning in order to promote student
achievement Cotton, (2000); Johnson, (1997); Marzano et al., (1993); Mason et al., (1992);
McBer, (2000); Peart & Campbell, (1999); Shellard & Protheroe, (2000). Thus, while
possessing one or even several of the teacher effectiveness quality indicators is not
sufficient evidence that an applicant will be an effective teacher, it is a research informed
method designed to increase the likelihood of selecting the best teacher applicants.
We believe to be crucial that a criterion for higher education teacher’s evaluation
is designed and implemented in our education systems because it clearly boost the teaching
and learning process as such as well as the teaching of English as a foreign language in our
country. Teachers periodically evaluated are more motivated because people tend to feel
more motivated when negatively evaluated in order to be positively evaluated. As much in
the same way, people positively evaluated tend to double effort in order to maintain their
positive evaluation and consequently keep making head way in the higher education
teaching career.
4.3.8. – Reason for choosing English
This topic aims at finding out the objective with which the administration of
schools of higher education in Luanda have decided to chose the teaching of English
instead of another international language. By making this question we wanted to
understand for what reason the management of higher education institutions has decided to
teach English to the detriment of another international language. So, the results obtained,
suggest that five out of six people, distributed in one course coordinator and four head of
departments, agreed that the choice of teaching English in their course curricula is because
this language is considered for many people and reasons, as the most international means
of communication used worldwide, as it was made clear by one of them who resemble the
majority´s answers.
A: Because English is a vehicle language of international communication.
Course coordinators and head of departments answers go in line with the
researcher´s objective because it has been demonstrated that the target language is still the
most important and used, especially for graduation courses in our country and in the whole
82
world for graduation and post graduation courses, as much in the same way, a great part of
courses bibliography in public schools of higher education in Luanda are written in this
language. This also proves that whenever students want to learn an international language,
the chosen one is in the majority of times the English language.
Education is a vast area where everyone needs it in order to sustain themselves.
So English plays a vital role in promoting the learners‟ learning skills in the field
of education. It is a known fact that English is taught as a foreign language or a second
language in most of the schools around the world. The learners of their countries are taught
or encouraged to learn English as a foreign language or a second language to promote them
for higher studies in the field of science, engineering and technology, software, medicine,
information technology, business, etc. Moreover, almost all the books related to higher
education are available only in English. Even though English is not an official language in
some countries such as Sweden and Netherlands, the syllabi in the fields of engineering
and science are written only in English. Since English dominates as a major language in
these fields, most of the studies and research is done in English and they are also written
mostly in English. In order to make the available material of the higher studies more
accessible to all the learners and research scholars of various countries, it is written in
English rather than in any other language. Rao, (2019)
4.3.9. – Syllabus principles used
In this thematic the researcher aims at discovering which were the principles used
to design the syllabus of English used at certain public institutions of higher education in
Luanda, taking into account that English is administered i.e. taught and learned as a foreign
language in this country. We´ve decide to make this question because we wanted to find
out whether teachers in public schools of higher education know some syllabus design
principles to use in EFL context. The results obtained, show that five out of six people,
distributed in one course coordinator and four head of department agreed that the
principles used to design the syllabus of English used in their schools is not known by
them, as it was made clear by one of them who resemble the majority´s answers.
A: the head of this department doesn´t know the principles used to design the syllabus.

Course coordinators and head of departments answers does not go in line with the
researcher´s objective because it demonstrate that they are not aware of the principles used
to design the syllabus of English which have been used in their schools. Therefore, they do
not know whether these principles are suitable for the teaching of English as a foreign
language setting just like it is our case. On the other hand, it helps the researchers to know

83
the situation deeply because their answers respond to his third question, allowing him to
design a syllabus accordingly to an EFL syllabus design principles bearing in mind student
´s needs.

Approaches to Syllabus Design for Foreign Language Teaching by Karl Krahnke

concentrates on course content. It provides an overview of different approaches to the
specification of course content and devotes separate chapters to the six types of syllabus
identified by its author: the structural, the notional/functional, the situational, the skill
based, the task-based and the content-based.

Moreover, the three principles which can inform language syllabus design,
according to Yalden (1987), are (1) a view of how language is learned, which could result
in a structured-based syllabus; (2) a view of how language is acquired, which would result
in a process-based syllabus; and (3) a view of how language is used, which would result in
a function-based syllabus. By integrating all three, Yalden proposes a proportional
syllabus, with a semantic grammatical organizational base, a linguistic component based
on language functions, and themes based on learners ‘interests. In the early stages of
language learning, one might place more emphasis on structure, before moving on to
functions and then using tasks or topics to apply and creatively use the language.

Furthermore, as a main advantage proposed by Rabbini (2000), proportional

syllabus with its spiral method of language sequencing leading to the recycling of language
appeared to be the most appropriate for learners who lack exposure to the target language
beyond the classroom. This feature of proportional syllabus seems to, make it a good
alternative of syllabus design in EFL countries, in which the exposure to the target
language is rare in naturalistic settings and it is merely limited to classroom contexts and
private institutes practicing English language. Also in EFL settings due to the lack of
teachers who are communicatively competent, applying a hybrid proportional syllabus
seems to be an appropriate option providing the teachers with conditions to conduct a
teachers-learner negotiation and choosing how to implement the syllabus.
4.3.10. – Criterion for allocating teaching load
This thematic aims at understanding what were the requirements used to
determine the teaching load ??institutions of higher education have during a week. In
making this question we wanted to find out whether course management in public
institutions of higher education have adopted a certain criterion for the definition of the
teaching load, if there is any, to know what were the requirements used to define it. So,

84
according to the results, six people out of six, distributed in one course coordinator and
five head of departments agreed that public institutions of higher education in Luanda don
´t have a defined criterion for defining the teaching load per week, as it was made clear by
one of them who resemble the majority´s answers.
A: This department doesn´t know the requirements or criterion used to determine the
teaching load.
Course coordinator and head of department’s answers do not go in line with the
researcher´s purpose because it has been proven that so far, public schools of higher
education in Luanda haven´t adopted a defined criterion who lead the definition of
teaching load of the English language for graduation courses, which means that each one
of them has its own reason, which may vary from a decision of the scientific council of the
institution, or a decision made through choosing subjects of a certain graduation course
specialty, as been those with greater influence or role in the course itself and so forth and
so on. Teaching load allocation, that is, which teaching staff teaches which subject, is an
essential task that is carried out in all teaching and teaching/research institutions every year
or every semester McClure and Wells, (1985). Teaching load allocation has been well
recognized as a major contributing factor to the teaching quality McClure and Wells,
(1987); Partovi and Arinze, (1995); Shin and Jung, (2013). The teaching load must be
reallocated for changes of staff (some teaching staff are no longer available (resignation,
sabbatical, retirement, other commitment) and new teaching staff are available) and/or
program (some subjects are cancelled and some subjects are developed). As a
consequence, teaching load has to be reallocated in each teaching unit at least once a year.
In teaching load allocation, three objectives should be achieved. First, all subjects
must be taught. Second, a teaching staff should not be allocated a higher teaching load than
that required by her/his role. Third, teaching staff should teach subjects that they are
proficient with; otherwise they have to struggle to effectively manage teaching tasks and
schedules to find time for the many other activities, events, and responsibilities.
4.3.11. – Syllabus range to improve communication ability
This thematic aims at understanding whether course coordinators and head of
teaching and investigation´s departments can write down to what extent the syllabus of
English used at their institutions of higher education can help the target population to
develop communication abilities. We found pertinent to make this question because we
wanted to find out to what extent course managers can mention some positive as well as
negative appoints in the current syllabus used, which can help students to boost

85
communication ability. So, the results obtained, suggest that: four people out of six,
distributed in one course coordinator and three head of departments agreed that they cannot
estimate how far the English syllabus used at their institutions helps students to develop
speaking skills as it was made clear by one of them who resemble the majority´s answers.
A: the head of this department can´t estimate how far the syllabus used helps students to
develop speaking skills.
Course coordinators and head of teaching and investigation departments answers
ounce again do not go in line with the researcher´s purpose because it has been proven that
they are not so involved in the foreign language teaching which is administered in their
institution, if those who coordinate courses are not directly involved in the teaching
process, it is not possible to achieve the best results because they are the ones closely
linked to this activity. So, they should know their syllabus ups and downs. Many language
teaching professionals around the globe are trying to make the curriculum as much
communicative as possible. After the introduction and influence of the communicative
approach, it has become a fashion to integrate activities that would trigger interaction. Not
only it is important to make our curriculum communicative, but it is also necessary for us
to maintain and monitor its effectiveness regularly. It is important that we make the
learning process go beyond the subject matter. That is, we should concentrate on ‘extra-
teaching’ especially with the objective of developing communicative skills of the learners.
Rajesh Bojan, M.A., M. Phil, (2010);

As scholars stated before in the current era of teaching English as a foreign

language, syllabus designers have the obligation of making it as more communicative as
possible, so it is a must for syllabus designers nowadays to greatly promote speaking skills
because of communication language teaching approach has appeared to revolutionize the
teaching of english as a foreign language all over the world. So syllabus designers must
design their syllabus thinking on the range of communication abilities that it is capable to
promote to students whose syllabus is going to be intended for.
4.3.12. – Admission criterion (Entry/placement test?)
This topic aims at understanding whether the management of public schools of
higher education has adopted a certain criterion for the admission of students concerning
the English language. We believe that making this question is extremely relevant because
we wanted to find out whether course management in public schools of higher education
has defined student´s admission criterion intended to English subject for non-specialty
courses. According to the results, six people out of six, distributed in one course

86
coordinator and five head of department agreed that in public schools of higher education
in Luanda, there isn´t any criterion for admission of students in non-specialty courses, as it
was made clear by one of them who resemble the majority´s answers.
A: No, there isn´t.
Course coordinators and head of department´s answers do not go in line with the
researcher´s purpose because it has been demonstrated that public schools of higher
education in Luanda haven´t adopted a criterion concerning the admission tests, for people
studying in non-specialty courses, there isn´t an application of an English test. So, as stated
by (Brown 2003; Bachman 1995 in Hussain 2015) language test is believed to be able to be
valuable sources of information about the effectiveness of learning and teaching. Whereas,
a test is a method of measuring a person's ability, knowledge, or performance in a given
domain. Desheng and Vergese (2013) indicated that test evaluates not only the progress
and achievement of learners but also the effectiveness of the teaching materials and
methods used.
English proficiency test in a country where English as a foreign language is
necessary as a valid test to measure one’s English capability. English proficiency test is
taken not only in attempting to pursuing study abroad but also as a requirement to
complete college, especially in institutions. TOEFL (Test of English as Foreign Language)
is the most popular test used in many countries in all over the world. Clark (2014) stated
that according to ETS (Educational Testing Service), the TOEFL test is used by more than
9.000 colleges, universities and agencies in more than 130 countries to help them make
admissions decisions, making it the most widely accepted English-language test in the
world. A reported 27 million people had taken the TOEFL test in the world.
4.3.13 – Syllabus advantages and disadvantages
This topic aims at discovering if course coordinators and head of departments can
describe some advantages and disadvantages of the current syllabus in use at their
institutions, bearing in mind that they are the ones who coordinate he courses. We found
important to make this question because we wanted to check whether course managers in
public institutions are capable to identifying some strong and weak point in the current
syllabus in use at their institutions. So, the results obtained, suggest that six people
distributed in one course coordinator and five head of departments agreed that syllabus in
use have more disadvantages than advantages, as it was made clear by one of them who
resemble the majority´s answers.
A: The greatest disadvantage is that it was designed in a Cuban context, taking into
account the different reality; there are no advantages because it must be reshaped.
87
 Course coordinators and head of departments answers do not go in line with the
researcher´s purpose because it has been demonstrated that syllabus in our schools has
more drawbacks than positive aspects and a syllabus cannot have more negative aspects
otherwise the objectives will not be fully achieved. It takes us to think about working
together course coordinators, head of departments as well as teachers in the devising and
designing syllabus because it plays a fundamental role in the target population academic
results. That´s why in 1988 Tarey said that by making practical decisions about syllabus
design, one must take into consideration all the possible factors that might affect the
teachability of a particular syllabus. By strating with an examination of each syllabus type,
tailoring the choice and integration of different types according to local needs, one my find
a principled and practical solution to the problem of appropriateness and effectiveness in
syllabus design.
4.3.14. - Study material appropriateness for developing speaking abilities
This thematic aims at finding out whether coordinators and head of teaching and
investigation department in public schools of higher education in Luanda know how far the
study material used by teachers is useful for developing speaking skills to the target
population, taking into account that we are in an EFL context. In making this question we
wanted to find out whether course management in public institutions of higher education
knows to what extent the study material used by teachers is suitable to help students to
boost communication abilities. So, the results obtained, demonstrate that four out of six
people distributed in three head of department and one course coordinator agreed that they
do not know the study material used by their teachers, as it was made clear by one of them
who resemble the majority´s answer.

A: the coordination of the course doesn´t know the study material.

Course coordinators and head of department answer do not go in line with the
researcher’s purpose because it has been demonstrated that in public schools of higher
education in Luanda, course coordinators and head of department are not aware of the
English subject study material used at their institutions. Therefore, there is no way for them
to describe whether it is appropriate to develop target population´s communications
abilities or not. Besides, choosing and adapting materials represent quite a challenge for
most (new) language teachers. At the same time, as pointed out by Harwood (2010),
quoting Allwright (1981), "(...) no pre-prepared teaching materials can meet the needs of
any given class precisely; some level of adaptation will be necessary". It is, consequently,

88
important that teachers become aware of that, understand why and develop informed
means to perform this task, inherent to the profession.
4.3.15. - Reporting Qualitative Research
In order to analyse our data conveniently, we´ve decided to use topics or themes
related to a given thematic we are discussing, it´s also very important to elucidate that this
thematic derives from a question that we are analysing, bearing in mind that. ´´ A good
thematic code is one that captures the qualitative richness of the phenomenon. It is usable
in the analysis, the interpretation, and the presentation of research´´ Boyatzis, (1998). To
code data into themes, a researcher first needs to learn how to see or recognize themes in
the data. Seeing themes rests on four abilities:
(1) recognizing patterns in the data, (2) thinking in terms of systems and
concepts, (3) having tacit knowledge or in depth background knowledge (e.g., it helps to
know Greek myths to understand Shakespeare’s plays), and (4) possessing relevant
information (e.g., one needs to know a lot about rock musicians and music to code themes
about a rock music concert) Boyatzis (1998). Three errors to avoid when coding see
Schwandt, (1997) are (1) staying at a descriptive level only (not begin analytic), (2)
treating coding as a purely mechanical process, and (3) keeping codes fixed and inflexible.
Codes have five parts (1) a one to three world label or name, (2) a definition with a main
characteristic, (3) a ´´flag ``description of how to recognize the code in the data, (4) any
exclusions or qualifications, and (5) an example.

However, we provide a presentation of the data collected through the instruments

such as: first, interview whose target were course coordinators, head of departments and
teachers, with interviews we wanted to maintain a face to face interaction with those who
manage directly and indirectly the implementation of English language syllabus in higher
education schools of Luanda city. Second, questionnaire whose targets were the students,
with questionnaire with wanted to obtain the largest quantity of information in a row from
students, concerning their learning process. Third, observation, with observation we
wanted to triangulate some information concerning the interviews done to teachers in
which we concretely wanted to check some classroom management aspects, and
questionnaires filled up by students, in which we wanted to check some learning aspects.

With this being done, we provide an extensive analysis of this data or

information, bearing in mind the existing literature in accordance with the aspect which is
being discussed. In the analysis, we classified our data into three distinctive categories:
first students, second teachers and finally course coordinators and head of departments.
89
First of all, after the permission being conceded by the deputy directors for academic
affairs in the three institutions of higher education whose request was done throughout the
sending of a formal letter. Course coordinators and head of teaching and investigation
departments were the ones who received and directed us to the teachers, as so teachers did
with the students. First of all we´ve scheduled a fifteen minutes briefing with them in order
to explain some of our research´s related issues such as: the purpose of the research; it´s
importance for the EFL teaching, the target population and so forth and so on.

Second, teachers were the second to get in touch with this research issues related,
they played the role of a door, they opened us the doors to their classrooms. So they were
the ones who allowed us to work with their students. Likewise, for the three institutions of
higher education of six different graduation courses, teachers had a briefing whose
intention was to explain the purpose of our research as its importance for the teaching of
English as a foreign language and so forth and so on, also asking their availability in
working with themselves and their students. Third, a bit different from what happened with
teachers but with the same objective before they got in touch with the questionnaires,
students from three institutions of higher education of six different graduation courses,
were submitted to a fifteen minutes elucidation session which intended to explain them the
objective of the research itself, objective of the questionnaire, its importance for the EFL
teaching; as well as clearing some doubts concerning aspects to bear in mind while
answering the questionnaire.

CONCLUSION

The focus of this research was on investigating the way in which public higher
learning institutions in Luanda manage the syllabus of the English language in the course
taught in the referred institutions. . Such teachers, course coordinators, head of teaching
and investigation departments, surely without excluding the ones who the teaching and
learning process should be aimed at benefiting (students). In our research, several syllabus
management issues related to teachers were discovered, as well as different teaching and
learning aspects concerning students, and also not only syllabus but course management
itself by the part of course coordinators, head of teaching and investigation departments;
So, as one of the main classroom management related aspects issues perpetrated by
teachers we can describe aspects such as: many public institutions of higher education in
Luanda, hire teachers not graduated in English to teach to non-specialty courses, as it was
90
agreed by five of them, but, it´s also relevant to mention that the two teachers trained in
English, didn´t receive any pedagogy vocational training in English. However, as
demonstrated through observation in the classroom, students are not given the status of key
player in the teaching and learning process, for the fact that most teachers still monopolize
the lessons, and as agreed by five out of five teachers.

Syllabus of English used in most of these institutions does not help students to
develop speaking skills at all. This fact maybe one of the reasons which makes teachers
stating that the syllabus they have been using contains more drawbacks than positive
aspects, and another very important aspect to stress out right here is that teaching load is
normally distributed according to the relevance of the subject, that´s why, from the three
institutions of higher education in which we´ve undertaken this research?????. Only one
has English lessons more than two times a week, i.e. three times to be more specific, it
happens because according to them, though English is not a specialty subject, it is closely
related to students’ future work place daily activity?????. Though we´ve just
mentioned some above, we can say that the student´s related aspects that we find very
relevant to bring here as conclusion is the fact that many Angolan students study English
for more than three years as stated by one hundred and four (104),, but their level of
English is still beginner, as described by one hundred and fifty seven (157), and one
hundred and sixty eight agreed that they have English lessons only once a week. Seventy
eight have reading as their favorite skill in English (78), and at the same time eighty two
advocated that reading is also their classroom activity.

Finally, management aspects related to course coordinators and head of teaching

and investigation departments that we would like to stress out here is that they do not
follow the implementation of the syllabus of English as agreed by six people namely: one
course coordinator and five head of teaching and investigation departments. Six out of six
argued that there is not a criterion for grading the quality of teachers, then, five out of six
distributed in one course coordinator and four head of teaching and investigation
departments advocated that they do not know the principles in designing the syllabus in use
in their institutions. The last but not least, four out of six namely one course coordinator
and three head of teaching and investigation departments stated that they can´t describe to
what extent the syllabus used in their schools helps students developing speaking skills.

Notwithstanding the great amount of findings encountered and already presented

throughout this research, still being our responsibility to mention the most relevant ones

91
according to the aims and objectives of this study. So, as clear and previously stated as our
research´s aim as being the design of a syllabus which helps to elevate not only general but
also academic language skills in social settings or environments to the students of the three
institutions of higher education in Luanda having English as a foreign language, in which
English language is taught as a non-specialty course subject.

However, taking into account aspects previously identified such as students´

language background, students opportunity to use English language in the classroom but
especially out classroom because for many of our students, schools are the only place in
which they have some contact with English language, as we´ve suggested in our remarks
on the types of syllabus i.e. the designing of a syllabus fully based on communicative
language teaching approach (CLT), such as: full emphasis on learning to communicate
through interaction in the target language; the introduction of authentic texts into the
learning situation; also full provision of real opportunities for learners to focus, not only on
language but also on the learning process itself; the enhancement of the learning own
experience as important contributing element to classroom learning; as well as a clear
attempt to link classroom language learning with language activities outside the classroom
which is a fundamental language learning requirement as acknowledged by Nunan in
(1991).

Happily for us, our research results responded our objectives, though in some
cases not accordingly because nor everything is as good as expected, because during this
process we could see that the current syllabus of English used in those institutions of
higher education, broadly speaking, does not help students in an English as a foreign
language setting to acquire solid backgrounds in English language. As clearly stated above,
certainly without ignoring the other types of syllabus but basing on the aspects just
mentioned, our research results also revealed that communicative language teaching is the
one which best fit learners of English in a foreign language context, because a syllabus
designed under these principles off course without excluding students´ needs, objectives
and wants in the classroom. Surely make all of them grow daily in each field of specialty
such as visual arts, music, theatre, tourism management, teaching of French as a foreign
language, primary education, and nursery school teachers.

In our research process we could also find out that teachers in those three
institutions of higher education were the one who designed the syllabus of English in use
92
in those institutions, but they did it without bearing in mind fundamental aspects needs
analysis i.e. students needs, wants, or preferences, class size, number of students per class,
as well as content principle organisation, and its most adequate methodology to use with
each one of the contents. This study revealed that public institutions of higher education in
Luanda have no criterion for the admission of students of English as an optional course
subject as a response to our second research question. It is also very pertinent stressing that
the inexistence of an admission criterion may mean admissions of several low quality
students in terms of language background just as we´ve seen in our schools of higher
education in this city.

So as clearly stated by teachers, though they perform teaching activity for more
than fifteen years, they have no idea of syllabus design, that´s why, they can´t describe the
principles used by themselves while designing the syllabus of English in use in own
institutions, by saying that, we respond to our third research question. So, to finish we can
gladly say that we´ve conducted a scientific research into three public institutions of higher
education in Luanda and this study may serve as an indicative on how the teaching of
English as a foreign language in our city is, not to say in the whole country.

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