English for specific purposes in surging English-medium instruction contexts

English-medium instruction (EMI) research increasingly reports on students’ language-related challenges and a lack of academic and language support classes, collaboration between content and language teachers and overall teacher training. Our study explores EMI in Japan and China, two contexts where EMI has been referred to as emerging but is now “surging.” In these contexts, EMI is closely linked to English language proficiency goals, yet research on supporting students remains scarce. Data were collected via interviews and focus groups with students, English teachers and content teachers, who provided insights into approaches to EMI policy implementation, stakeholders’ attitudes, and the need for English for specific purposes (ESP) and English for specific academic purposes (ESAP). The results provide much needed insights for evidence-informed EMI policy implementation, curriculum development and teacher training. The study also provides insights into institutional infrastructure conducive to EMI policy, with findings revealing ESP needs of EMI students and the training needs of teaching staff. The study presented in this paper furthers the work that has been conducted in Anglophone settings on the complexity of ELT practitioner roles. The results also provide directions for future research.

近年来，全英文授课（EMI）的研究越来越多地关注学生在语言方面的挑战、缺乏相关学术和语言支持课程、学科与语言教师间合作不足以及整体师资培训不足等问题。本研究探索了日本和中国的全英文授课实施发展情况。 这两个国家的全英文授课尽管起步较晚，但现已迅速发展。现有研究表明，全英文授课与英语语言能力目标紧密相关，然而支持学生学习的研究仍不足。本研究通过对学生、英语教师和学科教师的访谈和焦点小组讨论收集了相关数据，对EMI政策实施、利益相关者态度以及特定目的英语（ESP）和特定学术目的英语（ESAP）需求提出了自己的观点。本研究为基于实证的全英文政策实施、课程开发和教师培训提供了切实可行的建议。此外，本研究还探讨了有利于全英文授课政策的体制基础结构，进一步阐述了全英文授课中学生的ESP需求和教学人员的培训需求。本文介绍的研究进一步推动了在英语国家环境中开展的对英语教学（ELT）从业者角色复杂性的研究工作，也为未来研究提供了方向。