The perceived value of english: the case of tunisian university students

5.4. Suggestions for further research

A study that concentrates on gender, level, and institutional differences concerning the perceived value of English among university science students could be helpful in clarifying important aspects of this issue. For doing so, it seems important to resort to a test when measuring students' proficiency and to supplement with interviews of university teachers.

5.5. Recommendations

It seems important that policy makers in the institutions teaching science and commerce to decide to promote learning English and resort to efficient measures derived from their students and ESP teachers such as:

1. Giving more importance to English by increasing its coefficient.

2. Providing teachers with appropriate materials for teaching like English laboratories.

3. Establishing English clubs and encouraging teachers to run them.

4. Establishing (at least) a university that teaches scientific disciplines in English.

What seems needed from the part of learners is mainly good will to master English and having access to scientific publications written in English because of its importance for their future careers.

Adopting more active, creative and motivating methods in teaching science students instead of the traditional and sometimes monotonous ways could be an important measure to take on the part of teachers. Examples of such methods are:

1. Encouraging interpersonal interaction between the students when doing classroom activities.

2. Changing the environment of teaching by organising purposeful excursions.

3. Adopting communication based tests instead of paper-and -pencil ones.

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Appendix A: Questionnaire for students

University of Manouba 2007-2008

English department

Research project: « memoir de fin d'études »

Student: Mimoun ^MellitiSupervisor: Dr. Faiza Derbel

Questionnaire for students

This is a questionnaire that attempts to study the perceived value of English among a cohort of Tunisian university science students. This research is going to be used for academic purposes and all answers will be anonymous.

Thank you for your collaboration.

Section 1:

1.1. Age .....

1.2. Gender

1.3. Department

1.4. Level

1.5. Specialization

Section 2:

2.1. What was the last mark you obtained in the English exam? 0-7 8-12 13-Up