日本大学歯学部紀要 50，21‒26，2022

Highlighting the relevance of English language courses: Two case studies
Hugh Graham-MarrIntroduction
It is far from being a new observation that students may question the relevance of what they
are studying. As Frymier and Shulman (1995) write, “Frequently, students are skeptical of thesignificance of the material taught to them in the classroom” (40). They may be skeptical about
how the material fits in with their core area of study or of how it relates to their future needs,
whether personal or professional. Skeptical students may have little motivation beyond theproximal instrumental goal of gaining a mark in that course. This is perhaps a problem inparticular for skills-based areas of learning such as language courses, where sustained practicethat demands a relatively high degree of motivation is needed to gain any measure ofproficiency, sustained practice. Further, such questions of relevance come to the forefront when
the language course is a required part of the curriculum, which is, as Fryer et al (2014) note, acommon situation “in numerous Asian-Pacific tertiary contexts—studentsʼ chosen department
notwithstanding” (239) and indeed the situation of the two cases considered in this paper.
Motivation has long been recognized as central to language learning and much has been
written about it. Researchers have focused on the reasons people study a language (Gardner,1985; Deci and Ryan, 1985); learners and their beliefs about learning (Covington, 1998); classroom
dynamics and changes in motivation through the course of learning (Dörnyei, 2001). All of this isbeyond the scope of this paper. While motivation is the subtext, the thrust of the paper is far
narrower: relevance, about which Kember et al. (2008) write in reference to the professional
program they examined, “a failure to establish relevance… ..had a double-edged sword effect.
Students enrolled in the programmes with an expectation that they would provide an education
which would equip them for their future career. If it was not clear how what they were taught
was relevant to future needs it was easy for morale to diminish” (260).
Case 1 investigates selecting and presenting material in a manner that emphasizes therelevance of an English language course to the students’ core area of study, businessadministration. Case 2 examines the presentation of a general English textbook and the emphasis
on more distant goals in a dentistry program.

日本大学歯学部〒101-8310

外国語分野（英語）

東京都千代田区神田駿河台 1 − 8 −13（受理：2022年 5 月31日）

DepartmentofForeign

Languages(English),

Nihon

University School of Dentistry
1-8-13 Kanda-Surugadai, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 101-8310, Japan─ 21 ─

日本大学歯学部紀要 50，21‒26，2022

Case 1This case involves first-year students in the English-stream program in the School of Business
Administration at a large university in downtown Tokyo. By and large, students are quite
motivated to study English as they have elected to join this English select program and are able
to do so because they have a sufficient level of English. The classes in question were two Global
Issues classes with a total of 61 students. The classes aim to have students learn throughEnglish and develop their facility for discussing ideas in English. One of the classes was taught
by the author from the beginning of the year, and he took over the other from a colleague at thebeginning of the fall semester. In the fall semester, the focus was on environmental issues, witha strong focus on climate change. The author has taught Global Issues in the past to sociology
students, to English language majors, and in an English program that gathered students fromdifferent departments. This time, he wanted to introduce the concepts he had taught in previous
courses while approaching them in a way that more strongly connected the course with thestudents’ area of study, business administration. There was considerable leeway to do this as
there were no set course materials, and given the relatively high level of the students theinstructor was able to use a variety of realia or adapted realia: YouTube videos, newspaper
articles, presentations, and interviews. The following are some of the ways in which the course
was shaped to fit with the theme of business administration.
（ 1 ）We used the case study approach that is common in business schools. Environmental
cases were categorized according to the success of the responses and the reasons for thoseoutcomes were then analyzed. For example, why can our response to ozone depletion be byand large seen as a success whereas our success at combating acid rain is best described as
being more mixed? What turned an initially successful policy such as the ivory ban, into afailure?
（ 2 ）Business factors were very much a part of our case study analyses. For example,
concerning the response to the ozone depletion crisis and why it was successful, we
considered the following four factors: (a) there were relatively few players involved in thebusiness of making the damaging chemicals, (b) alternatives were available, albeit more
expensive, (c) the switch to the alternatives did not threaten the core business of thecompanies involved since the same businesses were still in the business of making thecoolant and propellant chemicals, just different ones, and (d) competing companies made thechange at the same time so no one company was at a competitive disadvantage in making
the change.
（ 3 ）We considered the business of the environment, and the failure of economics both to─ 22 ─

Highlighting the relevance of English language courses: Two case studies

account for both the input provided by the natural Commons, and to account for the cost ofexternalities. We all recognize the value of a living tree but we only make decisions basedon what is accounted for. So a tree has no value for the maintenance activities it does as aliving tree, such as providing a habitat for a great number of other organisms, maintaining
local rainfall (up to 60% of rainfall in a region may be dependent on its local tree cover; theroots bring water up from the ground to transpire through the leaves to fall again as rain),maintaining temperatures, nor does it have any value for providing oxygen or for acting asa sink for carbon. However, it might be given a value as a holding for its future value once
it is felled, or if its presence contributes to some other human activity such as sightseeing ormaintaining a watershed for fisheries. Once the tree is felled and dead, it has immediate
value. We approached this as a flaw distorting all our bottom-up business decisions.
（ 4 ）The analysis of business leaders was introduced into the course. In one assignment,
students were asked to read and summarize an abridged version of an interview on climatechange that Bill Gates had with The Atlantic magazine in which he discusses the roles ofthe public and private sectors in responding to the climate crisis and what he argues to be
the reasons for large-scale government involvement.
（ 5 ） We looked at the final case study, climate change, in terms of a business SWOT
analysis where O refers to opportunities and T refers to threats. Elon Musk’s solar roof
venture was introduced as a business response to the opportunity of climate change.
In other words, while the author introduced the same underlying issues of environmental
problems as he had with different previous groups of students, with descriptions of the issues, ofpolicy responses and of policy possibilities, the approach was modified to match the core focus of
the study of the students. Apart from this, no overt mention was made of the connection
between environmental challenges and business.
At the end of the course, two questions were asked of the students. The numbers of students
answering, “Yes” or “No” were as shown in Table 1.
Table 1 : Student perceptions of content relevance
YESNO1.

At the beginning of the course, did you feel that GlobalIssues were connected with your ﬁeld of study, Business
Administration?

QUESTIONS

32

29

2.

At the end of the course, do you feel that Global Issues
are connected with your ﬁeld of study, Business Administration?

60

1─ 23 ─

日本大学歯学部紀要 50，21‒26，2022

The survey showed a marked increase in students’ perception of the relevance of the course
to their main focus of study. However, in asking students to reflect back on their prior beliefs
rather than asking them about them at the time, it may be that some error was introduced.

Case 2This case involves second-year students in the School of Dentistry at another large Tokyobased university. They were enrolled in a compulsory course designed to develop theircommunication skills. In this course, there seemed to be a wide variation in motivation levels.
Many students did not necessarily envision using English in their future practices or in otherareas of their professional or personal lives. They also felt a great demand to spend as muchtime as possible on the courses at the core of their studies. A general English textbook chosen
by the author was used for the portion of the course he taught, which focused on listening andspeaking. The author felt this text could most immediately help students develop their English
communication skills. The text focused on helping students better use English in situations
where they have imperfect understanding, and to better utilize some of the language they
already have. A major focus of the listening portion of the text was to draw students’ attention
to connected speech. In speaking, the focus was on introducing and practicing speaking
strategies that can be used when a student has an imperfect understanding of the language:strategies such as checking or confirming understanding; asking for help from the other speakerin a conversation; and asking questions to show interest and move a conversation forward.
However, the text did not have any reference to dentistry or examples of the sorts ofconversations a dentist might have in English with a patient. Therefore, a student might not
immediately see the relevance of their studies in this class to their core area of study. To help
with this, the author undertook some steps.
（ 1 ）In each class an aspect of connected speech was presented. This was drawn from themain listening of the text unit and the sentences demonstrating the aspect reflected thatcontent. This might be, for example, something like assimilation, wherein a final ‘d’ sound +an opening ‘y’ sound in the following word, combine to make a ‘j’ sound. The text gives
examples such as ‘second year’ becoming ‘seconjear.’ At the end of such an activity, it waseasy enough to add dentistry-specific examples, so students could see the connection
between the aspect being presented in the text and how they might encounter it in theirworld. Thus, for example, an added example of assimilation of the type described might be“Could you open your mouth?” where the “d” in “could” and the “y” in “you” combine to
make the “j” sound. Similarly, a presentation of the liaison seen between consonant-ending
and vowel-starting words, could end with additional examples, such as “Rinse out yourmouth.”─ 24 ─

Highlighting the relevance of English language courses: Two case studies（ 2 ） In each class as well, a speaking strategy was introduced with tasks in the text
designed for the students to practice it. Here too, it was often easy enough to add adentistry-specific example. So, for example, after students completed an activity where they
were given objects that they did not know the names of and had to describe, the author
repeated the activity with the whole class, describing some of the tools that dentists use in
their practice. In this way, again, a connection was made between the students’ core area ofstudy and the skills being shown in the different settings offered by the text, bydemonstrating how that skill could be used in the setting of their area of study.
（ 3 ）Dentistry-specific examples were introduced in quizzes, once again emphasizing theapplication of what was being taught in a setting that was more the focus of the students.
For example, a portion of a quiz asking students to complete a conversation using anappropriate strategy is shown below.
B. I have a sore tooth on my lower left sideA. ___________________________________________
B. Yes, the lower left. Here.
A. I see. And how long has it been hurting ...
The two case studies introduced quite different situations: the first, a class of more motivatedstudents who had chosen to be part of an English-stream program and who could easily envision
themselves using English in their careers in the future, the second, a class of students, many ofwhom did not envision themselves using English in their professional futures, taking acompulsory class that they did not necessarily see as relevant. In different ways though,measures can be taken to bring the content closer to the worlds of the students. Although agreat many other potentially demotivating factors remain at play, perhaps content-relevance is
not one of them.

References

Covington, MW, The Will to Learn: A Guide for Motivating Young People, 1998 Cambridge
Cambridge University Press
Deci EL, Ryan RM, Intrinsic Motivation and Self-Determination in Human Behaviour, 1985 New
York Plenum
Dörnyei, Z, Motivational Strategies in the Language Classroom, 2001 Cambridge Cambridge
University PressFryer, LK et al (2014) Instrumental reasons for studying in compulsory English courses: I didnʼtcome to university to study English, so why should I?, Innovation in Language Learning and─ 25 ─日本大学歯学部紀要 50，21‒26，2022

Teaching 8:3, 239256, DOI: 10.1080/17501229.2013.835314
Frymier, AB, Shulman, GM (1995) “What's in it for me?”: Increasing content relevance to enhance
studentsʼ motivation, Communication Education 44:1, 40-50, DOI: 10.1080/03634529509378996
Gardner RC. Social Psychology and Second Language Learning: The Role of Attitudes andMotivation, 1985 London Edward Arnold
Kember, D, Ho, A, Hong, C. (2008) The Importance of Establishing Relevance in Motivating
Student Learning, Active Learning in High Education 9:3, 249-263 DOI: 10.1177/
1469787408095849 249-263

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