Impact of Negotiated Syllabus on Iranian Students’ Writing Skill in an ESP Context: The Case of Male and Female Business Administration Students

The main objective addressed in this study was to investigate the impact of the negotiated syllabus on Iranian students’ writing skills in an ESP Context. To this aim, ۸۰ Iranian male and female intermediate learners, ranged ۱۸-۲۸ in terms of age, participated in this study. They were divided into ۴ groups of ۲۰ learners randomly. The experimental group consisted of ۲ sub-groups, one of which included ۲۰ males, and the other one consisted of ۲۰ females. The same classification was conducted for the control group. A pretest on writing then was given to all participants to make sure they are homogeneous in terms of writing skill. As a treatment, the content of the material was discussed with the participants in the experimental sub-groups. Both the experimental group and control group attended an English course. The control group received a conventional ESP instruction in which neither content nor activities were negotiated. On the other hand, the experimental group received the treatment, which was based on the negotiated syllabus. After the treatment, a researcher-made posttest was administered. The statistical analysis of the data revealed that negotiated syllabus for ESP writing was more effective than the traditional approach to writing instruction. However, two gender subgroups in the experimental group were not different, the conclusion being that negotiated syllabus did not affect female and male EG students’ writing skills differently. The findings of this study can provide certain implications for educational policy-makers, material developers, ESP teachers, and second language learners.

Keywords:

Syllabus design , Negotiated syllabus , ESP , Writing skill.