Addressing ULA students’ wants, lacks, and needs in relation to their EFL classes: A needs analysis

Abstract

Teaching a new language is a very complex process. Teachers must be very well prepared in terms of methodologies, strategies, new trends, and have a good comprehension of the teaching context. According to Richards, Platt and H. Platt (1992), a needs analysis can be described as "the process of determining the needs for which a learner or group of learners requires a language and arranging the needs according to priorities" (p. 353). There are different ways in which this kind of information may be gathered. For instance, questionnaires, tests, interviews, or observations. The information is generally related to the situations where the target language is required, the objectives and purposes for acquiring the L2, the kinds of communications the students will need, and the level of proficiency that students should have. The purpose of this paper is to describe the results of a needs analysis carried out at Universidad de Los Andes in Táchira, Venezuela. It followed a mixed method approach with a questionnaire and an interview script as the data collection instruments. Participants were 36 students of an English I class, and two professors of EFL. Results show that students would profit from sessions with integrated skills activities within the communicative approach.