272 / 2018-06-11 20:49:15

Understanding EFL Athletes' Learning Preferences and Tips for ESP (English for Sports Purposes) Course Design

EFL athlete students, VARK learning preferences, athletic status, English for Sports Purposes (ESP) course design

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To understand students’ physical, emotional, social, and cognitive needs is one of the most demanding challenges facing EFL teachers, and it is more challenging when students are athletes. In EFL environment, understanding athletes’ learning preferences about how they take in and process information is an important component of developing their EFL abilities. Knowledge of their idiosyncrasies will assist EFL teachers in preparing them to their maximum potential in academic learning as well as their physical performance.
This study used The VARK-Questionnaire-for-Athlete (Traditional Chinese Version) to understand athletes’ learning preferences in a sport university, aiming at characterizing athletes with regards to their learning preferences: V-visual, A-auditory, R-read/write, K-kinesthetic, and MM-Multimodal. Athletes (n=120; 80 males, 40 females), age 19 ±1 yrs, completed the questionnaire and the outcomes were analyzed by Chi-Square analysis. The result demonstrated: (1) although mostly kinesthetic and MM and partially auditory learners, athletes demonstrated propensity towards hands-on learning, which could be ascribed to their habitus of being physical practitioners; (2) very few athletes have a visual learning style preference (n=1; a hearing-impaired) or a read/write learning preference (n=2; two Go players); (3) no significant difference was found regarding the correlations between gender and learning preferences, or athletic status and learning preferences; and (4) a significant relationship was shown between athletic specialty and VARK preference.
It is suggested: (1) the findings be applied to course designs of ESP (English for Sports Purposes) for athletes of different learning preferences; (2) EFL instructors be aware of the inadequacy of visual presentation of EFL materials and of using read/write EFL materials in EFL classes for athletes; and (3) teaching materials be presented in athletes’ preferences to motivate athletes to strive to their potential in learning English in addition to laying a focus on their athletic specialties.