English for civil engineers [ LANGL1871 ]

Moodle UCL : LANGL1871 English for EPL11 students.

It is essential that students possess at least basic skills and knowledge of English.

The main themes dealt with in the texts are closely related to the other subjects of EPL Bac 1 (e.g. Electromagnetism), and the topic of their end of year project.

At the end of the course,  students are expected to have reached

• a B1 upper level (Common European Framework of Reference for Languages) in the 2 following skills: listening and speaking; 
• and a B2 upper level in reading.

Assessment BAC 1 students are tested in the following way :

1. Compulsory Exemption test: At the very beginning of the academic year, all students MUST take an exemption test. This test is the same level as the exam. The students that obtained 12/20 at this test are exempted from the course but not from the final written exam. All students must take the final written exam
2. Final written exam: The examination will test whether the objectives concerning reading comprehension, including vocabulary and grammar, have been attained.
   The examination accounts for 2/3 of the total mark.
3. Continuous assessment covers all the activities organised during the course. English being the language used during lessons, the students will also be judged on their ability to use the language to carry out the activities in class and on their overall participation.
   Regular written texts will prepare the students for the examination.
   The test organised in week 8 is part of continuous assessment.
   Continuous assessment accounts for 1/3 of the total mark.
4. September exam covers everything and continuous assessment will not be taken into account. Only the mark of the exam will be taken into account.

The teaching methods used will encourage the active and interactive participation of the students. The first step, which is crucial, is the preparation of activities which will be dealt with more fully in the following lesson : students receive precise instructions on how to work either individually or in groups, on a series of problems which will enable them to discover, for instance, certain lexical or grammatical aspects of texts.

Afterwards, during the lesson, the students are expected to comment on the different problems they encountered, and the conclusions they came to, or else to apply what they have prepared, for instance, in role plays. These activities lead to various forms of interactivity and cooperation.

At the end of the course, the students will have acquired the necessary skills to read the scientific texts written in English that form the basis of a certain number of their courses in Applied Sciences, as well as other texts of the same type and level of difficulty (B2: upper level).

Concerning pronunciation, students will be able to

1. pronounce the letters of the English and Greek alphabet
2. use the English phonetic system
3. pronounce and stress words correctly

Concerning oral expression, the students will be able

• to use everyday language needed for group work 
• to give a brief well-structured but not too detailed account of their project.

• Course notes: « English : reading comprehension » (available at the ILV) ' Compulsory.
• Elearning tools on UCL website : on Moodle UCL : course LANGL1871English for EPL11 students