WEBQUEST AS TECHNOLOGY OF DIFFERENTIATED ESP INSTRUCTION AT UNIVERSITY LEVEL

Abstract

The current study aims to find out teachers’ attitudes to the WebQuest learning and analyze the specifics of WebQuests and possibilities of their use in differentiated ESP instruction of information technology (IT) students. A qualitative type of research was used. The participants of the study were 31 ESP teachers (28 females and 3 males) of the Department of English for Engineering of National Technical University of Ukraine “Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute”. The ESP teachers participated in the study voluntarily in 2019-2020. An anonymous questionnaire was used to collect the data. The questioning of the ESP teachers has shown that most of them appreciate the idea of using the WebQuest learning. The analysis of the WebQuest specifics allowed suggesting a classification of WebQuests based on ten criteria. The structure of a WebQuest is described with a focus on IT students’ language learning styles and foreign language proficiency levels. Approaches to the WebQuest learning used by ESP teachers in the differentiated instruction were analyzed. It was concluded that the use of different types of WebQuests with a focus on learners’ differentiation helps to diversify ESP learning at technical university and facilitates the development of professional communicative skills.