Q&A on university-level learning

What can I do to make sure I’m prepared for university as a non-native speaker?

Studying through a second language is understandably challenging as it also often involves a major switch in linguistic register, in addition to the actual language itself. If your experience of using language has mainly been through popular culture or even through your school or university teacher, the chances are that your exposure won’t have involved the same level of subject-specific vocabulary or formal style that you will find at university. This is a key aim of Garnet’s ESAP series.In order to familiarise yourself with the challenge you are about to face, I would recommend starting to read textbooks or journal articles from your academic field to develop an understanding of the way language is used in the written form. In terms of the spoken word, there are many examples of academic lectures online. You may even find a lecture series linked to your own discipline or department within your university. For example, at the University of Kent there are more than 100 videos in the Think Kent series, which give an excellent overview of academic register in practice.

What do ESL learners commonly struggle with at university level?

How do I make my note-taking more efficient and productive?

One of the main challenges of learning in the university context is how you as a student can make the best use of the information and research presented to you in lectures. Success in this will allow you to explore a variety of views and take the information a step further in the process of forming an argument. Many universities now use lecture capture technology which allows you to review a lecture after it has been delivered live. However, this is time consuming, so the quality of your notes are still vital. One of the most effective methods for useful and reusable notes which capture the main details and themes of a lecture is to develop your own system of shorthand or symbols. In conjunction with this, it is important to ignore unnecessary information, so that you aren’t writing too quickly or getting behind on what you are listening to. There are different examples of shorthand in EAP textbooks, but in truth, you can use whatever symbols you like, provided that you are able to consistently follow what you have written later on. You can develop your own scheme by creating a glossary of symbols or abbreviations. If you stick to this, then after a few weeks you’ll find it gets easier and quicker to capture the most important points and to understand what you have written at the point of revision or reuse.

How is language learning changing as we become more technologically minded?

Do you think language learning at university level is changing/ will change due to Brexit?

About the author

Dr Anthony Manning @UniKentDeanInt is Dean for Internationalisation at the University of Kent. His book, Assessing EAP: Theory and practice in Assessment Literacy, is one of the featured products on our website. It is structured with the aim of demystifying assessment and test design for educators who need to build and use EAP tests. In using the book, colleagues will find ways to extend their skills in different areas of assessment in EAP. Using the text in this way offers an opportunity to enhance ‘Assessment Literacy’, so that future tests can provide even better experiences and outcomes for the students who take them and the institutions that are required to interpret the results. He is one of the original creators of the TASK (Transferable Academic Skills Kit) series and remains one of the main authors of the second edition of this range of books. Also for Garnet, Anthony has written English for Language and Linguistics as part of the ESAP series. He has written a number of books and journal contributions for other publishers. He has delivered seminar papers at ALTE, IATEFL, InForm and BALEAP conferences on the subject of English for academic purposes, language assessment and academic skills development.