English for specific purposes: a qualitative analysis of MINEDUC documents and an application of theory for the creation of guidelines for the learning and teaching of English vocabulary in vocational high schools in Chile

Abstract

English education has been the focal point of several studies since the Ministry of Education set the goal of making Chile a bilingual country. In this guise, many of the documents pertaining English education in Chile have been studied, with the purpose of analysing the characteristics of English teaching in the schools of the country. Following this, the present research focused on the analysis of several documents dealing with English education in Chile, including the textbooks for 3rd and 4th year of high school, the English programmes, and the fundamental objectives for both regular and vocational schools. The aim of this study was to determine the suitability of these documents for the teaching of English in Chilean vocational schools. The results show that there is a disconnection between the demands and goals set by the Ministry for vocational students, and the information the official documents and textbooks provide for their education. From this disconnection stemmed the proposal for a set of guidelines focused on ESP vocabulary teaching.