English for pharmacy : an esp course in a CLIL context

Resumen

This article deals with an ESP course taught as an obligatory subject in apharmacy undergraduate degree programme in Spain. The language course is only one ofthe contexts involving disciplinary English as the degree programme integrates English inseveral content subjects. The ESP course is an attempt to find the right balance betweenstudents’ language needs, pharmacy-specific language skills, and the language-relateddemands of pharmacy content subjects which integrate English. The co-existence of ESPand CLIL teaching is seen as an opportunity for a closer cooperation and coordinationwith disciplinary experts to make connections between disciplines and activities towardsbetter learning outcomes. We propose a course aimed at raising students’ languageawareness through focused tasks which will cater to student’s communicative needs relatedto the two main themes of the course: chemistry and pharmaceutical care.