Abstract

The National Commission for Academic Accreditation & Assessment (NCAAA), Saudi Arabia, aims to determine ‘standards and criteria for academic accreditation and assessment and for accrediting post-secondary institutions and the programs they offer’ (2012). Along this line of teaching, learning standards, each department is required to submit the Course Report (CR) and the Course Specifications (CS) reflecting the quality of learning and the management of courses aiming to achieve the highest international standards. As mandatory procedure, English Language Centers (ELC) in the Saudi universities also prepare quality assessment reports. The reports include data about the assessment of English language skills of speaking, listening, reading and writing skills. In addition, the CR and CS both seek to establish whether students at the Preparatory Year have mastered core skills such as communication skills, problem solving skills, thinking skills, language skills, attention, executive skills, memorizing and other cognitive and interpersonal skills. This qualitative study highlights the major findings the teachers’ perceptions about integrating core skills into English language teaching that would potentially increase employability of students in the labor market in Saudi Arabia and as well as contribute to the national vision 2030 that includes ‘learning for working’. Our study focuses on the relationships between teachers’ perceptions about core skills development during English language teaching and teachers’ decisions about using teaching activities to enhance those skills. Data were collected through questionnaire, semi-structured interviews and class observations and coded into different categories and labelled and then the results were drawn analyzing the connection between those categories.

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