Abstract：Abstract: The same course of Introduction to Linguistics (ITL) offered to English major students in Singapore and China are received with different feedbacks. Based on this observation, this research investigates the problems of current ITL course and attempts to provide solutions. The comparison of teaching material and content reveals that the problems arise from the distinguished purposes of students in Singapore and China. This paper thus claims that ITL has to be revised to fulfill the needs of Chinese students in both terms of framework and content. The framework has to be complemented with the knowledge related more closely to the learning of language by students, while the content should be enhanced with the applicable explanation of linguistic theories. All these ideas are testified in the process of teaching ITL, which provides a foundation for the development of new textbook and a more extensive study in the future.
Key words: needs analysis; course framework; course content; language competence
