This paper is prompted by the notions of awareness, lifelong learning, and autonomous learning as familiar key-words for the planning, implementation and assessment of languages with reference to a common European language policy. It puts forward a global approach to the development of metalinguistic awareness through reading and writing tasks based on EST authentic texts which complement day-to-day classroom work, and reports on the experience with reference to the learner, the learning process and the teacher’s role. Even though this paper elaborates on the outcomes from a particular EST course (i.e. Maritime English), procedures and activities may also be used as such within any ESP context and/or content-based course, and conclusions transferred to tertiary levels worldwide.