Caireen Sever - Practical ideas for teaching business English 1 | Delta Publishing

Practical ideas for teaching business English 1

Monday 17 January 2011

Thanks for your comments related to our first blog ‘What is business English?’ It’s good to hear that teaching business English is a positive experience for you as it is for us. In our next two blogs we are going to look at some practical ideas for teaching business English. These are additional to the ideas look in Part B of The Business English Teacher.

As we wrote in our first blog, the role of the business English teacher differs from that of the general English teacher in many respects. One difference we didn’t mention, yet one of the most daunting for teachers new to teaching business English, is the many and varied unexpected situations the job can bring. This could be not knowing from one week to the next which room you are going to be in and what facilities are available or it could be erratic attendance from group members due to their work commitments so that you don’t really know who you will be teaching.

What can you do in such situations? Sometimes it is still possible to deliver the lesson you have prepared especially if it is of immediate and urgent need for the learners present. However, sometimes you need to improvise. To help you do this professionally, it is useful to carry a ‘survival kit’ with you.

A ‘survival kit’ could contain cards, pictures, maps, frameworks and business articles.

For example, using blank cards, you can get learners to write vocabulary from previous lessons on them and test each other on what the words mean. Alternatively, your cards could contain various job priorities such as good pay, long holidays, good colleagues, working alone, travelling, sharing an office. Learners discuss the cards and rank them in order of what is most important to them.

Pictures could be of famous business people or of recent news stories. Learners discuss what they already know about the people or situation and if they have internet access, they can do some research in English to find out more.

Maps can be a great prompt to talk about locations of your learners’ company headquarters, subsidiaries, factories or competitors, or where they have travelled to on business.

Frameworks, which are worksheets with space for learners to add their own ideas and information, are also a great standby. They can be used for a variety of activities including mini-presentations or structuring reading a relevant business article.

For all of these activities, it is important to give feedback by suggesting better language, helping with vocabulary and correcting errors where appropriate, either by making comments as the learners are speaking or by making notes to go through at the end of the activity. This makes sure that the lesson is still an opportunity for learning and still a good use of the learners’ time.

What situations have you experienced which were unexpected? How do you deal with them?

We look forward to your ideas, comments and questions.

Debbie and Caireen

3 responses to Practical ideas for teaching business English 1

@chriscattaneo says:

January 17, 2011 at 8:31 am

Dear Debbie and Caireen,

These are really useful ideas to keep ‘up a teacher’s sleeve’, thank you and I’ll add them to my ‘kit’.

I prefer to use little/no-materials ideas in these cases though it would depend how long the lesson is, I agree!

One idea I regularly like to use is DICTATION.
So instead of pre-prepared worksheets (there isn’t always a photocopier handy), I’d dictate questions, categories, sentences with the wrong word order (possibly as feedback), and so on. Discussions can lead on once they’ve collaboratively checked spelling etc (great revision and listening/writing practice). Useful for the teacher too as it can quickly help gauge levels with unknown students.

I always keep DICE in my bag. Even though we are teaching Business English, dice bring energy and fun to any lesson (i’ve even used them in 121 business english classes!) and are not only to be used for last lessons, if you ask me.
There are lots of ideas out there, but here’s one I often use for fluency: (a) I tell students they have to speak for 20-seconds (more for higher levels). I decide (or elicit) 6 categories(and these could be absolutely anything), for example, for maps & countries above, choose 6 countries/locations. Students roll the dice and have to speak for the alloted time about that country in relation to the company/job. Others listen to check all the information is correct – you could even ask students to include one lie so the others have to listen out for it; (b) Jobs / Job priorities: convince the others yours is most important (which is the number rolled on the dice) – after the allotted time, students in the group decide whether it was well-argued.

It could also serve as brainstorming leading to each writing a summary or report stating his/her own personal point of view (in class or for homework).

Dice give a ‘random’ way of ensuring students repeat and build, as the same number might come up more than once. Dictation, despite it’s bad reputation, is making a comeback and in the end is well-received by everyone.

Just a couple of ideas for you and others to try out. I’m very interested to hear of more though!!!

Reply
- Caireen Sever says:
  
  January 26, 2011 at 3:47 pm
  
  Hi Chris,
  I totally agree with what you say about dictation. It is great practice in listening for detail, as well as being low on preparation time and doesn’t involve carrying equipment around.
  I really like your idea about 6 categories and dice. I’m going to try that out!
  Caireen.
  
  Reply
efl-resource.com » ELT news feed » Practical ideas for teaching business English says:

January 18, 2011 at 1:14 am

[...] This second entry in Debbie Barton’s and Caireen Sever’s stint at the DELTA Publishing blog is all about survival. Print PDF Bookmark on Delicious Digg this post Recommend on Facebook Google Buzz-up this post Share via MySpace share via Reddit Share with StumbleUpon Tumblr it Tweet about it Bookmark in Browser Tell a friend Tagged as: business English [...]

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