TEFL and Business English Classes
To start with, teaching Business English undoubtedly belongs to the ESP area and so does teaching in-company classes.
And in the belief that there is ‘no one best methodology’ , I think teaching Business classes or in-company classes do not necessarily require us to forge a newly made methodology that can only fit business classes. All what we need a flexible methodology that takes into account how does the learner want to learn. In this context, Tom Hutchinson and Alan Waters argue that:
‘There is nothing specific about ESP methodology. The principles which underlie good ESP methodology are the same as those that underlie sound ELT methodology in general...the classroom skills and techniques acquired in General English teaching can be carefully employed in the ESP classrooms.’
On this background, I very often approach my in-company classes using my EFL methodology experience and, at the same time, leaving room to implement traditional methodology if the trainees appear to be antipathetic to the communicative -based methodology. However, in some cases at the very beginning of the course, they seem to reject the communicative methodology. Their resentment is justified and mostly it is due to their past learning experiences. So, at times I find myself devoting a session just to discuss and negotiate methodologies and the pros and cons of each. In most cases the trainees welcome the communicative methodology where they are required to work and talk more than I have to do.
In my training sessions, I always favour the communicative methodology which focuses on involving the trainee into the learning sessions. Why? Simply because:
It takes into account the learner .It makes the learner active and not only in class to be spoon-fed by the teacher. It focuses on the use of pair work, group works which spare more time for thinking and hence free the students from undue pressure. Briefly put, it renders the idea of whoever doing most of the work is doing the learning a reality.
In a nutshell, teaching is an interaction between a teacher and a learner and it’s better if the two then decide on matters that the whole learning experience enjoyable and useful.
1. Mark Ellis and Christine Johnson, Teacher Business English, Oxford University press,( 1994) P.219
2. Tom Hutchinson and Alan Waters, English for Specific Purposes: a Learning-Centred Approach, Cambridge University Press ( 1989) P. 142
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