ELTWeekly » ELT Articles

#53, Article: ‘TEFL Teaching – Business English’ by Natasha Mason

Tarun Patel — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 07:35:46 +0000

This article is about teaching business English. From a personal point of view, this has always been my favourite form of teaching English. My experience is in Madrid, Spain but this advice covers most countries with teaching Business English.

I was lucky to have a strong business background in law and HR so it felt like a natural route for me to take. However many of my graduates get very nervous about teaching business English, especially if they are new graduates with limited experience in the business world

What are you teaching?

The first thing to remember is that you are teaching English in a business context, not teaching business in English. Many of the directors I have taught have talked about how patronizing they find it for a college graduate to walk into their office and start teaching them how to give a presentation! They know how to give a presentation, they need help with the tone and terminology in English – ensure your classes are never patronizing. Many of the teaching text books do fall into this trap so make sure you adapt your classes to your audience.

On the other hand, even with limited experience of business it means that you can be a good teacher to any student who needs business English. If you are teaching finance English for example, the majority of the help they will need is the English you already know, for everything else there are specialist books and dictionaries. Don’t get me wrong, there are always students who need people with specialist knowledge and skills but it is the exception not the rule. When I was teaching at the Banco de España (The Bank of Spain), I knew very little about finance English and I was very honest about this to my students. They had no problem with this as they needed help with emails, presentations, small talk, grammar etc. They already knew their finance terminology but needed helping putting it all together so it sounded right to the recipients.

Hours

Business English classes tend to fit around the ebb and flow of business hours. Classes are normally early in the morning 7-9 or 9.30, lunchtime 1-4 and evening 7-9. The more senior the student, the more flexibility they have with their schedule but this is a double edged sword as they also have busy lives, constant meetings and often travel a lot which means they cancel more classes. I once had a student who I actually taught for only 21 hours in a whole academic year! Luckily enough his secretary was really friendly with an endless supply of croissants.

Whether you have got your hours directly with a Company or through a teaching agency, make sure you find out what the cancellation policy is. Whilst it may seem glamorous to have lots of senior executives as your students, they are more likely to have one-2-one classes and as stated above, have higher than average cancellations. In Madrid, many of the agencies now have an 80-85% cancellation policy which means that you get paid 80-85% of the classes regardless of how many they cancel. If you do have a large amount of one-2-one classes, it is very important to check this out in the contract to make sure you can still earn a decent living despite what goes on in your students’ business lives.

Resources

When teaching business English, the internet is your new best friend. If your client works for a bank make sure you look at their internet site and the sites of their competitors. Do a search and find out what articles have been written about them which you can then use as reading material in the classroom. Check out finance reports on the BBC that you can download onto your iPod. YouTube is another excellent resource for videos on meetings, presentations and negotiations (for both the right and wrong way to do it!).

Whenever you go back to your home country or have friends and family visit, get them to collect all the pamphlets they can. One man’s junk mail is another man’s teaching resource!

The text book industry has really stepped up the pace in the last couple of years and there are a range of books to suit the most junior to the most senior employees. Lots of influential newspapers and magazines (the Financial Times, the Economist etc) have joined up with the publishers to produce some very comprehensive business text books with real articles, interviews and up to date news. Make sure you do a proper needs analysis with your student to see what they need before making the choice about a text book.

Finally, stay confident and calm. Students need to feel that you are in charge and know what you are doing. Read up on what you are teaching the night before and plan ahead. Do a comprehensive needs analysis and level test and stay one step ahead.

Natasha Mason Kennedy is the owner and Director of TtMadrid, a TEFL academy in Madrid, Spain. Natasha has been working in the industry of business English and teacher Training for the last 10 years. http://www.ttmadrid.com http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TU3se92BLoU

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Hours

Resources

Whenever you go back to your home country or have friends and family visit, get them to collect all the pamphlets they can. One man’s junk mail is another man’s teaching resource!

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#53, Article: Using poems to develop productive skills

Tarun Patel — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 07:31:57 +0000

You and your students might already enjoy reading and listening to poetry in your own language and perhaps in English too. Poems are, after all, authentic texts. This is a great motivator. Poems are often rich in cultural references, and they present a wide range of learning opportunities. For me, the aim is to teach English through poetry, not to teach the poetry itself, so you don’t need to be a literature expert.

Most of the tried and tested activities used regularly by language teachers can be adapted easily to bring poetry into the classroom.

Communicative speaking activities

Working on pronunciation

Writing activities

Some pros and cons

Conclusion

Communicative speaking activities

Before doing any productive work, I like to give my students plenty of pre-reading activities so that they are adequately prepared.

Read the complete article at http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/articles

You and your students might already enjoy reading and listening to poetry in your own language and perhaps in English too. Poems are, after all, authentic texts. This is a great motivator. Poems are often rich in cultural references, and they present a wide range of learning opportunities. For me, the aim is to teach English through poetry, not to teach the poetry itself, so you don’t need to be a literature expert.

Most of the tried and tested activities used regularly by language teachers can be adapted easily to bring poetry into the classroom.

Communicative speaking activities

Working on pronunciation

Writing activities

Some pros and cons

Conclusion

Communicative speaking activities

Before doing any productive work, I like to give my students plenty of pre-reading activities so that they are adequately prepared.

Read the complete article at http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/articles

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#53, Article: ‘Activities to improve pronunciation in young learners of English’ by David Ockert

Tarun Patel — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 07:02:35 +0000

Activities to improve pronunciation in young learners of English

David Ockert

Key Words: Young learners, games, activities, pronunciation

Learner English Level: Pre-beginner, beginner

Learner Maturity Level: Young learner

Preparation Time: 5 minutes or less

Activity Time: Usually from 10-30 minutes

Materials: The card game Uno!

The activities presented herein are hoped to help young Japanese learners of English (JLE) understand and recognize the differences in pronunciation of /b/ vs. /v/, and /l/ vs. /r/, which are possibly the most distinctively recognizable of any English consonants when mispronounced by Japanese students of English, because so many words in English have different meanings when these sounds are not pronounced correctly (Avery & Ehrlich, pp.134-138). They make the difference between hearing, “Would you like some more lice?” vs. “Would you like some more rice?” And, in my case, the name is Dave, not Debu – fatso in Japanese (Ockert, 2006).

Given time, the activities presented will do something to alleviate this nagging problem. By including the proper pronunciation of these sounds in a simple word-list activity (the popular card game Uno), then moving up to a statement activity (Concentration), and on to a simple question & answer game (Go Fish!), teachers may also find other advantages to using these activities. Accordingly, the students will learn how to pronounce the sounds first in a word (blue, yellow, five, seven, have), then in a statement (It’s a blue seven.), then in a question form (Do you have a yellow five?). All of the these spoken forms place an emphasis on suprasegmentals, therefore, helping the students develop proper pitch, intonation, and word stress, especially when a native speaker’s role is emphasized as a model for speech patterns. For example, the teacher can help the students develop proper word stress by asking such questions as “Did you say a yellow seven?” when asked, “Do you have a yellow seven?” with emphasis on the word yellow.

Activity 1: Uno

Here I will explain a little about each activity, beginning with the popular card game Uno. As many readers may be familiar with how to play the game Uno, and the rules are contained in the game, I shall simply continue with the speech acts necessary to carry out the game.

Step 1: Practice the following phrases and clarify understanding.

Whose turn is it?

Is it my turn?

It’s your turn.

Finished!

Uno!

Draw four!

Draw two!

(yellow / blue / red / green).

Yellow / blue / red / green Draw two.

Yellow / blue / red / green Reverse.

Yellow / blue / red / green Skip.

Yellow / blue / red/ green Wild.

These are the various color and number combinations:

Yellow / blue / red / green zero.

Yellow / blue / red / green one.

Yellow / blue / red / green two.

Yellow / blue / red / green three.

Yellow / blue / red / green four.

Yellow / blue / red / green five.

Yellow / blue / red / green six.

Yellow / blue / red / green seven.

Yellow / blue / red / green eight.

Yellow / blue / red / green nine.

Step 2: Play the game. The game can be played with from two to as many as six or more players. Obviously, the fewer the students in number, the more opportunities to speak arise.

Activity 2: Concentration

Another activity that can be played using the same cards is Concentration. Because of the number of possible combinations of pairs (36 pairs for a total of 72 cards), and the desired goal of focusing speaking time on the sounds /l/ and /v/. Educators may wish to use the following card pairs for this activity in order to focus on these sound differences:

Yellow one, yellow three, yellow five, yellow six, yellow seven, yellow eight, blue two, blue four, blue five, blue seven, blue eight, blue nine, green five, green seven, red five, and red seven.

These are a total of sixteen pairs, each number from one to nine is present, all of the colors, and a majority of yellow and blue cards for /l/ practice, as well as four ‘five’ pair combinations and four ‘seven’ pair combinations for /v/ practice.

Step 1: The game is played by first shuffling the cards.

Step 2: Arrange the cards face down on a table or the floor.

Step 3: Play the game as follows: A student takes a turn by turning over one card and stating its color and number, for example yellow seven. Then they continue the turn by turning over another card in an attempt to find a match. The student again states the card color and number, for example blue nine. Since this is not a match, the student returns these cards to their original position, face down, and the game continues with the next student. If the student’s upturned cards should match, the turn continues until two cards that do not match are revealed. The game is finished when all of the possible pair combinations are matched, and the winner is the student who has the most pairs.

Activity 3: Go Fish!

The last activity is Go Fish! For this game, the card pairs identified above can once again be used. However, for a large number of students I often use the entire thirty-six pairs. To play the game, first shuffle the card pairs and deal out seven cards to each student. For younger learners, who have smaller hands and difficulty holding onto their cards, use fewer cards to start. If a student should be lucky enough to have a matching pair of cards (both color and number), they can set them down.

Step 1: The game begins by choosing someone to start and an order of turns. In Japan, this is commonly done using the game rock, paper, and scissors. A student takes a turn by asking one of the other players if they have a certain card, for example:

Do you have a blue five?

A student can answer either positively with: Yes, I do. Here you are.

Or negatively with: No, I don’t. Go fish!

The types of questions and statements above are all that are necessary to play the game, but students should also know:

Is it my turn?

Whose turn is it?

It’s your turn.

Step 2: If the student responds positively, he hands over the card and the person whose turn it is makes a pair and sets it on the table. He continues until he does not get a card from another player, whereupon he is told to Go fish! and draws a card from the pile in the center of the table and adds it to his hand. If, however, the player should be fortunate to draw the exact same card as he just asked another player for, his turn continues. If a different card is drawn from the deck, the turn passes to the next player.

References

Avery, P. & Ehrlich, S. (1992). Teaching American English pronunciation. Oxford: Oxford University Press

Ockert, D. (2006b). Excuse me? Was that /l/ as in ‘Larry’? And /v/ as in ‘Virginia’? In M. Swanson, K. Bradford-Watts (Eds.) JALT Applied Materials: Classroom Resources, (pp. 76-78). Tokyo: JALT.

Activities to improve pronunciation in young learners of English

David Ockert

Key Words: Young learners, games, activities, pronunciation

Learner English Level: Pre-beginner, beginner

Learner Maturity Level: Young learner

Preparation Time: 5 minutes or less

Activity Time: Usually from 10-30 minutes

Materials: The card game Uno!

Activity 1: Uno

Step 1: Practice the following phrases and clarify understanding.

Whose turn is it?

Is it my turn?

It’s your turn.

Finished!

Uno!

Draw four!

Draw two!

(yellow / blue / red / green).

Yellow / blue / red / green Draw two.

Yellow / blue / red / green Reverse.

Yellow / blue / red / green Skip.

Yellow / blue / red/ green Wild.

These are the various color and number combinations:

Yellow / blue / red / green zero.

Yellow / blue / red / green one.

Yellow / blue / red / green two.

Yellow / blue / red / green three.

Yellow / blue / red / green four.

Yellow / blue / red / green five.

Yellow / blue / red / green six.

Yellow / blue / red / green seven.

Yellow / blue / red / green eight.

Yellow / blue / red / green nine.

Step 2: Play the game. The game can be played with from two to as many as six or more players. Obviously, the fewer the students in number, the more opportunities to speak arise.

Activity 2: Concentration

Yellow one, yellow three, yellow five, yellow six, yellow seven, yellow eight, blue two, blue four, blue five, blue seven, blue eight, blue nine, green five, green seven, red five, and red seven.

Step 1: The game is played by first shuffling the cards.

Step 2: Arrange the cards face down on a table or the floor.

Activity 3: Go Fish!

Do you have a blue five?

A student can answer either positively with: Yes, I do. Here you are.

Or negatively with: No, I don’t. Go fish!

The types of questions and statements above are all that are necessary to play the game, but students should also know:

Is it my turn?

Whose turn is it?

It’s your turn.

References

Avery, P. & Ehrlich, S. (1992). Teaching American English pronunciation. Oxford: Oxford University Press

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#52, Article: Google and the lexical approach

Tarun Patel — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 04:25:32 +0000

Google is special among search engines in that it has become a starting point for enquiries and data searches of all forms. As most of this data is linguistic, it deserves special attention from language teachers, but until now, search has been largely ignored by most course writers.

In this article I give several practical examples of how you can use Gffoogle, combined with a lexical approach to teaching, to enrich your class material with authentic examples, as well as building learner autonomy.

Google and lexis
Lexis, as most of you will know, is simply another term for ‘vocabulary’. The Lexical Approach treats language as a series of prefabricated lexical chunks. Its methodology puts grammar in second place to vocabulary.

The approach I will outline here is based on inputting ‘lexical chunks’ (strings of vocabulary or phrases) into Google’s various search functions to find samples of real world text. These are split into different types.

How Google treats language

This is a little complicated. What you need to know is that…

Read the complete article at http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk

Google is special among search engines in that it has become a starting point for enquiries and data searches of all forms. As most of this data is linguistic, it deserves special attention from language teachers, but until now, search has been largely ignored by most course writers.

In this article I give several practical examples of how you can use Gffoogle, combined with a lexical approach to teaching, to enrich your class material with authentic examples, as well as building learner autonomy.

Google and lexis
Lexis, as most of you will know, is simply another term for ‘vocabulary’. The Lexical Approach treats language as a series of prefabricated lexical chunks. Its methodology puts grammar in second place to vocabulary.

The approach I will outline here is based on inputting ‘lexical chunks’ (strings of vocabulary or phrases) into Google’s various search functions to find samples of real world text. These are split into different types.

How Google treats language

This is a little complicated. What you need to know is that…

Read the complete article at http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk

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#51, Article: ‘Homework’ by TE Editor

Tarun Patel — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 05:12:26 +0000

Homework
by BBC TeachingEnglish Editor

“Homework seems to be an accepted part of teachers’ and students’ routines, but there is little mention of it in ELT literature. The role of homework is hardly mentioned in the majority of general ELT texts or training courses, suggesting that there is little question as to its value even if the resulting workload is time-consuming. However, there is clearly room for discussion of homework policies and practices particularly now that technology has made so many more resources available to learners outside the classroom.

Reasons for homework

Attitudes to homework
Effective homework
Types of homework
Conclusion

Reasons for homework

Homework is expected by students, teachers, parents and institutions.
Homework reinforces and helps learners to retain information taught in the classroom as well as increasing their general understanding of the language.
Homework develops study habits and independent learning. It also encourages learners to acquire resources such as dictionaries and grammar reference books. Research shows that homework also benefits factual knowledge, self-discipline, attitudes to learning and problem-solving skills.
Homework offers opportunities for extensive activities in the receptive skills which there may not be time for in the classroom. It may also be an integral part of ongoing learning such as project work and the use of a graded reader.”

Read the rest of ‘Homework’ article by visiting http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/articles/homework

#50, Article: A framework for planning a listening skills lesson

Tarun Patel — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 07:53:09 +0000

istening is one of the most challenging skills for our students to develop and yet also one of the most important. By developing their ability to listen well we develop our students’ ability to become more independent learners, as by hearing accurately they are much more likely to be able to reproduce accurately, refine their understanding of grammar and develop their own vocabulary.

In this article I intend to outline a framework that can be used to design a listening lesson that will develop your students’ listening skills and look at some of the issues involved.

The basic framework

Pre-listening

While listening

Post-listening

Applying the framework to a song

Some conclusions”

Read the complete article by visiting: http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk

istening is one of the most challenging skills for our students to develop and yet also one of the most important. By developing their ability to listen well we develop our students’ ability to become more independent learners, as by hearing accurately they are much more likely to be able to reproduce accurately, refine their understanding of grammar and develop their own vocabulary.

In this article I intend to outline a framework that can be used to design a listening lesson that will develop your students’ listening skills and look at some of the issues involved.

The basic framework

Pre-listening

While listening

Post-listening

Applying the framework to a song

Some conclusions”

Read the complete article by visiting: http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk

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#49, Article: ‘Personal Learning Networks’ by Gavin Dudeney

Tarun Patel — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 07:36:45 +0000

Here is Gavin Dudeney’s second exclusive article for TeachingEnglish.

I’m fortunate enough to be able to go to quite a few face-to-face conferences every year, generally as a speaker, though I also attend as many sessions as I can at each event – there’s always something to learn from any speaker, no matter how experienced they are. This year I’ve seen some great speakers, not just some of the more famous people in ELT, but a wide variety of teachers talking about what they do with great passion, and sharing their experiences and teaching ideas. In fact, these types of events are my favourite kind of professional development, combining – as they do – the talks, plenaries and workshops with fun social activities and occasionally some sightseeing.

But of course not everybody is lucky enough to be able to go to these events very often, and have to rely on local development opportunities such as workshops or in-school training. And, at least in my experience, this is actually relatively rare too. In all my travels this year I’ve met hundreds of teachers who receive no professional development each year. It’s as if they’ve simple been forgotten about… Now they’re in place and teaching, there’s no need to develop them any further or help them widen their repertoire, at least that is what seems to me happens in many schools. So what is a teacher to do in that kind of situation?

Read the complete article at http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/articles/personal-learning-networks

Here is Gavin Dudeney’s second exclusive article for TeachingEnglish.

I’m fortunate enough to be able to go to quite a few face-to-face conferences every year, generally as a speaker, though I also attend as many sessions as I can at each event – there’s always something to learn from any speaker, no matter how experienced they are. This year I’ve seen some great speakers, not just some of the more famous people in ELT, but a wide variety of teachers talking about what they do with great passion, and sharing their experiences and teaching ideas. In fact, these types of events are my favourite kind of professional development, combining – as they do – the talks, plenaries and workshops with fun social activities and occasionally some sightseeing.

But of course not everybody is lucky enough to be able to go to these events very often, and have to rely on local development opportunities such as workshops or in-school training. And, at least in my experience, this is actually relatively rare too. In all my travels this year I’ve met hundreds of teachers who receive no professional development each year. It’s as if they’ve simple been forgotten about… Now they’re in place and teaching, there’s no need to develop them any further or help them widen their repertoire, at least that is what seems to me happens in many schools. So what is a teacher to do in that kind of situation?

Read the complete article at http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/articles/personal-learning-networks

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#48, Article: ‘Simulated immersion’ by Duncan M

Tarun Patel — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 17:50:42 +0000

Duncan says, “I have often found that learners of all levels feel that there is inadequate time spent on listening in most language courses. Adult learners often complain that (sometimes) after years of study, they can’t understand native speakers. This is partly because they do not receive adequate exposure to authentic texts in class. Another is that it’s hard to find authentic audio texts that can be easily adapted for classroom use.

To tackle these issues, I have developed an approach to listening based loosely on the way children learn languages. I’ve found this to be hugely advantageous in my own language learning, and have passed it on to my students with considerable success.

Children versus adults – children win
According to estimates (Pinker, S., The Language Instinct, 150-151), an average six year old commands about 13,000 words, equivalent to acquiring a new word every two hours.

Children have huge advantages over adult foreign learners in the classroom – they are constantly exposed to the target language and their brains are optimized for rapid language acquisition.

In this article, I argue for a ‘simulated immersion’ approach. The idea is that learners engage in a variety of different types of listening in their own time, similar to what they would encounter if they were living in an English speaking country. Essentially they are trying to mimic the language learning behaviour of young children.”

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#47, Article: ‘Using news articles’ by BBC TE Editor

Tarun Patel — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 05:12:46 +0000

Topical news stories are a great source of teaching material. This article presents different ways to exploit news reports in the classroom and focuses on raising the level of involvement and participation that the students have in the lesson.

Selection criteria

Before reading

First reading

Second reading

Language focus

Follow up

Sources

Selection criteria

It is important that you choose your news article wisely. You should consider the following criteria.

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#47, Free eBook: English as a Second Language in the United Kingdom

Tarun Patel — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 05:01:36 +0000

This is, of course, as much a key topic in the UK as it was in 1985 when this book was originally published. The book aimed to cover ‘English teaching to British residents’ and addresses teaching children in the school sector; teaching adults in education and in the workplace; and teacher training, among others. One chapter asks ‘Can ESL teaching be racist?’

English as a Second Language in the United Kingdom