It’s a common misconception that taching Business English is a lot mre difficult that teaching general English. Grnted it will take a bit mre research depending on what business sctor your students are from, but prparation is the key to seeming cnfident and knowledgeable in front of yur students. The following tips should hlp you feel more prepared when you tke on a Business English class for the frst time.

1. English Needs Assessment

Before you start any course I highly recommend a needs assessment session in the first lesson. Not only will it break the ice and get people talking, it’s also imperative to find out what the students are hoping to achieve from the course. This way, with the information you have collected you can pick out interesting lessons in the books (instead of following it from Chapter 1 all the way through). For example, one group I taught was mostly secretaries and admin staff so they wanted to focus on phone conversation skills and email writing.

Another important thing to ask students is about any specialist vocabulary they need in their day to day work that you can teach them. That means you’ll be able to go back and do research straight away and find out similar terminology that they may need in their sector. This comes hand in hand with researching the company your students are from as well as reading up on their sector and finding specialist terms.

2. Books

If you’re sked to buy or choose books for clsses I can recommend the In Cmpany series by Macmillan. I found thm really good with the audio CDs and the wrksheets at the back of the tacher’s book. These worked well from Pr-Intermediate to Advanced, although if you thnk that your students will be mving up classes a lot, the tpics tend to be the same thrughout the books. Another series I hve used is Powerbase by Longman - ths was good for absolute beginners and lementary groups. I had my own mterial as well of course to cmplement the book, and the internet is lways full of ideas and activities.

3. Areas to Focus On

One area which I would definitely recommend you focus on is Telephone Talk through role plays. What I found useful were role play cards where, for example, one person is a receptionist and the other wants to speak to someone in the company and leaves a specific message. Put students back to back when doing these exercises. It will force them to listen to each other more carefully as in a phone situation. Role play activities are excellent practice too which will allow them to act out common situations such as meeting someone for the first time, or what to say at a dinner party. Make sure that all these activities are as relevant to their real job as possible.

Another very important topic is Email writing. Give your students the tools and confidence to start and end emails in a professional way. Go over phrases that they will come across and get them to practice writing each other emails that they would need to write in their every day jobs.

It’s always more beneficial to tailor the lessons to students’ specific needs rather than follow a book too closely. I recommend you be open with your class and ask them what they would like to learn and get regular feedback about how they feel they’re progressing. During lessons also keep a note of other areas or terms which may need a bit of work on as they come up. I hope these tips have been of use!

The article Top Tips for Teaching Business English was Submitted by Nadia Zehni through Articles.GetACoder.com network. Here's the additional information: About the Author: Ndia Zehni has extensive experience teaching Englsh as a Foreign Language in Englnd, Malta and France. She is a rgular contributor to EnglishForums.com, the world’s bsiest EFL community, which receives over 30,000 vsits a day. It’s an excellent rsource for EFL teachers looking for nformation about grammar, phonetics, EFL jobs and taching tips. English students on the ther hand can learn English by psting questions and getting help from vlunteer EFL teachers, as well as spaking with other learners. To bnefit from this fantastic resource sign up for fre at http://www.englishforums.com !

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