Course Design—Business English Course

As one of the most important branches of English for Specific Purposes， more and more undergraduates are choosing majors in Business English to improve their chances of finding a job. Many English but not Business English major students， such as English translation， often have less opportunities to get an international business offer due to their lack of business knowledge. The goal of my course is let them acquire international business knowledge， build up their confidence when looking for a job. The following tentative syllabus is designed to achieve my goal within a term：

Week 1 Topic： An introduction to Business English. Objectives： To define “Business”， develop concepts of business marketing. To figure out elements of a business company. To become familiar with terms. Materials/Facilities： Video： “Welcome to Business English”. An authentic paper about an analysis of brand building and market development of Haagen-Dazs. Activities： 1： After watching the video， discuss： “Why are you studying business？” in groups to show their personal reasons.2： Ask each group to paraphrase the main idea of the Haagen-Dazs paper.Focus on the vocabularies and professional terms related to business in this article. Week 2 Topic： Getting to know international trade. Objectives： To understand international trading situations.To be familiar with trading terms and trading clauses. To be familiar with payment terminologies such as The Letter of Credit. Materials/Facilities： Video： A sell process from a native trading company to a foreign one. The paper version of it. Activities： 1： After watching the video， Let them summarize the key words and expressions.2： Role play： ask them to work in groups to simulate the video clip characters and make the full use of what they just learned into real communicative setting. Week 3 Topic： How to Write a formal international business contract. Objectives： To get the skill writing a formal international business contract.To understand the structure、correct formats points of a contract. Materials/Facilities： Book： Activities： 1： Give students examples of international business contract writing.Explain and interpret every part of writing.2： Let them write a business contract by themselves， exchange the paper in pairs in order to mutual check and give advice. Week 4 Topic： How to Write a professional email. Objectives： To know how to write a business email and to be skillful. To recognize the written language features and correct formats of email writing. Materials/Facilities： Papers about business email. Activities： 1： List some words and expressions about greetings and closings in email.2： Give students the real email script in real scene and analyze them.3： Let them write an email based on a scenario and make mutual evaluation. Week 5 Topic： How to make phone/conference calls. Objectives： To become acquainted with the communicative competency in oral business English. Materials/Facilities： A conference calls in a film clip and a paper version of it. Activities： 1： After watching the film clip， Show them key expressions.2： Role play： Let them simulate the characters， work in groups to speak out in the real situation. Week 6 Topic： Everything Under Control-Negotiation. Objectives： To understand total quality and marketing. To learn how to establish and maintain a relationship with foreign customers. Materials/Facilities： Videos： a film clip about how an elite struck deal with foreign customers. Book： .Papers： about the culture of western business people. Activities： 1： Show students the video by asking them why the elite closed deal with the foreign customer very smoothly？ What are his negotiating skills？2： Analyze some case studies， make conclusion about the negotiating skills， cultural background， values in different countries beyond business. Week 7-10： Topic： Final Project Presentations & Assessment. Objectives： To put what was learned into a conclusion. To prepare a PowerPoint presentation. Activities： In last four weeks， let them make presentation about business English by using what they have learnt this term and the teacher makes assessment.

Conclusion

Designing business English course is a challenging program but rewarding process. As Sylvie Donna states： “Business English is special because of the opportunity it gives you to fulfill students immediate needs of English.” Business English is not only a major， it can become an interesting area of teaching.

References：

[1]Dubin，Fraida&Olshtain，Elite（2002）.Course Design.Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.

[2]Jack C.Richards（2001）.Approaches and Methods in Language Teaching，2thEdition.Cambridge University Press.

[3]Ellis，Rod（1999）.The Study of Second Language Acquisition.Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.

[4]劉昕蓉，董妍伽.國際市場營銷高手案列分析[M].南開大學出版社，2008.

[5]吳敏，吳明忠.國際經貿英語合同寫作（第三版）[M].暨南大學出版社，2005.

作者簡介：王婷婷（1989.11-），女，漢族，內蒙古人，碩士，就讀于天津外國語大學，研究方向為英語教育。