PHASE 1

Business English Teacher Training (BETT)

PHASE 1

Introduction

This phase highlights the paramount importance of CLT techniques. It’s

important to segregate the learners based on their experience. Unless and
until this aspect is addressed it would be difficult for the trainer to set the
expectations and nurture the skills of the participants; hence the need to
delve into the need of the participants based on their experience at work
place. The level of the learners is a vital aspect and this module showcases
that . There are various avenues of Business English and this module
would help you to introspect how you would be fit into a specific
requirement.

Introduction to Business English – features and components

The introductory module gives a perfect overview of the genre of

Business English and all those components and features that builds it
up. Business English relates to expectations of the students or their
sponsors, the efficiency and professionalism of the teacher/ trainer in
organizing a well planned methodology to cater to the expectation.

The teaching context is a key factor as the language learning here is

purpose-oriented and the context varies with the variety in purpose.

1
The language studied is governed by students’ needs with very clear
objectives. While objectives are concerned with ‘what’ is being taught
activities and techniques focus on ‘how’ the communication is done.

Business English Teacher Training (BETT)

PHASE 1

Introduction to Business English – features and components

The learner

Business English Teaching as a course aims at developing English

communicative skill for adults working in business of one kind or
another, or preparing to step into the field of business like millions of
people all over the world, using English in their daily activities.

Business is the act of buying and selling. In broader perspective it

encompasses exchanging, exploiting resources and capabilities. It uses
the language of commerce, of finance, of industry of providing goods
and services. It is about people coming together to accomplish things
they could not do as individuals. It is about design and innovation,
traditions, values about the exciting and mundane. It is about
cooperation, negotiation and conflict. It is about persuading,
understanding power, control, explaining and finding solutions to
problem. This business arena could include large multinationals, small
private companies or even government undertakings in product and
service sectors. In short, Business English is communication with
other people within a specific context.

The purpose behind taking up Business English varies from person to

person. For some it is a necessary part of their job. For others it is an
investment which brings status and possibly financial reward. The
needs are very specific for some whereas the others want to improve
their English. Some people may be near the end of their working lives
and others may just be starting a new job or career or project. This
might require developing generalized business skills (e.g. making
presentations), or something far more technical or academic , if the
student’s work is highly specialized or if the students need to learn how
to take notes and participate in meetings or prepare for a training
course conducted in English.

2
The length of the course and the venue of the training (in company / in
language school / other rented premises) might vary as well. Despite
this wide variety the learners together can be grouped in generally
accepted categories.

Experience based

Pre experienced learners belong to the category with little or no

experience of the business world. They probably are university or
secondary school students who embark upon English learning with
intentions to follow a business career. Often due to lack of experience ,
they will need the teacher to provide a window to the business world.

Job-experienced learners know a lot about their business, their own

jobs and often have very precise notions about why they need business
English. In contrast to pre experienced learners, they do not need or
expect the teacher to help them understand the world of business.

The third category comprises learners who may already have a certain
amount of work experience, but who are learning English in order to
move into a new job or for a specific purpose. They might be identified
as general business experienced falling somewhere between the two.

Organizational hierarchy based

The approach to business English learning differs with learners at

different level of the company. The senior managers for example may
wish to focus on specific skills like presenting or negotiating or may
wish to have 1-to-1 lessons because of their status within the
organization. The more junior staff on the other hand might not have
such defined needs or may not be enabled enough to manage and
influence their training needs. The company under such circumstances
might arrange for classes separately for senior managers and clerical
staffs.

National culture based

Training and education to a large extent is determined by varying

national cultures, traditions and values. To match with this, sometimes,
the learners are split up in separate groups. A private language school
in say, the UK, the US or New Zealand might decide to teach its Asian
and Hispanic learners separately owing to their different styles of
3
communication. This fact might otherwise interfere with the learning
process.

Need based

In the Need based for some learners the teacher is reached for certain
specific needs. For example they may be about to join an international
project team, or need help answering a company telephone hotline, or
want to describe their company’s products to new customer. Others
might look for a less focused course as their general aim might be to
improve their English. The other category may comprise of learners
belonging to similar genre of jobs like secretaries, accountants,
technicians, where the companies might vary but characteristics and
demands would be parallel.

Language-level based

At times learners are grouped according to their roughly similar

language proficiency. The predetermined levels might be ‘beginners’,
‘advanced’ or ‘level three’ which are assigned to each learner depending
upon their test-scores.

Business English teaching contexts

Business English generally caters to a number of contexts:

Education Institute

Educational institutions such as school, university are typical setting for

teaching young adults. In a tertiary education environment, teaching
might involve written texts and perhaps preparation of oral or written
assignments which can be graded. These assignments often bear very
distant link with future working context but might heavily be
influenced by the needs and traditions of the educational
establishment.

In some cases students also attend other (non-language) classes in

English. These learners normally nurture preconceived notions and
expectations about the class. They may unduly expect the teacher to be
4
an expert on the business world as well as language expert and give
priority to other subjects more than learning English. The relatively
large classes would contain learners with widely disparate language
levels and skills, ignorant of the exact usage of English in future. Here,
the focus on a specific target gets difficult to achieve. However,
compared to a more constrained in-company group, the setting makes
it easier for the teacher to cover areas better.

Private language school

Existing in most major cities of the world, private language schools are
often part of franchises or chains or at times, autonomously owned
small organizations. The teaching may take place in the schools own
premises or the teacher may be expected to travel to the customers’
location.
Customers may vary from private individuals on a drive to improve
English in order to apply for a job to large multinational companies
with employees posted all over the world. In some countries schools
are required (or can volunteer) to submit to outside inspection, to
ensure maintenance of certain standards.

In-company

Company teaching comes with an added advantage operating from the

learners’ workplace with a very prominent idea of their need for
English and a setting ensuring mental comfort for the learners. Client’s
premises can vary from a couple of hours a week to a full time job.
They are generally given their own training room with an access to
resources such as company intranet. The trainers are often invited to
attend meetings, do work shadowing (accompanying an employee
doing his normal job and giving feedback as necessary) or help with
written documents. In the course of time the trainer might as well
become indispensable to the company, contributing in various manners
like designing content-based training for employees’ induction and thus
facilitating cost reduction for the company. Besides teaching, the
company trainers are often steeped in administration handling that
might include booking rooms, ordering for stationary, attending fire
practices etc. They often need to walk about and meet people in
different departments, getting self-updated about the internal
happenings and also confirming their own presence.

The teacher is suggested to maintain an intranet presence keeping the

concerned informed about the times & locations of classes, different
5
 possibilities of learning English and useful links. The company normally
expects the teachers to use relevant materials. The new teacher
gradually builds up a bank of such resources. The teacher is advised not
to overload his or her teaching schedule as there is simultaneous load
of lot more work and many distractions as well. Twenty hours of
scheduled teaching is probably realistic assuming a 40hour working
week.

One to one

In Business English teaching, 1to1 (private lessons with one teacher

and one student) is quite a common arrangement. The job might
involve preparing the learner for a specific project, coaching over a
longer period checking or helping with presentations, correspondence
reports and so on.

 The requirement might be as pressing as fast acquiring sufficient

language skill for a new employee.
 Sometimes a highly motivated management level learner prefers the
idea of 1to1 as well. In 1to1, the teacher is able to focus entirely on the
learner’s needs and develops him as the main resource. The teacher’s
task is to:

 Reformulate the learner’s language working towards an improved

version either orally or written form, addressing grammatical & lexical
errors and going further beyond. For example let’s consider the case of
a learner who wants to give a presentation and who starts with an
introduction and improving it. This may mean correcting some
mistakes and also starting from scratch about what to include in a
introduction about presentations training. This singular focus on the
learner and his or her language makes 1to 1 teaching so different.
However, the concept of the content of learning being entirely provided
by the teacher is rarely the most effective way to do 1to1 teaching.
 One to one learning is a process intensive enough. Therefore excessive
keenness, effort and maximum input may add to a stressful situation.
Teachers are well advised to remember the value of silence and the
need to vary the pace and intensity of activities.
 In some cases the teacher and learner strike up a personal relationship
or build a special rapport with each other. The 1to1 situation is far less
contrived than a classroom situation and it can feel much more like real
communication.

6
 The teacher

In a Business English training the teacher- trainee relationship is a

symbiotic one;

 The teacher is the master in language and communication whereas the

trainee knows more about his job and the content.
 The teacher with considerable awareness about the business world
should be able to make informed decisions about language & language
learning with credibility and professionalism.
 The teacher should be able to adapt a particular teaching concept and
be open to self up-gradation.
 On most effective courses, students and teachers work in partnership to
build a constructive learning environment which is appropriate to
individual students’ professional and personal situations.
 Students, as clients often provide information and material and the
teacher as an agent on the other hand provides service and expertise.

Within the field of Business English, many teachers identify

themselves as trainers, coaches or even consultants:

Trainer’s perspective

In the world of business trainers are a common concept. There is a

fundamental difference in approach:

 The teacher is traditionally seen as a virtual educator having far flung

influence on the trainee’s all-round success in life. The trainer on the
other hand conditions the trainee’s behavior, ability to do a specific job.
 Training is job oriented while teaching is person oriented.
 In contrast to the language teacher who helps the students to learn a
language for a variety of (often unspecified) purposes, a trainer steers
the trainee linguistically and pragmatically – in a certain way.

Coach’s perspective Coach helps the learner to take advantage of the

learning opportunities in his/her own working environment, better
understand his or her strengths and weakness and plan accordingly. It’s
the concept of learner’s autonomy where the learner is almost fully
responsible for his or her learning.

7
 Consultant’s perspective

The consultant is necessarily an expert who is introduced in the

organization for his or her skills and knowledge. In Business English,
this expertise can:

 Cover a wide area including the ability to analyze communication and

communication needs.
 May require the teacher to recommend a training supplier
 Might involve a teacher negotiating with a number of hotels to choose
the best location for a course for instance.

Many freelance teachers operate as consultants. They create market for

themselves roping in potential clients employing techniques like
discussing contracts, needs analysis – interacting with the learners as
well as their sponsors for language training services, also evaluating
training delivery and outcomes. Eventually they are often in privileged
position, being the only person in the company with open and direct
access to all at every level.

The language

The language studied is governed by student’s needs and can involve a

high technical content, with frequent use of common business terms. It
also means a focus on styles of speaking or writing which are
appropriate to the student’s working environment and to the tasks they
have to perform. This means students will need to develop a keen
awareness of style – formality vs. informality, directness vs.
indirectness. Most importantly, through language study in class
students will need to become aware of the cultural context of language
use, i.e. national or local cultures, industrial cultures and corporate
cultures. As well as the language specifically studied in class teacher
talk (i.e. a teacher’s meta-language) can also provide valuable input and
exposure for students. In order to capitalize on this opportunity, it is
important to make this meta-language as adult and business-like as
possible.

8
The language of business English includes everyday English. When used
by a business person in a business context, it gets coined as Business
English.

A: Excuse me
B: Hi. Can I help you?
A: I hope so. I’m looking for room 142. Mr. Plummer’s office.
B: Yes, of course. It’s the 3rd suite down the corridor on your left.

A: What do you suggest?

B: I agree with you.
A: Are you sure….we get it delivered?
B: Yes of course, ok?

Understanding the essence of using the right words keeping in mind the
context is important!

Both these conversations can be categorized as everyday English. The

first can be identified on a visit to a principle’s office and the second,
exchanges between husband and wife deciding on selection of
upholstery. However, when used within business context, they attain
the dimension of Business English – the first being a visit to a client and
the next a discussion between two colleagues on an important deadline.

The application of everyday phrases thus also takes different

dimension, some groups of people use language in other ways too, ways
that are not as familiar to outsiders. They use specialist words and
jargons that make communication within the group easier and more
efficient. It is common for almost every individual profession, each of
which definitely bears an individual linguistic identity. Business
communities use specific language to communicate in specific context.
Accountants use the language of accounting (specific lexis) to talk about
accounting matters (specific context) .The sales engineers use specific
language to discuss their product specifications with their customers.

9
 Despite both are being business communities, their dedicated
vocabulary will not be identifiable to each other. This is described by
the term ESP (English for Specific Purposes), often used to describe
language that is inaccessible to people who are not members of a
particular language community.

Can we talk about gearing after lunch? I’m hungry. (in accounting)
We’ve had some SF6 leakage. (in the power industry)
May be we need to revisit the escalation clause? (in real estate)
It’s OTC. (over the counter, in e.g. retail pharmaceuticals)

There is also a language which is clearly business English, but can be

understood by most proficient users of English. This is sometimes
described as general business English, used in general business
English course books or in trade & business magazines. These
industry-specific business jargons understood by most proficient users
of English are to be considered as well.

Sales have fluctuated since we introduced the new sales strategy.

The team is responsible for the China project.
Has everybody had a look at the minutes?
They’ve terminated the contract.

Business English thus comprises of –

 General everyday English

 General business English
 ESP

Business English is a mixture of general everyday English but much

beyond strict business world context. Advertising language uses a lot of
metaphors and popular business books have its vocabulary resources
in literary compositions as well.

Business community employs English to communicate in varied

contexts like socialize, predict, analyze, negotiate, buy, write, persuade,

10
compromise, telephone, market, sell, produce, interview, train, travel,
plan, investigate, deal, advertise, explain and so on with business aim.
But the skill in using the language is inherent in certain techniques to
get the message across and not in mere words and language. So
business English is used in conjunction with business communication
skill.

Separated from the native English speaking used by first language

users, business English develops with the course of time to cater to
specific needs. The language of the learners’ might have only certain
characteristics to share with the teacher’s own version of English.

Many areas of business English and ESP lack reliable information due to
difficulty in recording natural discourse. An effective example is the
matter of small talk which has a business relationship building
accessory feature rather than the direct business content. Certain parts
of business English teaching also rely on the teacher’s and the learner’s
intuition.

The learners’ learning need would range from business English to

country / region specific English (British, US, International) to and ESP
or a mixture of all these. The objective is to do business and not just talk
about business through successful usage of the language across a wide
variety of culture, business skills, context and participants.

The technique of business communication

Business English is molded under the influence of various disciplines

like linguistics, general language learning and teaching and
management training. Because it is about implementation of language,
the issue of communicative competence deserves prior consideration.
Perhaps the most influential models have been based on work done by
Hymes in the 1960s, Canal and Swain in the’70s, and Bachman and
Palmer in the ‘80s. The basic argument was rooted in dissatisfaction
with earlier teaching approaches which tended to concentrate on
linguistic items (such as written grammar rules) as opposed to various
other components which also needs to be simultaneously considered
when discussing language skill; knowing about language is only one of
the components. Language learning should aim at successful usage in
real life situation. Business English teachers need to focus on 3 key
components:

11
 It’s important to ACQUIRE SKILLS as it’s the CATALYST for change at
work place catering to the business needs.

 Linguistic competence,
 Discourse competence and
 Intercultural competence.

Linguistic Competence

Linguistic competence is made of basic elements like vocabulary,

grammar, phonology and so on. The role of lexis (words and patterns of
words and its relationship with grammar (the way the words and
patterns follow rules) has a gradually increasing influence on business
English teaching. The demarcation between these two factors is fading
out as we find more about the functioning of the language system.

The Longman Grammar of spoken and Written English divides words into
three types:

 Lexical Words (Nouns, Verbs, Adjectives and Adverbs that carries meaning).
 Functional Words deal with the relationship between lexical words or indicate
how they are to be interpreted. Examples are Determiners (the, some, a, any),
Pronouns (it, they), Modals (can, should), Prepositions (in, to), Coordinators (and,
but, or) Wh-words (why, whose).
 Inserts (yeah, well, ouch).

Overlapping of these categories is common.

Multi-word units (also called lexical phrases, lexical bundles or

chunks) consist of two or more words, which act together as a unit. In a
sense they behave like a word. So nevertheless is one word, but how do
you do also acts like a single unit.

Indeed, studies on how we memorize language show that it is easier to

store ‘chunks’ of language than several individual parts. Note that most
12
multiword, units are not complete utterances, however. What’s the
Matter with … and I don’t think it’s … are examples of sentence headers,
and start off and bring up are examples of phrasal verbs.

Collocation is a phenomenon where certain words tend to co-occur

with certain other words. So we say small print rather than little print
or have a meeting rather than do a meeting. At times there appears to
be no particular logic to such matters, it is just the way it is.

Idioms are a type of multi word unit where the meaning is not clear
from the individual words (e.g. It’s going to crop up, or we’ve missed
the boat, or He’s in the driving seat.)

Words do not only collocate with other words they collocate with other
semantic word families (i.e. groups of words with related or similar
meanings). For example letter collocates with verbs which show what
you can do with it (write a letter, post a letter ,read a letter , open a
letter etc) and adjectives which describe the function of the letter
(covering letter, follow-up letter). Market collocates with adjectives
denoting place (European market ,French market ,South East Asian
market) and adjectives denoting size (huge market large market big
market small market)

Colligation is a phenomenon in which words tends to occur in

particular grammatical patterns. So, for example we can say letter of
application, letter of complaint, letter of enquiry, but we do not
normally say market of Europe, market of France or market of South
East Asia.

The appreciation recently developed also says that written and spoken
grammar can be very different and word forms acceptable in one type
are necessarily not acceptable in the other. Thus, for the learners’
information, written grammar rules in conversational speech may
make it sound unnatural and stilted.

Spoken grammar is normally used in real-time interaction. It has

different word-order rules, uses contractions (can’t, won’t),
hesitations (er , uh), repetition, ellipsis (words left out), and is often
vernacular. Utterances are often left incomplete or change their form
13
 halfway through. Other common features include fronting and tags.
For example in the utterance, the tape. Yeah we got it er .. Yesterday . I
think it was, the ‘ I think it was’ at the end is a tag which qualifies what
has just been said. Also common in spoken language are discourse
markers, which often occur at the beginning of an utterance (e.g. OK
Erm what I’d like to do today is …), backchannels (mm, uh-huh, to
signal feedback) and expletives. Business English learners are
interested in not only what is said, but how it’s said as well. Phonology
is about how we use our voices to make the sound of utterances. We
use stress rhythm and intonation (sometimes called prosody) to
convey meaning.

Chunking involves grouping words together with a pause or a change

in pitch or a lengthening of a syllable to signal the end of the chunk.
Combined with stress, intonation and rhythm, chunking can alter the
way the listener understands the message.

Discourse competence

Linguistic competence deals with the basic elements of language where

the context is not in focus.

 Discourse competence on the contrary deals with language in use. The

word discourse here is used to describe how people interact with each
other within context, e.g. negotiations, correspondence presentations
service encounters meetings and so on.
 Business discourse refers to the spoken and written communication
that is found within the arena of business.
 Surpassing linguistic competence identified as building blocks,
discourse competence symbolizes the language in its totality.
 The participants in the discourse have to communicate within different
contexts.

Different discourses require different strategies.

Use of register (the degree of formality, or the degree of specificity

especially of topic vocabulary) is one such strategy. Therefore, an
informal friends’ party would use colloquial everyday type of lexis and
would therefore have a different register from what we would expect to
find in a company conference which would probably have more formal
language and specific lexis.
14
 Discourse often portrays a power play between two participants – one
more empowered than the other, deciding the type of language used as
well. Naturally it reflects relationships between individuals and can
even be seen as a tool for manipulating others.

Genre describes the stylistic distinction between different types to texts

(for example what makes a memo different from letter of complaint or
a telephone conversation different from a presentation).

Discourse can be

 Spoken
 Written

Spoken discourse has more immediate value to a learner. It’s

considered more important in the business English classroom because
of its urgency. The converse can be argued, whereas written discourse
provides a more permanent record, thus mistakes less easily forgiven.

Spoken discourse can be analyzed in many ways. Conversation analysis

is a sociological approach, used to analyze the way people interacting
while conversing. Interaction here is recognized as a dynamic process
which is developed by taking into account what has already happened.
Conversation, by the virtue of its characteristics helps in understanding
what is happening and why it’s happening. Spoken interaction /
conversation have a structure, rules governing and directing the
course-flow. Participants speak in turn which is called turn-taking.
Often utterances come in pairs such as a question and answer or
complaint and an apology or a greeting and a responsive greeting.

A: Will you be able to shift a bit to your left?

B: Yes of course…if it helps you!
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-----------------------

A: She is really obsessed with her promotion….isn’t she?

B: But obviously…that’s what she is working for!

15
Conversation also has opening and closing sequences. Cited here is a
telephone conversation having the following components.

Summons answer: (ring ring) Hello, may I help you

Identification Hi Bob, this is Karen
Hi, my name is Bob
recognition: this side
Thanks for your What exactly made
Greetings:
response Karen you call up?
Can you please Yes of course, what
Initial queries: provide some sort of information
information? are you looking for?

The formation of language is determined by the standard sequences

and also the relationship between the caller and the receiver, bringing
variation to tones as well.

Intercultural competence

Geert Hofstede describes culture as the software of the mind or the

collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the members
of one group or category of people from another.

Fons Trompenaars defines it as ‘the way in which a group of people

solve problems’. As different cultures operate on different wavelengths,
even very simple things can get difficult and worse, hearing an
unfamiliar name can be interpreted to be familiar.

Culture is composed of behaviors, beliefs and values and influenced by

multitude of factors including environment, gender, family, age and
ethics. It is acquired and not genetic and ever evolving. Its
manifestation comes through interaction between people. Some
cultural differences are superficial and are relatively simple to deal
with. It is easy to see that people may dress or eat differently for
example. But cultural differences are not always so obvious like an
iceberg tip. The hidden bulk below the surface comprises of aspects
that are prone to cause problems if one is not aware of it and don’t
know how to deal with it.

16
 There are different types of culture:

 National Culture referring to the politically bounded nation state

composed of not single but different ethnic groups who do not always
observe national borders.
 Organizational or corporate culture describes the specific behaviors
and values found in organizations. It varies from company to company
depending upon the vintage, trade, employee strength and other
particulars of the company.
 Professions also have their own distinct culture. Despite having roots
in different national cultures, people in same profession are expected to
behave in a certain specific way. Even members of the group of people
who use English as lingua franca share certain characteristics with each
other because they have something in common. Therefore, people can
belong to different cultures at the same time. For instance, it is more
likely for an engineer in an American company to have more in
common with an engineer in a German company than say, a secretary in
the American firm. may share many of the values of other employees in
the same company but in some ways has more in common with an
engineer in a German company than say , a secretary in the American
firm may share many of the values of other employees in the same
company.

Stereotypes are the categories that generalize and simplify other

cultures and its people. It is often the tool for gauging new situation or
unfamiliar behavior (for example it may be useful to know about the
importance of face – i.e. people’s feelings about their own worth self
respect and dignity – in Asian countries) however with limitations to
their usefulness. One major impediment being no room allowed for
exceptions to the norm. All the members in a single group are expected
to behave specifically ruling out chances for individuals.

Intercultural competence thus creates spaces for dealing with other

culture, being sensitive to the differences. And from the business point
of view, these differences are cashed to do value addition to business
and its customers.

17
 Communicative factor in language Teaching

Communicative Language Teaching or CLT is an approach that

emphasizes on model of real-world communication and perspective on
society to inform what happens in the classroom. It develops the
learners’ skill of communicating through the language. The common
principles of CLT are:

 CLT involves language in use via functions such as interrupting or

agreeing or disagreeing (functions are ways of describing what a
speaker is trying to achieve at each stage in a communication activity).
This is beyond the boundaries of the linguistic items like grammar
which needs to be learned. Function focuses on the method of usage
rather than the content being used
 CLT provides the advantage of practical language learning. The
acquiring and applying of it in the real life situation occurs
simultaneously. Meaning takes precedence over form and fluency over
accuracy.

There are 2 basic forms of CLT – weak & strong used in business
English classroom.

 Weak form – focuses on what is to be learned. The language here is

presented, practiced (using a variety of different activities) and finally
produced through some sort of communicative activity – the PPP
approach.

 The learners are asked to perform a task that makes demands on their
competence in using language and then their performance is diagnosed
leading to a focus on specific language items – the deep-end approach.
 Michael Lewis creates a learning cycle that starts with observation,
followed by hypothesis and experiment – the OHE approach.

18
 Harmer divides the teaching sequence into 3 components where the
learners emotionally engage with the situation, study the language and
then activate it.- the ESA model approach.
 Strong form – focuses on how learning takes place. It strongly proposes
that language is learned via the negotiation of meaning in real
communication.

Language is learned to achieve a specific outcome.

Theoretical argument says language learning is unlike to be pre-

ordained and neat. Therefore a focus on the content or language item is
not an effective way to teach. It is better to provide the right input and
atmosphere which allow learning to take place at the individual’s own
pace and in response to their needs.

In business English classroom activities called tasks are employed

which focuses on the practical (do) usage of language. The outcome is
important here as comparable to the business world where language is
a means to an end and not an end in itself (compare this to traditional
language exercises, where the focus is primarily on learning languages
rules). Language is thus learned via interaction, by doing the task.
Many researches opine that task based learning, coupled with
judicious feedback which directs learners’ attention towards form (that
is the linguistic item which needs to be improved), is the most
productive way of learning a language.

Business English has the advantage of producing a language having

immediate relevance, while doing a task.

The disadvantage is that it is often difficult to predict exactly what will

happen during a task which can make them difficult to plan or assess.
A less experienced teacher may also have a feeling of losing control.
Some tasks can involve a minimum of language input from the
participants which makes them not necessarily the best way to provide
maximum exposure to useful language.

The probable problems of CLT being:

 Not certain that CLT always work well anywhere and everywhere. The
requirement to use the language in real communication may not be
19
 successful within a very large group of learners whose own educational
and cultural background presupposes that the teacher is the only one
who speaks.
 Not all non native English teachers also feel comfortable with a method
like CLT that can at times require native speakers’ levels of competence.
 Classroom and cultures across the world may have their own, more
appropriate way of doing things which takes into account local
expectations and needs.
 Teachers often pick and choose the approach best suited to their own
experience and teaching style considering the resources available and
the particular learning needs. Such an eclectic approach typically works
well for the most experienced teacher, but perhaps less well for the
newcomer.

20