Business English for Elementary Level
At Dave’s ESL Cafe, there is a thread on the topic of
what is to be done when a teacher has got to teach
Business English (BE onwards) to elementary level
students. Other posters agree that it can only
be done at an intermediate level, the idea
which is close to mine- I’ve been doing BE with
pre-intermdediates as well.
My opinion was the following: QUOTE.
1. I pick out the words from the next lesson and email a list to
the students, so they translate them as homework. In this way,
I get rid of pre-teaching stuff, which can be quite difficult since
their vocabulary is limited. Since it is In Company coursebook,
here and there are some financial expressions to fit the course
topic. BUT the book itself is not easy for elementary level!
2. I do selected listening and guided grammar exercises and drill
them in pairs, so that my students learn simple dialogues, e.g.
meeting someone at the airport, checkin-in a hotel, etc. In
Company is loaded with functional language.
3. Board games: speaking for fluency. I can’t remember now
any website to be exact, but try and google them. There are
some simplistic ones with adverbs of frequency or daily routine
questions.
Topics that take tim to cover but are businessy:
1. telling the time and daily routine.
2. spelling and numbers.
3. social English: greetings, offering coffee, how are you, etc.
I supplement a lot from general English books and I see no
crime in that. Also, it is very important to talk to your students
and tell what they realistically can achieve. UNQUOTE.
Having said that, I intend to devote some time for an
Internet search on BE materials for elementary students.
I will post my findings on my blog.
Race against the clock starts NOW.