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As our world becomes increasingly globalized, the demand for teaching Business English has grown. Teaching business English can vary in experience. You might teach an English class sponsored by a company that all employees attend or coach an individual motivated to improve their English skills in order to give a presentation. In preparation for my new job in Santiago, Chile I will explore the benefits and challenges of teaching one-on-one and small group Business English classes. One-on-one classes are very different than working with a large group that could have mixed levels, different ages, behavior issues or lack of concentration. One benefit of individual lessons is that the students are highly motivated as they have chosen to be there. When working with business people you do not need previous knowledge of business or even your students’ field – although this could come in handy. When working with one student, the course is based around their goals and in some cases on their company’s goals and needs. Before you begin a course, you should test your student to get a sense of their level. They might have a specific goal, such as learning to socialize with clients, but they might need to work on their base understanding of English first. Many clients may have English vocabulary that relates to their field, but they may not have enough grammatical knowledge to know how to form a sentence. After testing your student, you should do a needs analysis at the beginning of the course. This can be a conversation or questionnaire to identify your student’s past experience with English and their goals for the course — if they’re not sure you can ask them questions to identify a goal so you have a better guideline of how to write lesson plans. You can help identify what areas of English they want to practice most (speaking, writing, grammar, listening, reading, vocabulary.) You should ask what they need to do in English for their job, which will help you know which areas to focus on. If you’re working with a small group, they may have different job positions and objectives. After conducting a needs assessment you may need to have a conversation with the group and present an outline of the next few lessons. For example, if everyone in the group needs to work on writing letters, reports, and faxes, that could be the topic of one of your lessons. You should be prepared with materials, new vocabulary, as well as games and activities for the study and activate phases of your lessons. The great thing about individual or small group Business English classes is that they tend to have a more casual tone as you will often participate in activities with the student(s), rather than monitoring a group from afar. Since you are catering the lessons to your student’s needs, it will be easier to get direct feedback. You can ask they students if they liked a particular activity and want to do more or less in the future. You will most likely have materials or a book, but the pace of the class can be flexible and you should emphasize this, while also recapping the objectives and evaluating progress along the way.
