Creating a business English course
Date
2020
Authors
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Publisher
Tartu Ülikool
Abstract
In this quickly globalizing world, a broad world view and a good command of English is
becoming more and more important. Tartu Miina Härma Gümnaasium aims to prepare students
for this and provides many elective courses, Business English being one of them.
The aim of this MA thesis is to design a Business English course for Tartu Miina Härma
Gümnaasium that focuses on subject matter and Business English related vocabulary which makes
it a fusion of English for Special Purposes (ESP) and Content and Language Integrated Learning
(CLIL) course. ESP is an approach where English as a language is central but it is taught within a
certain subject area (for example, English for Doctors or Business English); CLIL is an approach
where a subject is taught in the target language and students learn both the subject matter and the
language at the same time.
The course that is meant for 12th graders consists of six units (“Corporate image and
supply”, “Marketing”, “Risk management”, “Free trade”, “Investing”, “Working life”) over 60
lessons and its materials come from different Business English textbooks and some are created by
the author of this thesis. Modular format with some cyclical course format’s characteristics is used
as course outline – this means that the topics do not have to be in a certain order because there is
little cumulative knowledge between the topics but revisiting previous topics is done wherever
possible. A lot of attention is given to revising vocabulary as this helps students to remember new
vocabulary better.