Teachers don't know everything

This piece makes a case for the fact that teachers need to eat humble pie as they cannot know absolutely everything about their subject. Examples are given from business English.

Ignorance is bliss

Teachers have their own qualifications, which may include a teaching diploma and something non-teaching related, for example. Through experience, they may have taught at certain levels, specific age groups and nationalities. Depending very much on their interests, background, how they were trained and their chosen path, all of these factors will play a key role as to what they know, in fact, what they don’t know. The ’chosen path’ sounds predestined, though what this refers to is the way the teachers choose to teach, when they can decide on the materials and make course programmes, for example, what may well happen is that they will carve a niche and stay within their comfort zone. Sticking to grammar that they are comfortable with and have a trusty folder full of custom-made handouts that can be recycled over and over again. This saves time and energy of course and probably helps to keep their sanity. Some schoolteachers, for example, do not have this luxury and must continue to juggle various different levels, streams and take on new curricula each year. There comes a time when an EFL (English as a Foreign Language) teacher will be challenged by those who ask questions which fall beyond this comfy, cushy existence. There is no harm in saying you don’t know something, you can always look it up (and, if necessary, come back to them later), or they can also look it up themselves. Teachers also make mistakes and it is always best to own them should they be made, perhaps humorously so. After all, we all make them.

A little less expectation

It’s the expectations which may be unrealistic and even cause you some discomfort. Work-related activities or ESP (English for specific purposes) seem to be becoming part in parcel of some business English courses. Some students expect they will be able to practice their own industry related jargon in the classroom, and, unfortunately, may have the misguided presumption that the teacher will understand the content or the language they use in writing, for example. The teacher can look at work samples, i.e. emails or parts of reports that include this type of language, but they are looking at it through a particular set of goggles, namely, grammar, sentence structure, tone etc. This may very well be lost on your students, and it may indeed be necessary to try to explain this to them to avoid any misunderstandings. Whichever industry the students work in there are certain tasks that can be adapted to suit their needs and accommodate their wishes.

Relevant vocab tasks can be far and few between. In some cases, you may wish to check with your students to see if the material is relevant to their work. From experience, if you find insurance related vocab, for insurance professionals, for instance, it may not be the type of insurance language they use in their jobs. Top advice from Scott Thornbury as he rightly pointed out that the best roleplays are where the students write them themselves. This can be Meetings Discussions incl. useful phrases (on a template), Company FAQ (frequently asked questions); this needs to be relevant to all parties. One student can write questions for him/ herself and then read them out and answer them before being monitored by the teacher. For Job Interview Roleplay, extra questions can be added by them adjusted to meet their requirements, i.e. three typical questions (each) you may be asked at your company. The elevator pitch can be tailored to that industry where they try to impress somebody who could help their career within 1 minute. Discuss a Project if they have worked on any projects at work with specific criteria (the team, the budget, deadlines & milestones, problems & solutions), Sales pitch roleplay based on the Dragons’ Den TV show adapted to the industry-related products or services for the pitch. Giving a Presentation about their job or industry related which should be relevant and appropriate and give them much needed practice, followed by feedback (peer if more than 1 and always general feedback from the teacher). One last gem is to give the students the opportunity to hand in assignments about topics related to their industry.

Can you think of any more adaptable activities?