Những chiến lược dạy viết báo cáo trong kinh doanh cho sinh viên chuyên ngữ ở đại học thăng long

PART ONE Introduction RATIONALE Writing business reports is one of the fundamental business writing skills. Business reports here are understood as "documents that present information on a specific topic for a specific business purpose" (Boone, 1996: 308). Nearly all business activities involve writing business reports, from analyzing the status of projects, summarizing business trips, to investigating an arising problem or suggesting a change in an organization. Writing reports sometimes becomes professional services which are provided for a fee. The job of market research companies, for example, is to write reports on the results from their researches on consumers' demands for a particular product or service. Writing effective reports is an essential skill for office workers and should be taken into consideration in language education in colleges, especially for language students who are likely to be office staff after graduation. The teaching of business reports in English is a part of courses of English for business communication, a branch of English for Specific Purposes. English-major students, however, have to face a number of problems when studying English as a means of business communication. First, most of the students are not familiar with business knowledge. Most of them have never taken part in any business activities so far. Business courses, if any, provide just general theories of economics. Second, the materials used for the courses are not usually tailored for language students to learn to write business reports in English intensively. In Vietnam, some intensive courses of English for Business Communication have to use materials for low-intensive courses and/or those written for 1 English native speakers to study business communication with English as the first language. Those materials can neither provide a thorough understanding of the subject nor anticipate the lack of language competence of foreign language learners. The knowledge of writing business reports in English is considered a need for English-major students who will soon graduate and might have to use the knowledge in working life. However, as a newly established non-state university, Thang Long has a remarkable number of problems in dealing with the matter. Firstly, the university staff, most of which are little informed teachers of English, has to begin designing the syllabus from nothing but references from several similar available ones. As for the courses of English for Business Communication, it is hard to find a relevant syllabus so the staff has chosen to rely on a textbook written for improving business communication skill for native speakers. Besides, as language-major students, students with English major find it really difficult to deal with business issues, let alone writing reports on the subject. With those difficulties, the teaching of English for business communication in general and writing business reports in English in particular is really a challenge. What the teacher can do now is to develop effective teaching strategies that help students understand the subject knowledge presented in the textbook, design useful exercises for practicing both language aspects and writing skills and avoid making errors in writing business reports. The study, therefore, is proposed to find out those necessary teaching strategies for the section of teaching how to write business reports in the course of English for Business Communication 3 at Thang Long University. 2 PURPOSES OF THE STUDY The research questions are: 1. What do language students need in learning to write business reports in English? 2. What are the difficulties for language students in learning to write business reports in English? 3. What are common errors made by students in writing business reports in English? 4. What are effective strategies for teaching writing business reports in English? From all of these, it is understood that the study aims at finding out effective and appropriate teaching strategies to achieve more satisfying results for the course. The satisfying results can be understood as students' ability to convey factual information efficiently and cohesively. Written texts must also lead to insightful and frequently profitable solutions. It is required that business report writers address specific audience and pay attention to appropriate format and design issues so that a finished document can be closely read or efficiently skimmed. Evaluation criteria should include attention to students' address of assignment, use of persuasive insights, consistent address of target audience, and ability to create effective summaries, headings, subheadings, lists and short paragraphs. Lastly, reports must be expressed in accurate, appropriate and effective sentence structures, lexical items, orthography and styles. It is surprising that although business reports in English are used frequently in most foreign offices in Vietnam, there have not been many studies on this aspect of business writing or business communication. This study attempts not only to look into the existing methodologies but also to find out distinctive features of the teaching context at Thang Long University and language students to apply these methodologies appropriately. 3 SCOPE OF THE STUDY The study focuses on the teaching process of the section of writing business reports in the course English for Business Communication 3 at Thang Long University. It tries to suggest effective teaching strategies that can be used in the course. A strategy can be understood as "a carefully devised plan of action to achieve a goal, or the art of developing or carrying out such a plan" (Encarta Reference Library 2004). Teaching strategies, therefore, can be understood as plans of action in order to achieve a goal in teaching. In this language content-based course, the language teacher also plays the role of an instructor who teaches skills. The strategies, therefore, are for teaching both language and skills. The subjects of the study are language students who major in English, not students with business major. The study does not deal with other kinds of reports apart from business reports used in business activities, i.e. activities performed in organizations operating in order to provide goods or services. English is used in these activities to facilitate communication involving people speaking English as the first, second or foreign language. The study only tries to find out teaching strategies to help students learn how to write business reports with the aspects including language, research methods, visual aid design, writing process and organizational structure. It does not try to suggest the needed changes of other aspects of the course and curriculum designs, such as time allotted for the course, facility settings, class size, and student assessment. METHODOLOGY The paper will present a review from published materials in the related fields. Also, a needs analysis will be conducted among the existing students of English major in order to 4 find out whether language students at Thang Long University consider teaching report writing useful and find out the prepared teaching methods, their expectations from, their difficulties in and their recommendations for the course. Lastly, an error analysis of students' writing samples is used to identify the common errors made by the students in writing business reports in English. Books, articles and Internet resources on English for Business Purposes, teaching English writing and business reports are collected to examine the history of the fields and to provide available suggestions in the practice of teaching business report writing. Next, the needs analysis is conducted through a questionnaire survey of students who are taking the course of English for Business Communication 3 at Thang Long University. The analysis of errors in writing samples is used in order to find out common errors students often make when writing business reports in English. This can help the teacher anticipate problems in the existing course and look for proper ways to deal with these common errors and solve those problems. The analysis also helps find out the strengths and drawbacks of the course, which may result in appropriate adjustments in the course contents as well as the teaching techniques of the teacher. The primary data combine both qualitative and quantitative methods with both open and closed questions in the questionnaire designed for the needs analysis, and the error analysis in texts written by students. CONTENTS OF THE STUDY The study includes four chapters, Chapter 1 presents a review on literature, Chapter 2 deals with the research description, Chapter 3 shows the interpretation of data analyses, 5 and implications for teaching how to write business reports in English for English-major students are recommended in Chapter 4. In Chapter 1, the trends and approaches of English for Specific Purposes are examined and later narrowed down to English for Business Purposes. Also, the chapter will trace down the approaches of teaching writing as well as analyze writing tasks and activities in a classroom. Lastly, the chapter presents features of business reports as a genre with analysis on its classification, rhetorical patterns, linguistic features and the writing process. Chapter 2 describes the study of needs analysis and the error analysis of the students' writing samples. In Chapter 3, the data of the two researches are analyzed to draw useful conclusions and implications. Firstly, the needs analysis questionnaire responses are put together and evaluated. The results will review the students' needs on the course content, methodologies, and their recommendations. Secondly, the results of the error analysis are presented to see the weakness of students' writing skills. Based on the review of literature and the data analysis in the Chapter 1 and 3, Chapter 4 will present key points of the studies: implications for teaching to write business reports. The chapter will follow the teaching process from presenting the knowledge in the content-based course including analyzing sample reports, giving practice exercises, and managing errors in these writing exercises. 6 PART TWO The Study CHAPTER I Literature Review I.1. ENGLISH FOR BUSINESS PURPOSES (EBP) IN AN ENGLISH FOR SPECIFIC PURPOSES (ESP) CONTEXT I.1.1. DEFINITIONS OF ESP Despite appearing first in as far as the 1960s, ESP has not had an agreed-upon definition so far. Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 19) emphasized, "ESP should probably be seen not as any particular language product but as an approach to language teaching which is directed by specific and apparent reasons for learning." English language teaching with ESP approach, therefore, becomes more targeted to the learner's needs and creates more motivation to the learner. Dudley-Evans and St John (1998: 4-5) have modified a definition of ESP by Strevens' into one including absolute and variable characteristics as follows: Absolute characteristics: • ESP is defined to meet specific needs of the learner; • ESP makes use of the underlying methodology and activities of the discipline it serves; • ESP is centered on the language (grammar, lexis, register), skills, discourse and genres appropriate to these activities. Variable Characteristics • ESP may be related to or designed for specific discipline; • ESP may use, in specific teaching situation, a different methodology from that of General English; • ESP is likely to be designed for adult learners, either at a tertiary level institution or in a professional work situation. It could, however, be for learners at secondary school level; • ESP is generally designed for intermediate or advanced students; 7 • Most ESP courses assume some basic knowledge of the language system, but it can be used with beginners. (Dudley-Evans and St John, 1998: 4-5) With these two views, it can be concluded that ESP is closely related with the needs of language learners in their use of English in their fields of professions or studies. Also, ESP includes a number of variations that can be flexibly adjusted to fit the various needs of learners. I.1.2. CLASSIFICATIONS OF ESP Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 17) and Dudley-Evans and St John (1998: 6) build similar trees for different divisions of ESP in which ESP is divided into such branches as English for Science and Technology (EST), English for Business and Economics (EBE), and English for Social Sciences (ESS), and further to English for Academic Purposes (EAP) and English for Occupational Purposes (EOP) or Business Purposes (EBP) from English for Management, Finance and Economics, and English for Business and Economics (EBE). Dudley-Evans and St John, on the other hand, suggested the use of a continuum with degrees of specificity, in which the higher the level is, the more specific the course becomes, accompanying with the levels of English. Martin (1992: 40) also gave a thorough description of several degrees of specificity, from more specific courses to more general courses, and no restrictions on the language levels, as presented in Figure I-1. The use of degrees of speficity of ESP course helps clarify English courses. Courses in type V will not be considered ESP courses due to the far too indirect link to the professional areas. On the other hand, type I courses are the most specific courses and can be applied to learners with clear professional target. 8 Degrees of specificity Targets Objectives Text-types Type I very specifiable / predictable / routine narrow skills (content secondary) specific, routine Type II specifiable / predictable in term of types skill and some content can be identified as genres, routine and non- routine Type III half specifiable, half unpredictable content and skill balanced a wide range of definable types Type IV primarily not predictable, but with some important specifiable elements content-focused skill- subordinate wide range of variable, unpredictable Type V very few specifiable or predictable both skills and content wide range, unpredictable Source: Adapted from Martin, 1992: 40. Figure I-1: The Five Degrees of Specificity of ESP courses In conclusion, the use the tree systems can be used in defining the branches of ESP and different disciplines that English can be used in, while the continuum can be seen as an effective tool in defining the courses of ESP in practice and in deciding the elements of those courses. Both the tree system and the continuum are relevant in classifying EBP courses in the teaching context of the study. I.1.3. TRENDS AND APPROACHES IN ESP Nelson (2000) worked out an overview of the different ideas on the different trends or approaches of ESP. ESP has experienced a number of phases: register analysis, rhetorical and discourse analysis, needs analysis, skills and strategies, and learning- centered approach. These phases will be presented in the chronological order. However, because ESP develops at different paces in different countries in the world and what is old 9 in one situation may still be appropriate and useful in another context, all the above trends can be seen in practice (Hutchinson, 1987: 9). I.1.3.1. Register Analysis Register analysis is the special language that is considered suitable for a specific situation. For example, the English used in computer science must be different from that in psychology. Swales (1988, as cited by Dudley-Evans and St John 1988:21) assumes that while the basic grammar is not different in different circumstances, certain forms of grammatical and lexical forms occur more frequently than other forms in one circumstance and than the same forms in other circumstances. The concept of register or a special language has been applied in language teaching in that some registers are emphasized in the materials and syllabuses of language courses. The analysis of those registers has been considered to be of little value as it is not a reliable basis for ESP courses to just focus on simply teaching the linguistic elements that are special in the context. However, with new computerized methods, for example, the development corpus analysis, register analysis is now coming back. I.1.3.2. Rhetorical or Discourse Analysis The next stage of development in ESP accompanies the development of field discourse analysis. Discourse analysis examines language in a higher level than the sentential level in register analysis, the text. The key factor of discourse analysis is the rhetorical patterns and the linking devices in a text. The ESP textbooks written based on discourse analysis concentrate on the rhetorical functions of different forms of language and the coherence and cohesion of the text. 10 [...]... recommending actions For training purposes, business communication books often deal with short and long reports separately These books focus on training the skills to write some typical short reports and guide the writing process in writing long reports Boone, Kurtz and Block (1996: 370-376), for example, choose to teach four types of short reports, progress reports, trip reports, investigative reports... subjects is 45 (39 female, 6 male) students of English major at Thang Long University They are in their early twenties and learn English as a foreign language The sampling is carried out through the convenient method These students enrolled in the course of English for Business Communication 3 in Semester 3 of the school year 2004-2005 at Thang Long University The course began in early April 2005 and lasted... representative ratio of the population These students are in their third or fourth year and have finished their foundation program in about six semesters or two school years (in Thang Long University, a semester consists of nine weeks and a school year consists of three semesters) In order to enter university these students had to pass an entrance exam in which English accounts for a third of the assessment... about the environment of the course has been described in the beginning of this chapter For parts (1) and (2), most of the questions are multiple-choice and open-ended questions and part (3) includes mostly scale questions The multiple-choice questions are chosen because they are easy to be analyzed while open questions allow respondents to ... the first year at Thang Long University have also provided these students with some business-related courses which will also be analyzed in the questionnaire due to the link to the ability to understand business activities reported in business documents II.3.2 THE SUBJECTS FOR THE ERROR ANALYSIS OF WRITING SAMPLES The group consists of 30 students of English Department at Thang Long University, who have... the subjects in the questionnaire survey, which means they are second- and third-year students in the English Department, Thang Long University However, they have finished the course of English for Business Communication 3 one semester earlier, at the second semester of the school year 2004 - 2005 They have also taken the final exam of the course and the exam papers are collected for the data of the... III will be based on to provide suggestions for teaching strategies in Chapter IV 30 CHAPTER II Methodology II.1 A DESCRIPTION OF THE COURSE OF ENGLISH FOR BUSINESS COMMUNICATION 3 AT THANG LONG UNIVERSITY Thang Long University is the first Vietnam’s non-state university, which was established in 1988 However, its English Department was not established until 1995 The curriculum for bachelor programs... structure On the other hand, samples are texts specially prepared for the writing class to analyze both what should be done and what should be avoided Hence, samples are not perfect and contain both strong points and weak points In prepared samples, there could be some “traps” of common mistakes that should be discovered when students discuss the samples Secondly, there are arguments that models are... Training College, which is now known as College of Foreign Languages under Vietnam National University, Hanoi For the past few years, approximately 100 students enroll in the English Department, Thang Long University each year The curriculum has changed due to the development needs All the students have to undergo two phases, foundation and specialized phases; the second phase can also be further divided... lasts 55 minutes In total, the course takes 33 hours, report writing takes two-thirds of the total time, which means 22 class hours The class size for English for Business Communication courses in Thang Long University is usually large The lack of teachers and facilities results in the fact that each class often contains from 30 to 60 students Unlike other English language courses, English for business . working life. However, as a newly established non-state university, Thang Long has a remarkable number of problems in dealing with the matter. Firstly,. Business Communication, it is hard to find a relevant syllabus so the staff has chosen to rely on a textbook written for improving business communication skill