Business English Textbooks Research Articles

IDIOMS IN BUSINESS ENGLISH TEXTBOOKS: THE CASE OF MARKET LEADER AND BUSINESS RESULT

Idioms represent an important part of effective communication between native speakers, but they are quite necessary among non-native speakers too. Their crucial role in making communication flow easily makes them attractive and important to be studied. Their use in not very common among non-native speakers, because they are usually taught at higher levels, such as C1 and above. This paper is a systematic analysis of idioms representation in Business English textbooks used in higher education, both Market Leader and Business Result. The focus is in identifying their presence in these textbooks, followed by an analysis and categorization of idiomatic expressions across various units and topics. A thorough approach of their complex nature and connection to real-world business scenarios is taken in order to see the efficacy of their inclusion in the textbooks. The paper contains extractions, which show how these expressions are introduced to students in these two textbooks, and if they are equivalent to the requirements in the Common European Framework of Languages. This research’s objective is to help teachers, educators and curriculum see how idiomatic language is treated in Business English textbooks. Also, the study adds a contribution of raising awareness of the role idioms play in language acquisition and the implications for effective business communication.

Effect of sequential tasks in the case studies of business English textbooks on fostering critical thinking based on cognitive load theory

There is a consensus that case studies in Business English class are helpful to foster critical thinking, but little research has been done to explore how case studies facilitate it. To bridge the gap, the present study uses the revised Bloom’s taxonomy as a tool to qualitatively and quantitatively investigate the effect of case studies in Market Leader textbooks on fostering critical thinking based on cognitive load theory. First, the presence of six cognitive levels targeted in the tasks is examined to see how case studies sequence their tasks according to the increase of cognitive complexity. Secondly, the scaffoldings distributed across the sequential tasks are explored to investigate how well they impose appropriate amount of cognitive load on students. Although six cognitive levels are found, there is an inappropriate administration of task scaffolding in a single task or task chain, leading to insufficient or superficial scaffolds and thus inducing high level of cognitive load for students to develop critical thinking. Accordingly, case study writers and teachers are recommended, when designing and adapting sequential tasks, to consider systematic inculcation of cognitive levels among tasks and proper administration of scaffolding with regard to the aspects of task input, conditions, progress and outcome so that a balanced level of cognitive load aligned with the state of working memory capacity of students can be achieved for fostering critical thinking.

Linguacultural competence in business English communication: the case of a business English textbook in China

ABSTRACT Internationally operating professionals in China study business English to develop their language proficiency and transcultural communicative competence. While a variety of business English textbooks are on the market and are used in China, their conceptualizations of culture tend to be nation-based, static, and predictable – views of culture that have been increasingly problematised in the field of second language teaching and learning. This investigation drew on a research-informed conceptualisation of linguacultural competence that incorporates three theoretical lenses: Business English as a Lingua Franca (BELF), linguaculture, and genre. Competencies identified in the research literature were cross-checked with empirical data from active job-experienced business professionals via semi-structured interviews and questionnaires. These competencies were then used to examine how one popular business English textbook, Market Leader Intermediate, fares in developing linguacultural competence. The results revealed that while the textbook includes opportunities to develop several necessary competencies, many others are not addressed. Further, expressions of culture in the textbook are often simplistic or limited. These findings can inform textbook adaptations and development for effectively inculcating linguacultural competence in internationally functioning professional communicators.

A practitioner's commentary on C. Chan (2009): “Forging a link between research and pedagogy: A holistic framework for evaluating business English materials”

In this commentary, I discuss the value of Chan's (2009) research-informed checklists for evaluating business English materials by providing a practitioner's approach to using the checklists. I adapted the checklists for three different uses. The first was to evaluate the teaching methodology followed in a business English textbook from an ESP series. The second use was as a guide and evaluation tool for my in-house business English material development. The final use was also to support the design and then evaluation of custom-made banking English course materials. In conclusion, I found that adapting these research-informed checklists, based on local needs, creates opportunities for professional development, tailored courses, and transferability to other ESP genres.

From Corpus to Classroom: Teaching Semi-technical Business English Vocabulary

Semi-technical vocabulary has been considered a challenging and neglected area of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) instruction. This paper employs AntConc to extract a keyword list of a self-compiled business English textbook corpus (BETC). Through manual identification from corpus keywords, we focus on semi-technical vocabulary, addressing the fundamental question of “how to identify”. We also draw upon pedagogical materials from the academic sub-corpora within the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA) to design a corpus-based language pedagogy (CBLP) lesson. This lesson serves as a model for instructing the multifaceted meanings and diverse patterns of the semi-technical word “default” across various disciplines and contexts, addressing the question of “how to teach”. Our research leverages the rich resources provided by pedagogical corpora, offering in-depth analysis, including collocation, colligation, semantic preference, and semantic prosody, as effective teaching aids. In doing so, it promotes interdisciplinary, comparative, and exploratory teaching and learning of semi-technical business English vocabulary. By bridging the gap between corpus analysis and classroom instruction, it provides innovative strategies for educators in the field of business English, and by implication, in various ESP disciplines.

Bridging the Gap between Pedagogy and Workplace Needs

For a university teacher of business English to both undergraduates and postgraduates, one of the biggest challenges is the lack of suitable books with authentic texts and updated information for demonstration/illustration of workplace texts and genres. First, students nowadays expect authenticity but not dated examples from existing business English textbooks. Second, the genres and communicative functions covered in most business English textbooks are limited, and emerging features and genres of workplace texts are rarely covered. Third, research findings are highly sought after to inform how workplace texts are composed in terms of content, structure and language features. This paper will give examples of the niche that needs filling, and then discuss what ESP teachers can do.

2015 개정 교육과정에 따른 비즈니스영어 교과서 분석

This study examined whether the business English textbooks used in vocational high schools followed the revised 2015 national curriculum and were abided by its teaching and learning principles. In this study, three business English textbooks were analyzed both quantitatively and qualitatively. First, in terms of skills, all of the coursebooks covered writing the most while treating speaking minimally. This unbalanced coverage of skills went against the curriculum’s goal which pursues communication-oriented business English education. Among three textbooks, one rigorously followed the curriculum while the other two did not. However, the in-depth analysis based on the teaching and learning principles stipulated in the curriculum showed that the textbook that strictly adhered to the curriculum did not offer engaging activities, which can promote students’ communicative competence in a business setting. Pedagogical suggestions were discussed.

Evaluation of pedagogical impact of Business English textbooks on teaching critical thinking skills

One goal of undergraduate courses in Business English is teaching critical thinking, but this goal has been hindered by disagreement over how to teach those skills. Many textbooks pay insufficient attention to critical thinking skills. It remains unclear how effective existing textbooks are in helping teachers teach these skills. In this article, we report on a study which uses the Knowledge Process framework to qualitatively and quantitatively evaluate five textbooks in the Market Leader series. The presence of four knowledge processes in the textbooks is examined to see how effective the distribution of those processes is in teaching critical thinking skills. Although four knowledge processes are found in the textbooks, there is an imbalance among sub-processes, which leads to lack of scaffolding for teaching critical thinking skills. It is thus recommended that textbook developers and teachers design a sequence of scaffolded tasks to help teach critical thinking skills.

"Fear, greed, and dedication": the representation of self-entrepreneurship in international English textbooks

A number of studies have reported neoliberal representation in English textbooks in a variety of contexts around the world. However, the study focusing on self-entrepreneurship as one of the critical neoliberal tenets is scantily addressed. To fill this void, the present study seeks to investigate the representation of self-entrepreneurship deliberately inculcated in English textbooks. Anchored in critical discourse analysis and Halliday’s Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL), this study investigated three Business English textbooks used in higher education in Indonesian. The findings of the study revealed that the English textbooks employed role-playing, presenting celebrity and fame, exhibiting famous entrepreneur figures, presenting the distinct image of entrepreneurial figures, and portraying entrepreneur figures through article or literature to disseminate self-entrepreneurship notions displayed in a variety of discourses. The findings of the current study call to equip educational practitioners (e.g., teachers, policymakers, book designers) with critical thinking skills as well as provide them practical tools to interrogate ideology, norms, and values encapsulated within curriculum artefacts such as language textbooks.

The Role of Women in Business English Textbooks (1970s-2010s)

The Role of Women in Business English Textbooks (1970s-2010s)

Integrating digital tools into ESP teaching: A need analysis of a business English course

This case study was a preliminary stage of an on-going research and development project on developing a business English textbook integrated with digital tools for students of English Education at Nahdlatul Ulama University of Yogyakarta. It investigated the students’ perceived needs on their business English course. To collect the data, a needs analysis questionnaire was administered to the students using Google form including the students’ necessities, lacks, and wants for a practical business English course design. Both quantitative and qualitative methods were used to analyse the collected data. It defined the context in which the students would use business English in their future profession. Results showed that (1) the students’ English proficiency was still in the middle, (2) The use of English in daily life communication was on occasion, (3) The English skills’ preferences should be learnt in the business context were speaking, writing, listening, and reading, (4) Topics included in the business contexts were interview, curriculum vitae, and presentation in the top three, (5) Digital tools’ preferences to be integrated into learning were Kahoot, Padlet, and VoiceThread in the top three, and (6) Learning methods implemented were group discussion and project-based learning in the top two.

CONTENT ANALYSIS: EXPLORING THE SUITABILITY OF BUSINESS ENGLISH TEXTBOOK FROM LEARNER’S PERSPECTIVE

ABSTRACT
 This research aims to find out how the following aspects of analysis in textbook evaluation can facilitate assessment of the suitability of the text book students have been using as the main course book. The aspects are (1) use of business language skills and grammar (2) business vocabulary (3) business related materials (4) pedagogic features.The textbook being referred to is Market Leader, Third edition, Elementary published by Pearson Education, London, United Kingdom. The gap filled in this research and prior research is that they are prior-use textbook evaluation, while this article is based on a in-use textbook evaluation. To achieve the aim, this research employs Philipp Mayring’s Qualitative Content Analysis research method, and Chengqian Guo’s new text book evaluation model as the framework developed from previous evaluation models.
 Keywords: Business English text book suitability; Content Analysis; Textbook evaluation; Phillpp Mayring’s Content Analysis; Chengqian Guo’s New Textbook Evaluation Model

Stilettoed Damsels in Distress: the (un)changing depictions of gender in a business English textbook

Appropriate gender representation in textbooks is crucial for socially educating professionals who use English for work-related communication. It is further important to longitudinally understand how these textbooks keep up with changes in gender equality taking place in the real world. This study critically analyses two editions of a popular international business English textbook for equality of gender representation. Improvement in the visibility and portrayal of women and men was found between the older and newer editions. Results suggested that gender bias has reduced in the newer edition of the textbook, especially at the level of images. However, much more change is needed to bring them to the level of current equality guidelines published by government and independent organizations. The study recommends that, instead of imitating the realities of the world, textbooks developers must consider presenting scenarios that societies aim to achieve. Furthermore, in the absence of gender equality in textbooks, stereotypical depictions of gender need to be discussed critically in classrooms.

FACTORS INFLUENCING TEACHERS’ INTEGRATING INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE (ICC) INTO BUSINESS ENGLISH TEACHING

Globalization has triggered the need to teach ICC in Business English education for effective communication and interaction across cultural diversity. This case study was carried out at a college specializing in International Trade in Vietnam with six Business English teachers as participants. The study aims to explore factors influencing the teachers’ integrating ICC into their Business English teaching (BET). The data were collected through 1/ in- depth interviews; 2/ analyses of two syllabi and two Business English textbooks in current use; 3/classroom observations. Inductive analysis was used to analyze the data. The findings revealed that the teachers hesitated to teach ICC due to multiple influential factors. The results of the study were a good source of data for more efficient policies to develop ICC teaching and learning in the global integration.

Evaluating students’ perceptions of a scenario-situated business communication course

Research has identified that Business students, who are immersed in theoretical concepts, may not be equipped with the skills required to operate successfully in the global workplace in the English medium (Evans, 2013). Secondly, tasks in Business English textbooks tend not to bear much resemblance to those of a work environment (Bremner, 2010; Evans, 2013). This paper discusses an optional written business communication course open to international postgraduate business school students. Although the course is worth ten credits, it can only be used for a separate award, not part of their degree programme. The course focuses on the use of appropriate register, Business English vocabulary and intertextuality, as these features have been identified as pivotal to successful written business communication (Evans, 2013). A short questionnaire was distributed to the students towards the end of course to elicit their perceptions of the usefulness of the course. Consisting of two closed questions and one open question, data was then coded using constructivist grounded theory (Mills, Birks and Hoare, 2014), from which themes emerged providing valuable and unexpected feedback. The primary finding was that the course appeared to have alerted students to the importance of the business writing genre, resulting in an overwhelming request for more instruction.

Readability Assessment of Business English Textbooks

Business English: An Integrated Course published in 2010 is the first series of textbook compiled in accordance with the National Teaching Curriculum for BA Program in Business English of China . This paper uses Flesch Reading Ease to conduct a readability assessment of its textual difficulty. The quantitative analysis indicates that there is room for improvement: 1) the four books in the series lack a scientific hierarchy of readability, 2) the readability in the same book covers an unreasonably wide range, 3) some texts are too difficult. These defects prove the important role readability can play in the compilation of business English textbooks. This research is hoped to shed light on the use of readability assessment in the compilation, revision and evaluation of business English textbooks.

Pragmatically-oriented Input in Business English Textbooks: The Case of Speech Act Realization

Pragmatically-oriented Input in Business English Textbooks: The Case of Speech Act Realization

What Brings a Good Textbook: The Research on Business English Textbook Compiling?

With the establishment of business English major in the universities in China, more and more kinds of the business English teaching materials have flooded into the market. However, the authors find that the business English teaching materials in the market can‟t totally meet the demand of business English education. Based on the theory of Constructivism, the authors firstly do the research on the present market of business English textbooks, and then design questionnaire to investigate users‟ opinion about textbook. The statistics indicates that the existing business English textbooks can‟t effectively attract the university students for self-studying, and more group work and activities are desirable. Finally, the authors try to offer some suggestions for improvement of business English textbook to enhance effectiveness of business English teaching and learning.

Idiom Variation in Business English Textbooks: A Corpus-Based Study

This paper deals with the variation of idioms from sport which are used to talk about competition in business, e.g. a level playing field. In business English textbooks they are listed in one form, whereas corpus data show that they occur in two or more lexical and/or syntactic forms. Furthermore, it has been shown that alterations result in a change in the overall meaning of the idiom and that different variation types serve specific functions. In order to explore the variability of idioms included in business English textbooks, we conducted two corpus studies of ten competition idioms. The aim is to show that competition idioms vary lexically and syntactically, and that there may be considerable differences between the textbook form and those in which the idioms occur in the corpora. In addition, we will give a cognitive linguistic account of how different variation types affect the idiomatic meaning and what functions they fulfil. The findings may have implications for teaching figurative language in ESP given that (1) idiom variation presents a challenge to non-native users of English, (2) idioms are frequently creatively exploited in discourse, and (3) idioms are used not only to convey information but also evaluation.

Whose Culture and How Far? Culture Presentation in Current Business English Textbook Series

International business communication is associated with cultural norms of both native and non-native business counterparts. It seems that the study of culture presentation from the perspective of English as a lingua franca in business English textbooks has been rather underexplored. To this end, cultural contents in two internationally distributed business English book series published by leading publishers were examined. It was found that the selected textbooks in the series were in favor of a representation of native speakers in global business encounters, the inner-circle culture of native speakers was the dominant culture content, and the level of cultural presentation tended to remain in the knowledge-oriented rather than communication-based level. This leads to an argument in favor of critical and reflective culture presentations in business materials.