Academic project in Applied Linguistics. Help please

[WienSam]

Hi All

I am currently reading for a Post Graduate Certificate in Professional Studies in Education (Applied Linguistics) by reading a distance-learning course on Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages Worldwide (TESOLW) with the Open University in England. This is a very tight and demanding course with the primary focus being on Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL).

My personal primary interest is in teaching Business English (or, preferably, Business Management in English) on corporate training courses. I already have a Post Graduate Certificate in Education, having followed a 1 year teacher training programme (Greenwich University, PGCE) and have a Certificate in English Language Training for Adults (Cambridge University, CELTA), not to mention a BSc Hons in Business Computing Systems, an MA in Arts Management and numerous other professional qualifications. You can find out more about me at https://www.openbc.com/hp/Simon_HeathcoteParker/ and www.SHPconsulting.com/BusinessEnglish. I have to do this course as a direct result of being passed over for interview for a position as a university lecturer here purely because I do not have a university qualification with English as the subject (despite the fact that it was actually to teach Business Management on a Media Management degree programme).

I have to come up with a project proposal for the above mentioned course by the end of the month that centres around the ideas of 3 readers and a book on Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL). The books are as follows:

* 'Analysing English In A Global Context' (edited by Anne Burns and Caroline Coffin),
* 'English Language Teaching In Its Social Context' (edited by Christopher N Candlin and Neil Mercer),
* 'Innovation In English Language Teaching' (edited by David R Hall and Ann Hewings), and
* 'Using Functional Grammar' (NCELTR).

I am currently based in Vienna, Austria, and currently have just 1 private student for TOEFL (US academic university entrance Test Of English as a Foreign Language) whom I will only be teaching for the next 10 days. Vienna shuts down completely over the Summer until late September so direct class observation is impossible.

Would anybody have any ideas how to go about this? The project proposal is due at the end of the month and the project itself is due by mid-September. It is not a long project, just 5,000 words, but it has to be academic and reflect the books above.

All serious help and advice would be very much appreciated. Maybe some of the teachers here would be prepared to answer some questionnaires or something? Please help.

Thank you very much in advance

[jmackinnon]

WienSam,

I recently completed graduate work in curriculum, a program I followed with the specific intent of integrating ESL with Communications ( non academic) English. The program focusses on peer education, a recognition of language modelling and authentic (social) Communication. The Centre for Applied Linguistics was a great deal of help. I teach in a classroom setting and have had agreat deal of success with this "emmersion" technique. I am not sure it would be effective with a directed type situation (tutoring for TESOL) described in your post.

John MacKinnon

[Eric18]

Just a quick note to let you know that you face a real challenge. I would be tempted to look at some standardized tool used by corporations to evaluate English proficiency. For instance, I understand that the TOEIC exam is used by many corporations in France, Korea, and Japan to determine hiring decisions.

You could also look at how various private educational institutions have evolved to meet this practical need for 21st century business professionals to both speak in English and prove their competency on the TOEIC exam. Many more traditional educational institutions, often influenced by ideological concerns, look down on both the emergence of English as the global business languate and training business professionals for a narrow use of a language.

Good luck.

Shalom

Eric
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www.compellingconversations.com