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[lonach]

I will be teaching Russian business people, business English and regular ESL classes. From what I have learned in my ESL course, classes should be engaging, fun and somewhat active. I am worried that these business people will be staring at me with serious expressions and questioning why they are spending money to play games. Anyone have any experiences they would like to share with teaching adults in Russia.

[spiral78]

I've only taught in Moscow this year, on a three-month project for LUKOil, but have worked extensively with Russian Exxon staff in Canada for the past three years, and have taught businesspeople in Europe for eight years, so I hope I can speak to this issue from some experience, though there are others on this forum who have been IN Russia much longer.

I have very rarely had a group that would respond well to games. Businesspeople, and particularly Russians (!) are busy people, and the most 'engaging' lessons are the ones that are the most useful IN THEIR EYES. Games are nice for young international students, but any 'game' you use in a business group should have a very clear language purpose and not require them to act silly.

For example, I sometimes instruct the group to stand and order itself in a line by the first letter of their first names (or something else esoteric). They must ask, answer, and explain in English. Then, I give one student homework: to devise a different way to order the group the next day (by house numbers, year of oldest child's birth, office telephone numbers, etc). The language purpose of this is useful for business: getting/giving information, explaining how to do something, explaining to me why the group is ordered in this way. And it doesn't require anyone to act silly. And you can do it every lesson, so long as the students find it useful and interesting.

Russian businesspeople, in my experience, often have a real need for English for social purposes. They travel abroad, and many times have stronger business vocabulary than social. This can also make for useful, active lessons.

You may find that there is a preference for British English. I usually approach this by polling the students on who they speak English with, in actuality. There may be Brits in the mix, but it's likely that they speak the most English with other non-native speakers. I focus my teaching on international English, and don't usually approach cultural/coloquial/regional issues.

Russians don't like to be seen making mistakes. It can be quite difficult, when you have groups, for them to feel comfortable talking in front of each other, and with each other, in English. It can take a lot of focus, tact, and consideration to overcome this.
I have been successful at team-building among my Russian groups, though it's not easy. One thing I have usually done at the outset of a course is to ask each student to prepare and make a brief (5 minute) presentation on his/her job (or another topic that is useful to him/her). Prepared speech is a safer forum, because they will make fewer mistakes. It's one way to begin....

You'll need to find out what they think they need. And focus on doing that.
'Fun' is probably not called for - engaging, interesting, and useful is more on target, in my opinion and experience. It requires a lot of focus on your part, but not necessarily a lot of control from you. Strong preparation will be respected.

[lonach]

spiral78,

Thank you for the reply. You have confirmed and clarified a lot of thoughts I had in my mind. I�m curious too, if in your experiences teaching Russian business people if you have developed any friendships?

[spiral78]

Yes, some of the best that I own overall, but it takes some time. Russian people are very warm, but not without trust and relationship building first.

[spiral78]

By the way, salutations. It sounds as though your instincts are on track. That's a great start.

May I recommend a book that offers practical ways to plan lessons along the lines I've mentioned?
It's eminently readable, as well.

Willis, Jane (1996) A Framework for Task-Based Learning. Longman.