Job Discussion Forums

7969 · Joined: 26 Mar 2003 Posts: 5782 Location: Coastal Guangdong

I've done some searching on google, but not found much satisfactory. does anyone have a good link where i can get ahold of a comprehensive vocab list/dialogue scenarios of tourism english? i've just taken on a load of students who will become tour guides and would like to focus on their specialty a bit more than general english if i can.

thanks. 7969

ODIN · Joined: 13 Feb 2006 Posts: 14 Location: CHINA

Hi,
Why not use books such as the Lonley Planet. This give a start on information that could help

Roger · Joined: 19 Jan 2003 Posts: 9138

I don't give much store on teaching materials in such specialised cases; why njot think up lessons in which you and your charges do ROLE-PLAYS, with students imagining themselves to be guests at a hotel, restaurant, tour operator etc.?
I did something like this with young kids in Yangshuo a while back; their grasp of English was phenomenal (always is in Yangshuo but seldom elsewhere...).
My local student had to think for the first time how to check in at a hotel ('your ID, please...") and enquire about check-out time, room sizes, room rates, facilities, etc. Ditto for restaurants - Western food, Chinese food, drinks, etc.

And as an aside: what your students have to take note of - writing down in a ledger - they will commit to their memory far more effectively than what they memorise from a silly book...

vikdk · Joined: 25 Jun 2003 Posts: 1676

well i reckon the first thing they have to write down in that ledger (has somebody been using an electronic dictionary - writing in a simple notebook will do Laughing

) is - look left/ look right here we have.......

william wallace · Joined: 14 May 2003 Posts: 2869 Location: in between

7969 · Joined: 26 Mar 2003 Posts: 5782 Location: Coastal Guangdong

ah always good to see the humour ever present in this cafe. i will take your expostulations and procure some leaflets/manuals/brochures/novelettes that will enable me to help them out ( i do have an old lonelyplanet hanging around here somewhere....)

7969 Very Happy

Super Mario · Posted: Thu Feb 23, 2006 7:38 am Post subject:

Even an average foreign language bookstore should have dialogue type texts. How useful they are is a different thing.
Easing your students into authentic style dialogues is a better bet.
"I want a corkscrew. Can't you dumb *beep* get anything right?"
An authentic opener.

dialogger · Joined: 14 Mar 2005 Posts: 419 Location: China

I've taught Tourism English and wonder whether there is any such thing.
(I know the Chinese think there is).
Isn't it English with an expanded vocab to do with a particular industry?
This is like IT English HR English.
If the basic fluency isn't there, I wonder if a tour guide will be anything other than an automaton.
Good luck anyway - pass on titles of any good dialog texts you locate.

Super Mario · Posted: Fri Feb 24, 2006 6:04 am Post subject:

I taught it in Guilin. Yes, vocab for one. Then doing things like planning an itinerary in clear English, translating menu items into meaningful [1000 dragons soup doesn't give the tourist a hell of a lot to go on: chickens feet or pigs stomach does] English.
But mostly helping them understand those little cultural nuances that are important to us folk. Like the fuwuyuan not hawking up into the corridor ashtray at 6 am for example.
Tourism students aren't always the sharpest tools in the shed, but they are often, once graduated, the major interface between China and The Foreigner.

Spiderman Too · Posted: Fri Feb 24, 2006 8:33 am Post subject:

The book I am using for my English classes this term, called Practical Spoken English for International Business (ISBN 7-81078-106-5), may help, in part.

Lesson 1 - Meeting someone at the airport
Lesson 2 - On the Way to the Hotel (polite social intercourse)
Lesson 3 - Settling your Guest into the Hotel
Lesson 6 - Talking about the Weather
Lesson 16 - At a Restaurant
Lesson 20 - Parting

3 or 4 dialogues for each lesson (reasonably realistic) + pattern drills + 'situational conversation' (role plays) + translation exercises.

I have been teaching the book for only 2 weeks and I like it so far.

dialogger · Joined: 14 Mar 2005 Posts: 419 Location: China

Spiderman
What level are your students?

7969 · Joined: 26 Mar 2003 Posts: 5782 Location: Coastal Guangdong

thanks for all the posts. they have been helpful.

7969

Spiderman Too · Posted: Fri Feb 24, 2006 4:26 pm Post subject:

Mpho · Joined: 30 Aug 2004 Posts: 58

I will be teaching tourism English next semester. The two textbooks I am going to use are: Tourism English Conversation ISBN 7-310-01191-0 and A Listening and Speaking Course for Tourist Guide ISBN7-310-01495-2.

I am currently using these same books to teach my junior high students some basic English and using topics for discussion and reading.

The books are actually quite good.

Mpho
Kuitun City, Xinjiang

Super Mario · Posted: Fri Mar 10, 2006 5:42 am Post subject:

Hey, Mpho, I've been to Xinjiang and saw precious few English speaking type tourists. And considering I've never heard of Kuitin, it must be an emerging tourist market if you're running classes there.
Please enlighten me!