TEACHING BUSINESS ENGLISH FOR ARAB SPEAKERS

Abstract

Teaching Business English (L2) for target learners whose L1 is Arabic requires certain procedures. Instructors must address problems that their Arabic learners will probably face in acquiring Business communication in L2. This paper will discuss the major problems that learners whose L1 is Arabic face in learning Business English which is L2 and what the role of the instructor is in guiding the learners to overcome these obstacles and acquire the desired skills. Instructors need to address the four problems that their Arab learners are probably going to encounter. These problems are: 1) negative transfer; 2) the difference in writing strategies; 3) prepositional knowledge; and 4) collocational patterns. Thus, instructors have to teach the learners to overcome negative transfer, include practices that guide the learners to overcome the differences in strategies of business communication that exist between L1 and L2 and address the cultural differences between the two main languages.