Learning through extra curriculum--English for Business Negotiations

An English for Business Negotiation Project--A Hand-on experience on Negotiations





This activity was taken place in 2007 and was initiated in order to meet with the course objectives and provide the students an opportunity to gain more knowledge, practice, and performance by doing. I always attempt to see my students , especially forth year ones, brush up and employ their accumulated knowledge and skills to good use on their last year of the academic surrounding. Thus, this seminar was done by the students with the teacher providing the guidelines; it was also the integral part of the learning process, which is concentrated on learning by doing.

This course is designed to provide opportunities for forth-year students to improve both their negotiation and English language skills (especially speaking and writing). This is a ‘hands-on’ course where students will learn the basics of the negotiation process, including tactics and language required to conduct effective negotiations. Cross cultural awareness, including verbal and non-verbal languages, will be introduced to the students. Nevertheless, the focus will be on learning, practicing, and refining skills in using the English language in negotiations while reflecting upon performance so that the students can apply their skills to the ‘real world.’ The activities to be practiced will train the students to practice their speaking, listening, writing skills of English in correlation to negotiation process.

Extra teaching to high school students for O-Net Exam!

October 8, 2008

My colleagues and I were assigned to visit a high schoolin Nakhon Phrathom, out side of Bangkok, and give a terse lesson for the English subject in the O-Net and A-Net exams performed in Thailand to about 70 high school students . Many students came, mostly those who major in Science and some in Languages (such as Chinese and Japanese, and English). I hope they learned some thing from us...well only half a day won't do the trick, but at least they came here to learn...to pass the exam! And we promoted our university.

Learning for passing is something that does not buy me. I may seem negative with this a wee bit, since I do not wholeheartedly agree with testing much. They, as learners, don't seem to benefit from testing much compared to the practical outcome. Learners can receive 600 for TOEFL, but really they don't seem to be able to communicate effectively. However, many might disagree, testing is one of those keys to show whether or not the learners have made any progress. On another note, it possibly encourages the learners to learn and improve. Nevertheless,I would say that testing is the first step to further learners' knowledge (such as study abroad)or know where they are at in any fields. They are always pros and cons in almost everything.

Now, it reminds me of Lingua Franca! Many academia believe in this paradigm. They believe that learners should learn 2L for practical use. In other words, grammar and structure should be put aside and prioritise the use of the language per se--or I would say learning to practical use it in everyday situation. Learning English here might be more productive and perhaps could answer to the question as "Why can I not speak English after learning it for 12 years?!" Though, a question might have arisen here from the grammarians about its standard. Learners might be able to communicate only to get the message across--but with "broken English." This is interesting!

Anyway, back to the tutoring, we thought we did our best and hoped to make it better next time with the presentation. We were not quite organised and prepared due to short notice and preparation.

Teachnology can boost student's energy and trigger their curiosity!

I have found some fun activity (actually from my Australian colleague) for my students in a Business Negotiation course. It worked and my students from last semester loved it big time, so I am thinking about using it again this semester. This site is initiated by Michael Gibson. The web site is called "Zap Dramatic" It's an online-negotiation games...Fun stuff!

See the link http://www.zapdramatic.com/am1.htm

One Proud Teacher :)

This is my Speech Communication class(gee, about 130 students in two seperate sections)with Hotel and Tourism students. We really had a great time. At least, I myself was having a blast since they many of them did what I taught them-using index cards (instead of a full piece of A4 paper)...to be continued!

Sripatum Academic Forum: Research and Innovations for Sustainable Development

August 13, 2008. Today there was an academic forum on the title of Research and Innovations for Sustainable Development held at Sripatum University. What I liked the most about this forum was the keynote speaker in the afternoon. Asst.Prof. Kanok Wongtrahgan, Ph.D. He gave a talk on Education in Thailand.

He noted that Thailand had become greater than many countries like Australia in terms of reinforcing people to receive higher education. As we can see that there are many students have entered to universities. In juxtapose, not many Australians (or New Zelanders)pursue their education after finishing high schools. However, many of the Thai students who have graduated can find no job or are not capable of working. Like my students, for example, they have learned English all their lives, yet they can't communicate with foreigners effectively. In conclusion, we have focused too much on quality, but lack in quality. Unlike people in Australia, after high school, they would go on training to apprenticeship to learn skillful tasks/jobs to become , for example, a locksmith and so forth.

Now, there is a new challenge/ weakness for the education system of Thailand to have to solve the latter problem and solve a question on how to take the burden of the parents and society of new graduates not getting a job. We can't just keep producing people with higher education, but lack of knowledge,competency, and proficiency.

In order to become successful and famous, according to the speaker, university should learn to blend in with its community, help people in the community (acknowledge what the university can do for the community, not what they can get from the community). Here, community and university should be united. For instance, Columbia University in New York used to separate itself from the New York City, so they were not quit successful and could not build as good reputation as Harvard University. Later on, they changed the management and strategy, they were more involved in the city and open the university to the city and tried to be a part of it by opening more schools that are in high demands in the job market in the NYC. Then, they became famous.

Furthermore, the speaker also mentioned about the goal of UNESCO of the basis of learning. UNESCO (2005) came up with the Basis of learning: Learning to know, learning to do, learning to live together, and learning to be.

Key Skills from Dan Buckley: Communication skill, Problem solving, Evaluation own and others, Information and communication technology, and working with others.

Now, education is not just some one's responsibility. It's every one's. We need to teach our students how to think, not what to think or do. They need to be able to apply the theoretical knowledge they have learned in classrooms to the real situations. They need to be able to answer the questions of their companies about what they do know, what they can do and how they can solve problems.

The speaker left a good note on students' imagination. Imagination is important and many times teachers spoil their imagination, so that they don't make progress and do not know how to think! It's very sad, but true!!

Teaching Co-Operative students

Today it's the first day of teaching (Cooperative Program) again after 2 months of teaching in Australia. This program was for those who would have to do there internship in companies and organizations for about 4 months. Prior to working, they needed to have some kind of English competency. The lesson comprised of four different topics in English business. The first two that were introduced today was preparing for a trip and booking a flight and a hotel room.

It was fun actually to run activities with the students. They seemed to interact better. Perhaps I was fortunate to have students who were majoring in English for Business and Communication. The first activity that I ran this morning was to pair students by employing words, phrases and sentences that would be taught in the first chapter. Once they had found their partners, I had them read them out loud in class. Then, I started introducing them vocabulary words. Power Point prepared by my colleague was utilized throughout the lesson. It was good to have the program; however, I could be detrimental since the teacher might not have enough time to do other activities that would have emphasize some of the points he or she might want to focus on.

Working in pairs and groups was also effective. I have them role play in pairs, but some of them were still stuck with the old way of doing it--memorizing the dialogue. Thus, I walked around and listened to them pair by pair to make comments. Another activity that was very effective in regard to reviewing a dialogue. I had my students repeated a dialogue with me once. Then, we started to interact by me reading person A's line and students would read person B's line and switched. The third time, I had them choose which line they would like to say, then, I had them close the book and we said the dialogue without reading. They really enjoyed doing this activity. There was another thing that I had students do--writing dictation. I had them listen to a conversation they learned in the last two hours, then I had them write down as many words, phrases and sentences that they had just learned as they could to review them. It was fine.

I was a good start of teaching Thai students again. One important thing of teaching is great attitude of the teacher and students!

"The Best Practices in Teaching and Learning" KM Workshop at SPU

Friday 8 August 2008

I was invited today to attend a KM Workshop on Best Practices in Teaching and Learning at(or what I would put it as "Professional Development")initiated by Dr. Numthip the Director of the Library of Sripatum University as part of Knowledge Bank Management. I was very pleased to attend the seminar and workshop as I learned more good teaching practices through the real role models (teachers from Assoc. Prof.Dr. Umporn, Srinakharinwirot University; Assoc. Prof. Dr. Somtawil, Kasetsart University; and Dr. Anuchit, Sripatum University). The keynote speakers are very knowledgeable and the one thing that I noticed during their speeches was that they are "born to be" teachers. They have their hearts and souls in this profession, so that they always learn new ways or strategies of teaching. According to the speakers, there is no such a thing as the best teaching and learning practice. It all comes down to serving what our students' needs and what is right for them. What I gathered, furthermore, good teachers are not merely those who know what to teach, how to teach, but also those who are perseverance and creative. Having a natural gift in teaching is one thing that help teachers imparting knowledge to their students more effectively. More importantly, the art of teaching can be developed since everyone has the capacity to learn, to change and to grow. Teachers should have good attitudes and mindset. Also, good teachers should have good knowledge in any subject matters and have good morale. Here, I have to say that I say all this traits in this three speakers and I was, inevitably, satisfied and energised or somewhat empowered to do my very best in this profession while I am still a teacher. There are also many teachers whom I met in Brisbane during the exchange program. Also, I am sure there are many other Thai teachers who are as good and dedicated.

One speaker mentioned about "Learning Community." I was very mesmerised by the term and kind of hoped that we have such community at Liberal Arts, Sripatum University. This place will be an ideal place for teachers to learn...learn how to teach and help one another to solve problems and develop our teaching skills and the courses we teach.


There are also many good teaching techniques, according to the speakers, as the following:
-writing a good and lengthy course syllabus,
-using role play, case studies, games, and other communicative activities
-assigning external reading and keeping journal logs
-teaching or giving advice on how to ask questions
-giving students a second chance for any small tests
-explaining to students about objectives of each lesson and activity taught and done in classroom
-providing teaching time in different phases: Lecture/teaching, Practice/action, Presentation/evaluation
-encouraging and valuing students' work in public or to share with other students in and out side of classroom
-teaching students to recognize their own potentials and each other's strengths and to socialize
-teaching students by following the MEAT model: Man, Edutainment, A...., Technology
-etc.

By and large, I have learned so much from this seminar and workshop. I learned that everyday has the capacity to change to learn and to grow.

A question left hanging in my mind though after the workshop. As a teacher, is knowing what we teach enough to make students become complete human beings with knowledge, morale, good spirits, and other good traits? And is knowing how to teach enough to help them stand on their very own feet with pride and courage to help support their own family and develop their own community and country after graduating?