TEACHER’S NOTES

Simulations: Forbodies.com
by Chris Barwood

Pre-teaching of vocabulary and content

business & ESP

Level: Intermediate and above 1

2 Task preparation
Age: Adults, young adults
3 Simulation
Time needed: 60 minutes +
4 Feedback
Grammar objective The language of
meetings: expressing opinions, making
suggestions, agreeing and disagreeing.
Stage 2
Section / Subject: Business English Skills Pre-teaching (10 minutes)
Summary: A lesson plan for a simulation Hand out the simulation description (Worksheet 1) to
of a business meeting the learners, and give them a couple of minutes to find
the items from the vocabulary sheet (Worksheet 2) in
This simulation is very flexible. Numbers can be three to the text. Then divide them into groups of three to find
six for each group, with as many groups working simul- the meaning of the words in dictionaries and from their
taneously as is practical for your situation. If you need context, using the vocabulary sheet if necessary, and
to reduce the amount of time for the meeting itself, you with help from you on items that could be difficult.
can simply reduce the number of topics to be discussed. The vocabulary you need to work on will change with
the language level and business knowledge of each
Purpose class, but you can carry out this technique for any
class. For more effective teamwork make sure each
Simulations develop a range of skills
group divides the task by ensuring that each member
Language: Speaking practice, specifically to practise
looks up different words. (If necessary, divide words
the language of meetings:
into groups 1, 2 and 3 for each member of each group.)
1 Expressing opinions
Tell learners that each group will have to define/trans-
2 Making suggestions late some of the words and put them in a sentence.
3 Agreeing and disagreeing When most of the groups have finished, have someone
from each group feed their definition/translation and
Business communication skills development: sentence back to the whole group. Correct or improve
Teacher’s notes

participating in meetings, chairing meetings: the responses when necessary.

1 Setting an agenda
2 Summarizing
3 Facilitating communication
Stage 3
Task preparation (7 minutes)
Anticipated problems Put students into pairs/threes to check understanding
You need to keep tight control on the simulation and of the simulation description together and come back to
the learners’ activities, paying close attention to you with any difficulties they cannot resolve, which you
timings and ensuring that learners are on task. This can then explain to the whole class where necessary.
kind of activity works best with well motivated Now put learners into the groups they will be in for the
learners. Cultural differences can lead to difficulties simulation. The optimum number is usually four,
and may need to be explained in advance. depending on how talkative your learners are. More
than six in a group can mean that individual
contributions get limited. Make a few final checks
Stage 1 before you allow learners to start the simulation activity:
Briefing (3 minutes) 1 they need to decide very quickly on a chair;
2 the chair must decide on an agenda and manage
Give learners an overview of the lesson so that they are the meeting, especially timing;
aware of the purpose of the lesson and the nature of its
3 they need to discuss the issues and come to clear
stages. Outline these stages:
decisions;
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 TEACHER’S NOTES
Simulations: Forbodies.com
by Chris Barwood
business & ESP

4 after a set time they will need to be able to feed

Language feedback
their decisions back to the whole group and may need
to do this in the form of a written report; You may be able to do the feedback in a separate
5 they should stay in the role of regional managers
lesson from the simulation itself. The advantage of
this is that you’ll have time to organize from your
and not talk to each other as language learners.
notes or recordings exactly what feedback you want
to give. I usually prefer to put examples of the most
representative errors/good practice onto a slide or the
Stage 4 whiteboard. A practical starting point is to brainstorm
Simulation (20 minutes) all your feedback onto one slide/whiteboard version
and then get learners to identify which items are errors
Let the groups start by deciding the chair and agenda,
and which good language usage. Then give them the
then go into the meeting itself. They should only spend
slide/whiteboard version showing them which are
a maximum of about three minutes deciding on chair
errors and which are correct, or simply mark them on
and agenda, so cut this short if they run over. After that
the board as errors or good practice if you are teaching
it’s important not to intervene in the learners’ com-
the simulation and feedback in one session. You can
munication unless they really are not able to continue
then move on to correcting errors with the whole class.
successfully with the task. But it is important that you
monitor this stage of the lesson and get feedback from it
relating to the language and business aims of the lesson, Skills feedback
whether through video, audio or your own note taking.
Give learners the appropriate feedback on their skills,
My personal preference is usually to listen unobtrusively
drawing attention to what you noticed whilst
and make paper notes of errors/good language usage
monitoring regarding the various chairing and
and meeting skills. I focus largely on feedback that will
meeting skills identified at the beginning of the lesson.
be relevant for the whole group and keep it anonymous,
The way you do this will of course depend on how
but if the group is small enough individual feedback is
much or little you have already worked with the group
highly prized. Bring this stage to an end either when the
on meeting skills.
discussion has finished or you have to stop it in order to
have enough time for feedback.
Teacher’s notes

EXTENSION
Stage 5 Learners will have spent a lot of time speaking, so a
Task feedback (5 minutes) written task for follow up is often appropriate, and if
they know this is coming, it can help them to be more
Get feedback from each group on how the activity
precise in the earlier stages. A report to the Board of
went for them. You need to find out:
the decisions made will be useful, particularly if you
1 what decisions they made (i.e. the result!) are also teaching report writing skills.
2 how the meeting went (was it a successful process
and were meeting skills used effectively?)

Stage 6
Language and Skills feedback (15 minutes)
Make sure that you have allowed enough time for
feedback. If you chose to use video or audio recording
for your monitoring, then you’ll probably use it for
feedback and there are too many ways to do this for
me to go into much detail here, but you can see more
in the article.
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 WORKSHEET 1
Simulations: Forbodies.com

Forbodies.com has a range of cosmetic and beauty products with stores in the UK, Holland and
BUSINESS & ESP

France, and a renowned website that has great sales success. It has a reputation for customer
service and ethical products. The regional managers’ representatives meeting needs to discuss
the items below and reach decisions for action in 30 minutes. Decisions will then be passed on
to the board.

F FORBODIES.COM

Staff discounts Currently all retail staff are permitted a discount of 8% on all in-house
items, to a maximum of £150 per month. Total sales between stores
and between individuals in each store vary greatly and a proposal has
been made to link the amount of discount to performance, keeping 5%
as the base line.

Training Training for store managers is encouraged, but although a wide range of
training opportunities exists, many managers do not take advantage of it.
In particular managers need training in skills like leading teams, chairing
meetings, delegation and decision making. How can you make sure your
managers receive the training they need?

Saturday staff It is company policy that at weekends for every member of Saturday
staff (usually a person aged 16 or 17) there must be one member of
full-time regular staff. Recently in the bigger stores more Saturday staff
have been used and now some of the smaller stores want do the same.

United colours A customer survey of our British shops has revealed that customers find
the staff uniform too business like and would like a more relaxed look
from the staff in the shops. Many staff feel that asking staff to wear
simply the company colours of blue and green would be the most
satisfactory solution.

Flexitime Currently there is no flexitime in the stores: all staff work set hours.
Although some staff would like to work flexitime, it has been felt until
now that flexitime was not practical for Forbodies.com because of quite
high staff turnover and the necessity of keeping the store effectively
staffed at busy periods.
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 WORKSHEET 2
Simulations: Forbodies.com
BUSINESS & ESP

Vocabulary

Learner 1 Learner 2 Learner 3

FLEXITIME ETHICAL IN HOUSE

BASE LINE COMPANY COLOURS SET HOURS

STAFF TURNOVER RENOWNED REPUTATION

CUSTOMER SERVICE DECISIONS FOR ACTION THE BOARD

PERFORMANCE TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF TO CHAIR A MEETING

DELEGATION

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