Teaching Business English for Distance Learning Students – Challenges, Problems and Potential Solutions

Teaching Business English for Distance Learning Students – Challenges, Problems and Potential Solutions

Zagan-Zelter, Diana
Zagan-Zelter, Sergiu

Distance learning has become a type of learning which is increasingly preferred by students both in bachelor and master programs at the Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, mainly due to economic reasons which force young people to start working immediately after finishing high-school. However, distance learning is also a solution for middle-aged people who graduated different universities in their youth, but have professions which are no longer requested on the job market. As the spectrum of distance learning students is so heterogeneous from different points of view such as age or professional background, teaching English to such students has encountered a number of challenges and problems that we have been trying to cope with so far. In order to identify these problems, we have made a survey among distance learning students from our faculty by using questionnaires and guided interviews. We have also made a summary of the issues identified in our teaching experience and we have talked to colleagues who are in the same situation in order to discover the common points. The paper will present the results of this investigation and the solutions we propose, solutions which are based on our 10 year-experience in teaching distance learning students as well as on the review of specialized literature in this area.

Conference or Workshop Item
PeerReviewed

2011-05

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