Teaching Commercial Correspondence for Business-English-Majored Students in Ho Chi Minh University of Food Industry: Difficulties and Recommendations

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to figure out the difficulties the students of Bachelor of Business English in Ho Chi Minh City University of Food Industry (HUFI) face in commercial correspondence. During the 4th semester of Bachelor of Business English, students in HUFI study the course of commercial correspondence. The major barrier for these students is their inability to use terminology and syntax correctly. For this purpose, data were collected from 100 students from two Business-English-majored classes in HUFI using timed Grammaticality Judgment Tests proposed by Ellis, R. (2005). The results showed that most students were not familiar with terminology commonly used in commerce; they failed to use formal English language syntax in their correspondence writing. In the post-test interviews, students shared that they were not equipped with enough terminology used in commerce, and it was so complicated to use grammar correctly in commercial correspondence. The findings in this paper may serve as a foundation to figure out factors that need to be considered when designing materials and teaching business English.