engleski

Developing students' business writing skills using specialized corpora

The last two decades have seen an increasing use of online corpora in ESP. Although recent research highlights the need for further empirical investigations into the measurable contributions of corpus tools in developing specific language skills, a growing body of empirical studies testifies in favor of using such tools in ESP classroom. The present study investigates the effects of corpus-based instruction on developing students’ business writing skills, namely writing economic and financial reports. The corpora used in the study were Cambridge International Corpus (CIC), Wolverhampton Business English Corpus (WBE) and Business English Corpus (BEC). The study was implemented during the period of four months with second-year students of Economics at the Faculty of Economics in Split, Croatia. The study aimed at answering two research questions: (a) Does training learners in the use of specialized corpora have an effect on the ‘naturalness’ of students’ writing? (b) Which of the corpora tools did students find more useful in redrafting their reports? The results of the study suggest that online corpora use positively impacts students’ writing in the redrafting stages and following a three-week instruction in corpora use. Moreover, students expressed a slight preference towards the Business English Corpus.

ESP, specialized corpora, corpora instruction, business reports, business writing skills

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