The Application Of Genre-based Approacch To Teaching Of English Business Letter Writing

With the rapid development and integration of the global economy, the international communication and cooperation are intensified. As an important means of communication, English business letter plays a crucial role in international business activities. Different from other writings, English business letter has high structural formation, definite communicative purpose, and language features. However, traditional teaching which focus on the analysis of single sentences and grammars, fail to conduct students the discourse of the English business letter. Therefore, it could not get a satisfied result. Thus the writer applies the genre-based teaching approach to teaching of English business letter.The genre-based teaching approach, which merged in80s of last century, is based on the theory of genre and genre analysis. It develops teaching activities focusing on the schematic structure of a discourse. Its purpose is to make students know that the discourses with different genres have different communicative purposes and discourse structures. It also aims to enable students to master the schematic structure of a discourse and understand the process of a discourse construct which can help students understand or create discourse in a certain genre.Based on the genre analysis theory and features of the English business letter, teachers carry out the teaching activities around the schemata structure. Accordingly, students’awareness of communicative purposes and discourse structure of different English business letter will be cultivated so that a better understanding and a deeper perception of the business letter will be achieved.Through the test, questionnaire and empirical study, it is concluded that genre-based teaching approach can effectively help students to improve their ability of business English writing competence. Though the genre-based teaching approach contributes a lot in teaching English business letter, there is still limitation. At last the writer provides some suggestion for further study.