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Syllabus design is one of the most important thing while developing a course. My present summative work will be focusing on syllabus design for business English. In order to formulate a syllabus, a lot of factors have to be kept in mind. These include the purpose of course, present proficiency of the students in language, the field in which the students specialize so that the course contents can suit the requirement of their profession subsequently, the aims, goal and objectives that you intend to achieve at the end of the course and the environment for which the course is to be designed, in addition to variety of other factors. The syllabus design is supposed to be a step by step logical and a progressive process to take the students from their present level of proficiency to the desired level. The syllabus could take various forms. It could be ‘structural syllabus’ which is also known a grammatical syllabus, the ‘functional syllabus’ which is based on the idea of making the students able to communicate their functions through the concerned language, ‘learner led syllabus’ in which students have their own input in the design process or ‘situational syllabus’ which is based on the situational needs. Further, the syllabus can be categorized into the ‘student syllabus’ which is the part that students will see, the ‘material syllabus’ which deals with the material required in different phases of syllabus and ‘organizational syllabus’, which deals with organization of various resources etc. For developing a syllabus that suits the needs of clients, first of all a detailed analysis will be required to identify as to what does the client need out of this syllabus, followed by initial evaluations of the clients proficiency which will help a lot in formulating a suitable syllabus design. The main areas of the need will be identified through a detailed discussion and then these main focus areas will be separated into various units or modules for the course. Then the designer will see as to what kind of lessons, both in vocabulary as well as grammar will suit the specific module so that after studying that material, the client should be able to meet the specific needs. The same material can be later translated into lesson plans, with detailed distribution of time corresponding to each activity. While dedicating number of hours to each unit or module of the syllabus, it must be kept in mind that some time will have to be dedicated to introductory portion as well as a well-organized testing mechanism. This will allow the teacher to measure the efficacy of program and allow students to monitor their progress. These tests could be ‘diagnostic tests’ (to assess the students’ knowledge and skills in specific areas and are conducted before the course begins), ‘placement tests’ ( for enabling the teacher to group the students together), ‘aptitude tests’ (to predict students’ future progress), ‘achievement tests’, ‘proficiency tests’ and ‘progress tests’, with each type of tests suited for special kind of evaluation. The final step in course design is the evaluation process which is very important as it helps in evaluating the course material to suggest improvements in curriculum as well as teaching methodology, if need be. It also gives the students an opportunity to give away their feedback on course and evaluate its efficiency against the initially planned aims. Moreover, it also helps the teacher in giving useful information to the employer regarding the conduct of course and students’ performances. These evaluations are basically of two types, including students evaluations regarding the usefulness of the course and teachers evaluations regarding the students. The syllabus design is the single most important aspect of a specialized course for business English. Overall, other than teaching methodology, understanding of the user/ client requirement, course material etc, all revolve around syllabus design. A good syllabus design is the key to successful achievement of the aim of teaching the business English.
