Over the last decade, employers are facing difficulties to find candidates to fill positions that require good business writing skills. Employers and their businesses are suffering great financial loss due to the deficiencies of their employees writing skills. To overcome the challenges of their employees, businesses are investing in written communication and grammar training sessions.
Employers seek candidates who are proficient both in verbal and written language. A study conducted by the National Commission on Writing (NCW) in 2004 confirmed that employees spent over $3.1 billion annually to attempt to resolve the employee’s writing deficiencies. Even to communicate via email, employees must possess very basic writing skills. This is one of the top priorities of a successful employee. New graduates from exemplary colleges are producing students who lack skills in basic spelling, sentence structure, and grammar.
According to the publishers of the American College Test (ACT), grammar is the most important skill for students entering college however high school teachers consider it to be the least important skill. Grammar has been taught using a rule-based approach. This approach focused on teaching grammar rules with a focus on the form (present, past, future, etc.). Teachers provided students with repetitive drills and grammar or punctuation exercises, which over time proved to be ineffective. The National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE)in 2006 affirmed its position regarding the use of grammar drills in a news release stating that most English teachers do not see themselves as “grammar police” patrolling for sentence-level deficiencies in their students’ writing. This approach has since been abandoned by most educators and NCTE.
Contrary to the rule-based approach, the context-based approach focuses on what students are reading and writing