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The European Journal of Education PREMIER
and Applied Psychology 2023, No 3 H
ISSN 2310-5704 ppublishing.org
DOI:10.29013/EJEAP-23-3-22-26
DEVELOPING LINGUISTIC COMPETENCE OF FUTURE LANGUAGE TEACHERS
Nilufar Tuxtayeva 1
1 Senior Lecturer, Department of Theoretical Aspects of the English Language, Uzbekistan State World Languages University, Uzbekistan
Cite: Tuxtayeva N. (2023). Developing Linguistic Competence of Future Language Teachers. European Journal of Education and Applied Psychology 2023, No 3. https://doi. org/10.29013/EJEAP-23-3-22-26
Abstract
In the current era of rapid globalization, developing the communication skills of future English language teachers in higher education is one of the urgent issues of today. In the theory and practice of teaching foreign languages, the most important condition for success in the career of a future teacher is his/her linguistic competence. Linguistic competence includes knowledge of the language, skills of verbal communication, as well as experience in creative and practical activities, which are the basis for the successful implementation of intercultural communication of future teachers. This article highlights important components of developing linguistic competences of future English language teachers.
Keywords: linguistic competence, future language teacher, communication, foreign language, modern requirements, speech, activities
Introduction
The issue of forming the competencies of future language teachers is now of particular relevance in the context of changing the paradigm of education based on a competency-based approach and focused on integration in the global educational space and international professional cooperation on a global scale. In connection with a fundamental change in the methodological basis of education in higher education, new categories and concepts are appearing in the field of education based on current reforms. Currently, graduates of bachelor's and master's degree course of language departments will have the highest level of mastering foreign lan-
guages, which will correspond to the C1 level according to CEFR - the level of professional knowledge of a foreign language. On the basis of the approved standard control and measuring parameters for state certification, training programs specific to the institution have been developed. Particular attention in the standard is paid to linguistic competence, which describes the requirements of students' skills in choosing the right linguistic forms and means of expression depending on the situation, the communication purpose, and direction of the speaker. Pragmatic competence, according to the standard, includes the ability to communicate in a foreign language in accordance with the development of
a communication situation and strategy that promote effective communication.
The subject of research in this article is the interaction of linguistic, in particular grammatical and lexical competencies, and professional foreign language competencies in order to form linguistic competence of a future language teacher. Our assumptions about the formation of foreign language linguistic competencies to find answers to the following questions: what methods and techniques can be used to develop grammatical and lexical competencies; are there any priorities in the development linguistic competence of future language teachers. The basis for pedagogical assumptions and conclusions was experimental practical classes on the formation of foreign language linguistic competencies in a number of linguistic universities that train future language teachers.
First, it is necessary to define the basic concepts of the stated topic, on their interpretation in modern scientific and pedagogical literature.
Materials and Methods
"Linguistic competence of a future language teacher means the integral personal qualities of a student who has knowledge of the language system, linguistic thinking, experience of independent application of knowledge and skills in new language situations" (Collins, 2007). In other words, linguistic competence as a system of social phenomena and signs is understood as the knowledge, skills and abilities of students about language, the structure and function of language, and the ability to use them in different situations (Achilovna, 2023). Linguistic competence provides students with theoretical knowledge of language levels through teaching based on a special program, which can be called experience, skills and competencies to use in written and oral speech practice (Lehmann, 2007). Linguistic or grammatical competence - is the ability to be able to apply grammatical, lexical, syntactical, and stylistic rules to oral and written utterances. Linguistic competence is important since it explains how utterances and sentences are structured - structural conceptualization of language. However, these rules are not enough to accomplish a communicative goal since
non-linguistic factors play a role in constructing social meanings (Chiesa, et.al. 2019).
According to CEFR model of communicative competence, it is divided into three fundamental competences: 1) linguistic competence, 2) sociolinguistic competence, and 3) pragmatic competence. Each one of these competencies is interpreted as knowledge of its content and the ability to use it. For example, Linguistic competence involves language users' knowledge of and their ability to use different resources of language to develop well-structured messages, whereas sociolin-guistic competence refers to knowledge and skills required for appropriate use of language in social situations. Pragmatic competence is subdivided into functional competence (e.g. production of language functions, speech acts) and discourse competence (cohesion and coherence). However, CEFR model does not include strategic competence as a component of communicative competence. Instead, strategic competence focuses not only on compensating for breakdowns in communication but also a wide variety of non-compensatory communication strategies (Alter, 2019).
Studying the concept of "linguistic competence" allows us to conclude that the idea of referring to the language as a static system with a certain set of rules for rote learning dominates. We will try to consider language as a dynamic system and focus on the development of linguistic competence from the standpoint of understanding language as a dynamic system.
Indeed, the language is a harmonious, but unstable system, fixing with absolute accuracy all the changes taking place in society. Considering language as a dynamic system, we note that in the process of developing linguistic competence, reducing it to a universal scheme is a necessary but not sufficient condition, since mastering schemes as a formal side of the language does not reflect the communicative orientation of the process of teaching a foreign language.
Results and Discussions
Many studies confirm that it is necessary that future teachers should be able to choose language means in accordance with the communicative tasks in a certain linguistic environment. Linguistic competence includes
knowledge of the language, skills of verbal communication, as well as experience in creative and practical activities, which are the basis for the successful implementation of intercultural communication of future teachers. In this regard, future language teachers should also be able to lexically correctly formulate expressive speech and understand the speech of a partner in communication. When carrying out productive types of speech activities (speaking and writing), they should be able to:
- own lexical-semantic and lexical-thematic associations;
- combine new words with previously learned ones;
- choose appropriate words and combine them with significant ones;
- choose the right word from antonymic oppositions and synonymous rows;
- make equivalent substitutions;
- predict the statement at the level of form and content;
- own the mechanism of distribution and reduction of structures;
- adapt to the individual characteristics of the speaker and have a quick reaction;
- use words correctly, taking into account the norm of the language and the situation of communication.
Receptive types of speech activities (listening, reading) require them to correlate the auditory/visual image with semantics; overcome the focus of attention on internal articulation, differentiate words similar in sound and form according to informative features; differentiate homonymous, synonymous and anton-ymous phenomena: own the mechanism of receptive combination; use word-formation and contextual guessing, instantly identify a graphic image according to the auditory-motor one and vice versa; widely use forecasting and perception guidelines to create an attitude to perform a certain activity with new or previously learned lexical material.
Thus, future teachers should have knowledge of word-formation tools to create and expand a potential vocabulary; derived words (affixation, prefixes, suffixes); word formation; conversions (the formation of nouns from verbs, in particular, the infinitive and other forms); formation of verbs from adjectives; polysemy of a word (lexico-se-mantic variants of words); stylistic; equiva-
lent; territorial; word-building means for the formation of antonyms, types of homonyms, linguistic terms, neologisms, some lexical elements of everyday colloquial speech, proverbs, sayings.
The lexical component means the ability of future teachers to combine one word with other words; use words or phrases appropriately to the situation of intercultural communication of the use of a particular word; choose the right word to adequately convey the communicative intention; the correct use of connections in the languages, expressed depending on the rethinking of the original vocabulary; the use of lexical means of communication in appropriate situations as a source of national-cultural information; adequate use of homonyms and antonyms, neologisms and phraseological units, background and non-equivalent vocabulary, as well as vocabulary with connotative meaning and national and regional color, realities (words denoting objects of national material culture) in appropriate situations of intercultural communication.
The grammatical component should ensure the use of the language as a tool of intercultural communication for building relationships with representatives of a foreign-speaking society in the context of a dialogue of cultures, empathy and tolerance. In this regard, future language teachers need to have solid knowledge about the parts of speech: about the classification of verbs (semantic, morphological, syntactic); basic forms of the verb; the system of temporary forms of the indicative; categories of collateral; mood categories; impersonal forms of the verb; about the noun: about the classification of nouns; lexico-grammatical category of gender; number categories; about the category of case; categories of certainty-uncertainty; about pronouns: their classification and grammatical categories; about adjectives: their classification, their grammatical categories, degrees of comparison of adjectives; about adverbs: their classification; about the use of adverbs in sentences as a circumstance; about numerals and their semantic classification; about modal words; about prepositions, conjunctions, particles, interjections; about the offer and members of the offer; about a complex sentence; about a complex sentence; about the degree of de-
pendence of subordinate clauses; about the text as semantic, communicative unity.
In addition to knowledge of foreign grammar, future language teachers need to have well-formed skills and abilities, as well as experience in their application in creative and practical activities. They should be able to construct their statement grammatically correctly: to express the modality adequately to the situation of intercultural communication; logically connect sentences, establish logical connections between statements; clearly and grammatically accurately formulate your statement; use modal words, particles and interjections to express the estimated value to the content of the situation of intercultural communication; correctly use various grammatical means to achieve sufficient information in the intercultural communicative situations.
The next important component of linguistic competence is reading, which is included in the sphere of communicative and social activities of people and provides a written form of verbal communication. As in any activity, two plans are distinguished in reading: content (subject content components) and procedural (elements of the activity process), and the first always plays the leading role.
The content of the activity primarily includes its goal is to understand a speech presented in writing. Although in the real act of reading the processes of perception and comprehension proceed simultaneously and are closely interconnected, the skills and abilities that ensure its process are usually divided into two groups.
All this requires from future language teachers both the work of memory and a wide variety of mental operations: comparison and generalization, analysis and synthesis, abstraction and concretization.
Within the framework of this study, we overviewed interconnected components of linguistic competence, which gives grounds to endow linguistic competence with inte-grative properties and consider this phenomenon as the ability of future language teachers to correlate language tools with goals, areas, situations, conditions of ver-
bal communication, which allows reaching a certain level of language proficiency. Thus, the concept of development of foreign language linguistic competence of future language teachers should be based on the following principles:
- Consideration of the patterns of mastering a foreign language based on the features of the formation of language ability in future language teachers;
- Interaction of theoretical knowledge with practical skills while respecting the priority of the theoretical level of knowledge;
- Understanding of linguistic competence as the ability to correlate linguistic features with the goals, conditions, areas and situations of speech communication;
- Learning the components of foreign language linguistic competence;
When developing the concept of developing linguistic competence of future language teachers, we reviewed the existing achievements of methodological science and a number of related sciences as well. These provisions have a certain theoretical significance and scientific novelty and make a significant contribution to the development of the concept of linguistic competence of future language teachers.
Conclusion
Achieving a high level of development of linguistic competence is demonstrated in the ease with which a person can use direct lexical resources in direct and indirect communication, adequate use of phraseological expressions, proverbs, words specific to the speech of native speakers. One cannot master a language without mastering the required number of words. Even, special tasks in all forms of international examinations aimed at assessing the ability to use vocabulary in different types of speech activities also indicates the recognition of the special importance of lexical material mastery. Therefore, professional speech requires more attention to the development of grammatical competence, while oral speech focuses learning more on the development of lexical competence in the target language.
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submitted 22.08.2023; accepted for publication 20.09.2023; published 8.10.2023 © Tuxtayeva N.
Contact: nilufartuxtayeva0609@gmail.com
