Научная статья на тему 'The general cultural competence formation in the process of the foreign language learning by students-managers'

The general cultural competence formation in the process of the foreign language learning by students-managers Текст научной статьи по специальности «Языкознание и литературоведение»

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Аннотация научной статьи по языкознанию и литературоведению, автор научной работы — Shmeleva Zhanna N.

The article discusses the ways of the general cultural competence formation in the process of learning English by students of non-linguistic agrarian university in the framework of the introduction of new educational standards of higher education. The author believes that the general cultural competence acts as a component of the content and object of training, as well as performs a communicative function and the function of influencing the behavior, actions, thoughts, feelings and consciousness of foreign language interlocutors. Requirements to the selection of materials for the general cultural competence formation are given.

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Текст научной работы на тему «The general cultural competence formation in the process of the foreign language learning by students-managers»

на усмотрение преподавателя. Но нам кажется, что icebreakers, warmers, fillers, coolers неотъемлемые составляющие образовательного процесса. Необязательно использовать их каждое занятие и необязательно использовать их все сразу, потому что существует риск того, что ученики просто перестанут серьезно воспринимать занятия, но дозированное их применение будет способствовать созданию комфортной рабочей атмосферы на занятиях и развитию коммуникативных навыков обучающихся.

Список литературы:

1.WorksheetLibrary:10GreatClassroomIcebreakers.URL:http://www.worksheetlibrary.co m/teachingtips/icebreakers.html (дата обращения 12.09.18).

2. BusyTeacher. Top 10 Time Fillers For Your Classroom by Susan Verner. URL: https://busyteacher.org/7081-top-10-time-fillers-for-your-classroom.html (дата обращения 12.09.18).

3. Teflwise. LESSON COOLERS. URL: http://teflwise.com/?page_id=4672 (дата обращения 12.09.18).

UDC 378.1

THE GENERAL CULTURAL COMPETENCE FORMATION IN THE PROCESS OF THE FOREIGN LANGUAGE LEARNING BY STUDENTS-MANAGERS

Zhanna N. Shmeleva

PhD, Associate Professor of the foreign language department Krasnoyarsk State Agrarian University Krasnoyarsk, Russia

Abstract: The article discusses the ways of the general cultural competence formation in the process of learning English by students of non-linguistic agrarian university in the framework of the introduction of new educational standards of higher education. The author believes that the general cultural competence acts as a component of the content and object of training, as well as performs a communicative function and the function of influencing the behavior, actions, thoughts, feelings and consciousness of foreign language interlocutors. Requirements to the selection of materials for the general cultural competence formation are given.

Key words: communication, competence formation, English language, standards, country studies, dialogue of cultures.

Living in the XXI century, hardly anybody doubts that there is the need to possess the skills and abilities of oral and written foreign language communication for personal and professional purposes. This is thanks to the fact that an important role in our time is played by the globalization of relations in the modern world, the expansion of political, economic and personal interethnic contacts, the intensification of the dialogue of cultures between countries. The foreign language knowledge acting as a factor that increases the value of a specialist in the labor market, is today in

most cases one of the mandatory conditions of employment and increase in the amount of his salary. At the same time, in accordance with the decision of the Bologna Declaration, the priority task is the requirement to provide different levels of training in a foreign language, which includes the formation of students' intercultural communicative competence, optimizing the effectiveness of contacts in a particular area and situation of communication and the achievement of certain communication goals.

In the early 1990s, the European continent experienced a language situation in which English had become the dominant language. This was facilitated not only by the stable economic development of the UK, operating in the markets of Europe, Asia, Australia and New Zealand, but also by the successful promotion of the United States of America to European markets in connection with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the opening of borders for American producers in the post-Soviet space. The need to develop competencies in the field of foreign languages, in particular English, is not new and unexpected.

In the 60s of the last century, the Council of Europe took a number of measures aimed at developing a programme to intensify the teaching of foreign languages on the European continent. The activities were aimed at creating a system of teaching foreign languages not only to students of higher educational institutions, but also adult learners facing problems of communication in a foreign language in the course of their activities in foreign markets of goods and services. As a result, there was a concept that gave special attention to the formation and development of the ability to communicate in a foreign language in the context of student-centered learning. In the same years, a number of projects were carried out, the purpose of which was the formation of a system of communicative training. In the integrated communicative approach created on the basis of deep theoretical and practical developments, the communicative orientation of training is given special attention. One of the leading experts in the field of communicative methods of teaching foreign language communication was E. I. Passov, who in 1989 published his book "Fundamentals of communicative methods of teaching foreign language communication" [2], which became one of the fundamental for those professionals who have been engaged in the formation of communicative competence. Language competence, which is included in the concept of communicative competence and is the possession of a system of information about the target language by its levels (phonetics, vocabulary, composition of words and word formation, morphology, syntax of simple and complex sentences, the basics of text style), is especially important today, because in the world of growing global integration and the development of international relations the ability to establish contacts without intermediaries leads to the strengthening of the position of companies and the growth of their profits. This leads to the conclusion that, while training specialists in the field of management, marketing and economics, universities should pay special attention to training in foreign languages and the formation of students' language competence for subsequent active participation in international and foreign economic activities.

The transition of higher education institutions to a two-level system of education has identified the need for the formation of competencies of students, including language. Graduate in the field of training 38.03.02 "Management" with the qualification (degree) of Bachelor must have, in accordance with the standard, both general cultural competence (CA) and professional competence (PC) [1, p. 182-185].

General cultural competence is of interest for us and includes the following:

- knowledge of world culture and willingness to rely on them in their personal and cultural development;

- knowledge and understanding of the laws of nature, society and thinking and the ability to operate with this knowledge in professional activities;

- the ability to take an active civil position;

- ability to analyze and evaluate historical events and processes, etc.

The formation of general cultural communicative competence is based on a certain content of teaching a foreign language in any type of educational institution. Krasnoyarsk state agrarian university has been giving special attention to the foreign language teaching since 1995. This program was implemented in the institute of International management and education which allowed the Institute to receive the accreditation of the European Council for Business Education in 2017 for the direction 38.03.02 "Management" for the period till 2022.

Scientists have found that the main components of the foreign language teaching content are areas, topics, communication situations, philological and country knowledge, language skills, speech, training and compensatory skills, etc. Country-specific knowledge is an important part of the content of training - the possession of this knowledge is considered as a prerequisite for the full communication of specialists for whom a foreign language acts as another (along with the native language) instrument of oral and written communication. This knowledge is considered by modern science as a component of cultural studies and, accordingly, general cultural competence.

General cultural competence, acting as a component of the content and object of training, performs not only a communicative function, but also the function of influencing the behavior/actions, thoughts, feelings and consciousness of foreign language interlocutors. At the same time, the formation of general cultural competence reflects the current trend towards humanization of education, contributing to the achievement of the relevant goals-attaches to a different culture, increases the overall level of education in the learning of a foreign language in the process of mastering new cultural knowledge, expands its horizons, provides effective management of both its communicative activities and personal behavior of students.

Thus, the acquisition of the general cultural competence is extremely important, optimizing the achievement of the main goals of the foreign language teaching. In accordance with the definitions of modern scientists, general cultural competence is the knowledge of students of "elements of national culture, national and cultural specificity of speech behavior of speakers of a particular language and the ability to use those elements of the socio-cultural context that are relevant to the generation and perception of speech from the point of view of native speakers: customs, rules, norms, country knowledge, social conventions and stereotypes", that is a stable system of social attitudes.

General cultural competence is a complex whole. One of the components of this whole is non-equivalent vocabulary, toponymy, proper names, etc. These components are reflected in such sources of information as genre-stylistic varieties of authentic texts that contain cultural information about the country of the language studied, its cultural characteristics and traditions, paralinguistic and iconographic sources of information (auditive, visual, audiovisual, etc.), accompanied by the necessary verbal explications that help to better navigate the content of the concept of "foreign language culture". At the same time, visual sources of information can serve as a support in the formation of skills and abilities of dialogical and monological speech (in particular, those that reflect the life and customs of native speakers). The same role is played by video, and audio materials in the form of cultural orientation texts, as well as video and movies, etc. The use of these materials and the assimilation of the cultural knowledge contained in them is a prerequisite for foreign language learners to achieve the appropriate level of general cultural competence necessary for intercultural communication. These materials, being reasonably selected and organized, are the most effective means of reflection, understanding and development of the specifics of the studied culture and features of speech behavior of its representatives in the course of certain intercultural contacts. The use of authentic materials opens wide opportunities for students to get acquainted with the phenomena of the real foreign cultural world, the implementation, categorization of various components of a different culture, functioning in specific communicative acts, and the acquisition of appropriate skills of exchange (transmission and reception) of information important for communicants.

Of particular importance is the fact that the didactic materials used for the formation of general cultural competence, contain, as a rule, certain, adequate to the competence of the concept, stereotypes of objects and acts of culture, standard scenarios that can form the basis of the unfolding further actions in the conditions of intercultural foreign language communication. It is necessary to emphasize the special importance of the maximum equipment of the educational process with authentic materials and visual aids, the absence of which can provoke serious difficulties in achieving the objectives of the training program. The selection of these materials, as well as the process of their organization, should be guided by general didactic and proper methodological principles of teaching a foreign language, as well as those requirements that are widely covered in the pages of the methodical press on the various didactic materials used in the process of learning a foreign language. In addition, it is necessary to provide the availability of certain phenomena of foreign language culture for students in the selection of these materials.

Scientists have developed requirements for the selection of materials for the formation of socio-cultural competence. These requirements are as follows:

• authenticity of the materials used;

• information saturation;

• novelty of the information to the recipient;

• modernity and contemporary historicism;

• taking into account the interests of students (including professional), and also hobbies, preferences;

• correspondence of speech utterances to the literary norm of the studied foreign language;

• country and linguistic-cultural significance of the materials;

• selection and use of teaching materials in accordance with the level of foreign language proficiency of students (taking into account the principle of accessibility and affordability);

• organization of selected materials in accordance with the principles of thematic unity and increasing complexity.

A particularly important requirement for the selection of educational materials for the foreign language training is the information richness of these materials noted by many scientists. With regard to the problem of the general cultural competence formation under the information saturation is understood to be a fairly complete reflection in the educational materials of socio-cultural background knowledge. Therefore, it seems appropriate to interpret this characteristic as the country and linguistic-cultural significance of these materials. The degree of the cultural unloading of materials, as well as the decision on the preference for explicit information implicit in each case, should be determined in accordance with the level of communicative competence of students. At the same time, mastering a wide and diverse range of cultural knowledge is possible only through the use of various types of materials listed above, which give a multidimensional representation of culture, customs, traditions, customs and material values of the country of the language studied. The important features of the training materials used in the developed methodology include their relevance. The materials contribute to the socio-cultural development of students, involve them in the dialogue of cultures, i.e. they develop readiness to comprehend the socio-cultural portrait of the countries of the studied language, ethnic, racial and social tolerance, speech tact and common cultural courtesy, a tendency to search for non-violent ways of conflict resolution.

In conclusion it should be mentioned that the formation of general cultural competence of foreign language learners, assumes as mandatory components of such a method of training, as familiarization of students with certain knowledge or information and the implementation of a series of exercises aimed at mastering this information, as well as speech skills and abilities,

adequate to the goals of intercultural communication. It should be clarified that the formation of general cultural competence is carried out in the course of the natural learning process without violating the curriculum, approved as an official document. In many ways, the formation of socio-cultural competence organically merges with the formation of communication skills in the foreign language studied and generally implements, as mentioned above, the same practical, educational, developmental and strategic goals, the achievement of which is aimed at teaching a foreign language to a particular contingent of students. Moreover, the teachers of IIME proved that the formation of this competence in the process of the foreign language learning helps the students adapt and socialize in the changing world.

Список литературы:

1. Капсаргина С.А. The problem of development professional communicative competency of students of non-linguistic specialities. The strategies of modern science development: proceedings of the VIII international scientific-practical conference. North Charleston, SC, USA, 2015 Изд-во: CreateSpace С. 182-185.

2. Пассов Е.И. Основы коммуникативной методики обучения иноязычному общению. - М.: Рус. яз., 1989. - 276 с.

3. Шмелева Ж.Н., С.А. Капсаргина Адаптация и социализация студентов аграрного вуза посредством изучения иностранного языка в институте международного менеджмента и образования. Современные исследования социальных проблем (электронный научный журнал). Изд-во: ООО "Научно-инновационный центр", Красноярск, 2016 - №10(66) C.156-168.

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