scholarly journals Integration of Creativity-Developing Activities in Foreign Language Learning: Students’ Attitude

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-90
Author(s):  
Liudmila Dulksnienė ◽  
Nemira Mačianskienė

SummaryThe increasing significance of science and more intensive cooperation with foreign partners have created demands for plurilingual specialists, capable of providing solid research-based solutions, able to read the most advanced professional literature in a foreign language, participate in international conferences with foreign partners, negotiate and cooperate in scientific and subject-oriented activity while freely communicating in several foreign languages. However, in the case of specialized higher education institutions, such as medical or agricultural universities, foreign language learning is often oriented to the learning of occupational terminology; whereas acquisition of plurilingual communicative competence is much more than linguistic competence, it is a multifaceted competence and its acquisition can be enhanced by integrating creativity-developing activities into the program curricula. The aim of the study was to reveal the students’ attitude towards the integration of creativity development when studying foreign languages at a higher education institution. The generalized results of the study suggest that even though students considered linguistic competence (vocabulary and grammar) to be most important in language learning, yet they valued the acquisition of socio-cultural competence as important in communicating cross-culturally. The students’ attitude to the application of the elements of art in foreign language classes was positive, as these elements increased their interest and motivation in learning; integration of drawing and creation activities facilitated communication; the assignments became motivating and useful when communicating on intercultural topics. The students also positively evaluated the teacher’s work, the teacher’s assistance and positive approach to the evaluation of application of the elements of art by the students, which was the key element in the success of such classes. The importance of stress-free environment was singled out as a prerequisite for creativity expression and communication in a foreign language class.

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (8) ◽  
pp. 250-255
Author(s):  
Maria-Gabriela Drăghici

Family is the social institution where a child is born, develops cognitively, socially and empathically, and which contributes to the child finding his/her place in the society of the future. Family helps a child form, learn, understand and develop basic aspects of his/her conduct out in the world until the he/she is introduced to the first education institution in his/her life, namely kindergarten. A pupil’s success and efficiency take shape only if the relationship between school and family is very solid. If parents are involved in school and after-school activities, then they can even support foreign-language learning by donating teaching materials, textbooks, storybooks, games in foreign languages, puppets, etc. to the school library. They can work together with foreign-language teachers to organise field trips, camps, programmes, workshops, exchange courses abroad. Parents’ involvement in school activities is a necessity for both the present and the future. Our article presents a survey of 290 pupils and 51 parents regarding the latter’s views on studying foreign languages, which is promoted as part of current public and private educational offers.


2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (194) ◽  
pp. 126-129
Author(s):  
Tetiana Kapitan ◽  

Nowadays foreign language is not just a part of nation's culture, it is also the guarantee of student’s successful career in the future. The achievement of high level proficiency of foreign language is not possible without fundamental language training in higher education institution. Most of them in our country provide students with at least two or even three foreign languages. In the context of higher school reforming, important changes in the educational technologies of foreign language teaching are envisaged. Modern language education is also gradually being modernized, introducing a modular rating system for teaching foreign languages. Interdisciplinary integration, democratization and economization of education determine the manifestation of innovative components in the teaching of the foreign languages. All this requires the formulation of the new claims for teaching and a foreign language teacher in the Free Economic Zone. At the current stage of society development, the purpose of foreign language teaching in higher education institutions is students' mastering of communicative competencies that will allow them to implement their knowledge, skills and abilities to solve specific communicative tasks in real life situations. The introduction of the new effective methods of foreign language teaching in the process of preparing students of humanities and technical specialties has become not only desirable but also necessary. Innovative orientation requires teachers to master and apply the pedagogical innovations, as well as stimulate the search for new forms and methods of educational process organization. High-quality language training of students is impossible without the use of modern educational technologies. The most effective are the professionally-oriented foreign language learning, the project work in teaching, the application of information and telecommunication technologies, the work with educational computer programs in foreign languages (multimedia system), the distance technologies in foreign language learning, the use of Internet resources, the foreign language teaching in the computer environment (forums, blogs, e-mail, etc.). Nowadays, the methodology of the use of computer programs is being developed actively getting more used. Computer programs offer ample opportunities to improve the process of foreign language learning, increasing its efficiency. The computer program provides the perception of information through auditory and visual channels, so it also allows you to organize teaching and control the foreign language acquisition in different modes of independent search and at different levels of complexity. Foreign language teaching means are important to ensure the full and effective organization of students' learning in the classroom to master foreign language activities.


Author(s):  
Olena Ivashko

The article tackles the problem of teaching foreign languages to seniors. The general trends in FL education for the third-age learners are outlined. The institutions in which seniors can study foreign languages in Poland are enumerated. The psychological, physiological, methodological and social peculiarities of teaching a foreign language to the third agers are analyzed. Special emphasis is laid upon educational needs of the Third Age learners. Some language learning strategies which help seniors’ foreign language learning are suggested.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 781
Author(s):  
Maria-Anca Maican ◽  
Elena Cocoradă

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the online learning of foreign languages at higher education level has represented a way to adapt to the restrictions imposed worldwide. The aim of the present article is to analyse university students’ behaviours, emotions and perceptions associated to online foreign language learning during the pandemic and their correlates by using a mixed approach. The research used the Foreign Language Enjoyment (FLE) scale and tools developed by the authors, focusing on task value, self-perceived foreign language proficiency, stressors and responses in online foreign language learning during the pandemic. Some of the results, such as the negative association between anxiety and FLE, are consistent with those revealed in studies conducted in normal times. Other results are novel, such as the protective role of retrospective enjoyment in trying times or the higher level of enjoyment with lower-achieving students. Reference is made to students’ preferences for certain online resources during the pandemic (e.g., preference for PowerPoint presentations) and to their opinions regarding the use of entirely or partially online foreign language teaching in the post-COVID period. The quantitative results are fostered by the respondents’ voices in the qualitative research. The consequences of these results are discussed with respect to the teacher-student relationship in the online environment and to the implications for sustainable online foreign language learning.


1979 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-97 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. S. Rodgers

My intent in this short piece is to provide a context for consideration of learner variables in foreign language learning. I first propose a question set outlining the major issues, as I see them, arising in the design of learner-based foreign language learning systems. I then present a simplified three-part design model comprising knowledge considerations (language needs assessment), instructional considerations (learning access alternatives) and learner considerations (characteristics of learners). A review of some recent work in the first two of these prefaces the discussion of the third, learner considerations. A brief state of the art report on research in learner variables is followed by some speculation on next directions in the determination and description of learner variables within a general design model for learning foreign languages.


Author(s):  
N. Zaichenko

The article deals with modern views on the concept of “nationally oriented foreign language teaching”, presented in the linguo-didactic discourse of domestic and foreign scholars of the last decades. The author reveals and characterizes its evolution as one of the basic concepts of Russian and Ukrainian language education as foreign languages. It is found that they relate to the subject matter, content, and operational components of this phenomenon. There are significant changes in the views of scholars on taking into account students’ native language in teaching these languages by speakers of languages with different systems. There is a growing interest in didactic and linguistic data processing of the analysis of Chinese and Russian (Ukrainian) languages and their practical implementation. In terms of content, priority is given to culturally oriented and ethno-psychological aspects of mastering foreign language in a monocultural and multicultural educational environment. The innovative approach to this issue is also manifested in the increasing attention of researchers to the peculiarities of cognitive, mental and educational activities of Chinese-speaking students, formed by the national linguistic and methodological tradition, which is radically different from the national communicative and active lingvodidactic paradigm and needs appropriate methodological correction. Prospects for further study of the issues raised in our investigation are related to the research of a number of “new” terms in the terminological field of the basic concept of “nationally oriented foreign language learning”, as well as from the normative and codification side.


2021 ◽  
pp. 73-78
Author(s):  
Валерия Алексеевна Петрова

Рассматривается процесс изменения вектора государственной политики в сфере изучения иностранного языка в 30-е годы ХХ века. Показано, что после революции 1917 г. изучение иностранного языка было прекращено, потому что расценивалось как пережиток прошлого, антагонистического общества с ярко выраженным и непримиримым классовым неравенством. Однако в 1923 г. Н. К. Крупская в статье «О преподавании иностранных языков» доказательно опровергла необходимость изучения эсперанто и четко обосновала свою позицию по поводу изучения иностранных языков, описала практическую значимость, обозначила основную цель и показала приоритетный метод их преподавания, заложив тем самым основы изучения иностранных языков в нашей стране на многие десятилетия. Рассматривается ряд постановлений Центрального комитета Коммунистической партии Советского Союза от 1929 и 1932 гг., направленных на усиление изучения иностранного языка в городских школах второй ступени, техникумах и вузах, фабрично-заводских семилетках. Приводятся размышления общественных и политических деятелей, педагогов, публицистов, филологов о культурологическом потенциале иностранных языков. Показана цель их изучения в 30-е годы ХХ века. The article deals with the process of changing the vector of state policy in the field of foreign language learning in the 30s of the XX century After the October Revolution, they stopped the study of a foreign language because they regarded it as a relic of the past, an antagonistic society with a pronounced and irreconcilable class inequality. However, in 1923, Nadezhda Konstantinovna Krupskaya denied the need to study Esperanto on a national scale in her article “Teaching Foreign Languages” and described the practical significance, main goal and priority method of teaching a foreign language and more than that her own position about the role of foreign languages, thereby laying the foundation for its study for many decades. The 1927 became a further important step in the history of teaching a foreign language in the country of the Soviets. The People’s Commissariat for Education of the RSFSR adopted a special decree on the study of a foreign language in all city schools of the second level, starting a large campaign “Foreign languages to the masses”. It considers a number of resolutions of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1929 and 1932, aimed at strengthening the study of a foreign language in all city schools, technical schools and universities, and Factory Seven-Years. The article gives the reflections of public and political figures, teachers, publicists, philologists on the cultural potential of foreign languages. It shows the purpose of foreign language study in the 30s of the XX century.


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