The problems of specialists’ training

 

Evgeniya Klimkovich

Siberian State Automobile and Highway Academy, Russia

Subject-related communicative language competence of future IT specialists

 

Facing the challenges of international cooperation, academic and professional mobility, university distance learning, etc. the system of higher education in Russia has been undergoing considerable changes. In agreement with quickly changing political, economic and social conditions competence-based training has been adopted in the overwhelming majority of higher educational institutions.

Competences are generally viewed as “the sum of knowledge, skills and characteristics that allow a person to perform actions” (Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Learning, Teaching, Assessment, 1996: 9), as “an internal dynamic resource featuring active knowledge with skills for efficient problem solving, and experience of effective performance through development, sensitivity to innovation and personality growth in life-long learning” (Millrood, 2003: 19-20).

Promoting modification of higher education in Russia is primarily associated with language learning/teaching. In response to the growing demands for improving Russian university students’ professional competencies and work opportunities the language policy of higher educational institutions (the goals, contents and results of teaching foreign languages) has been updated. In compliance with the new National Curriculum foreign language training should be aimed at developing learners’ communicative language competence using the material of a definite subject area (Federal state educational standard, 2010).

In the framework of this article we will reveal the nature of subject-related communicative language competence of future IT specialists and talk about its structure and contents, highlight the significance of  using Internet resources for IT students’ language training.

Competence-based approach to language teaching is to a large extent related to developing students’ communicative competence. According to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages communicative language competences are those which “empower a person to act using specifically linguistic means” (Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Learning, Teaching, Assessment, 1996: 9).

W. Littlewood summarizes four broad domains of skills that make up a person’s communicative competence. In his view, to express the intended message a person should be able to use the linguistic system spontaneously and flexibly; to distinguish between the forms and the communicative functions they perform; to develop skills and strategies for using language to communicate meanings; to be aware of the social meaning of the language forms and to vary his or her speech to suit different social circumstances (Littlewood, 1981: 6).

Teaching English in technical universities is referred to the area of ESP that entails the following core characteristics (Harding, 2007: 6):

·                    meeting the learner’s specific needs;

·                    making use of the methodology and activities of the discipline it serves;

·                    focusing on the language skills, discourse and genres appropriate of these activities.

According to A. Maley, English “is perceived as the language of career opportunity, so the pressure grows for teaching to be more directly employment related” (Harding, 2007: 3). A few researchers argue that technical university students acquire the ability to exploit their scientific and subject-related knowledge and implement their professional interaction skills of communication in the process of developing their subject-related communicative language competence. A. Petrova considers subject-related communicative language competence one of graduates’ professional competences and defines it as their willingness and ability to master the scientific knowledge in a particular subject area to use it in professional communication in a foreign language (Petrova, 1999: 61).

Subject-related communicative language competence is of paramount importance to future IT specialists’ foreign language training since the graduates’ professional activity categories, the implied professional tasks as well as common cultural and professional competences necessary for  their  accomplishment are associated with communication in foreign languages (Federal state educational standard, 2010). To achieve a more complete communicative perspective under the conditions of a technical university and provide future IT specialists’ language training suited to the requirements of the new National Curriculum is impossible without developing students’ subject-related communicative language competence as an integral part of their professional competences.

For the purpose of revealing the nature of subject-related communicative language competence of future IT specialists and distinguishing it from other professional competences we would like to examine its structure. In the writer’s opinion, subject-related communicative language competence of future IT specialists has a complex structure that consists of three units: the special unit, the social behavioral and the communicative unit.

The special unit is associated with the professional constituent and reflects the level of special knowledge, abilities and experience acquired by the learners.  It comprises the following components:

- cognitive component that implies acquiring the system of professional knowledge and the ability to gain knowledge independently;

- intellectual component that presupposes flexible, independent, critical thinking, the ability for analysis and synthesis as well as for creative work and research;

- motivational component which is the sum-total of intrinsic and extrinsic motives to reach the level of  learners’ performance  related to their professional needs;

- operational pragmatist component that means the ability to use the acquired knowledge to solve particular problems, to make the choice of appropriate means for performing specific activities and successfully apply them.

The social behavioral unit involves students’ sociocultural awareness, i.e. their sensitivity to social conventions and stereotypes of behaviour. It includes the following components:

- behavioral component that suggests generating tactics, strategies and actions following the models of behaviour;

- social component that implies future IT specialists’ willingness to take responsibility in order to accomplish  professional tasks as well as to take risks in professional communication in a foreign language.

The communicative unit involves linguistic, sociocultural and intersocial competences that promote effective intercultural, interpersonal language contact. It embraces the following components:

- linguistic component that includes the level of language proficiency, the quality of language and speech skills, awareness of a variety of linguistic means and their efficient usage;

- information communicative component that implies the abilities to satisfy information needs in the professional sphere and to transmit the processed information in the communication process;

- interactive component that requires the ability to express communicative intention depending on the communicative situation and the participants’ personal characteristics, their willingness to engage with other people in social interaction in a subject-related foreign language.

Specifying the structure of subject-related communicative language competence of future IT specialists allows us to identify its contents. The contents of subject-related communicative language competence of future IT specialists comprise specific linguistic knowledge, speech skills, know-how and personal qualities that provide the graduates’ willingness for professional communication in a foreign language.

In the writer’s view, the contents of subject-related communicative language competence of future IT specialists include the following constituents:

- knowledge of lexical items of the studied language and the terminology of certain subject areas, the rules of originating grammatical forms and meaningful phrases; the peculiarities of colloquial, official business, scientific styles; the specific character of native speakers’ language activities;

- skills to familiarize with a social situation and handle it; to come into communicative contact with other people; to comprehend listening texts presented by native speakers or recorded at a natural pace; to construct complete, coherent and logical statements of various functional styles in oral and written speech; to correlate linguistic means with specific communication conditions and communicative tasks,  communication participants’ social roles; to engage in conversation on general scientific and professional issues, correctly express and argue the assumptions and statements of the subject area in a foreign language; to annotate and summarize general technical texts as well as specialized literature;

- know-how of pronunciation and intonation; spelling and punctuation; skimming, intensive reading, scanning of both original and adapted general technical and specialized literature; subject-related translation of texts referred to various types of main professional activities; public speaking in a foreign language;

- strategies of designing and interpreting various text types; the ways and means of  compensating  the insufficient knowledge of language (compensatory strategies);

- tactics of language activities according to conversation models; ways of expressing semantic, communicative, structural cohesion between the parts of the utterance.

The contents of subject-related communicative language competence of future IT specialists are specified depending on the level of its development, the orientation of professional training and updated with the introduction of new training aspects.

Developing subject-related communicative language competence of future IT specialists is substantially stimulated and enhanced by the use of Internet resources. Employing Internet resources in teaching subject-related foreign language promotes students’ educational activities increasing the level of their overall training, forms efficient ways of learning and encourages them to complete educational and professional tasks through problem-solving that stimulates learners’ independence and initiative. Besides, high quality visualization typical of Internet resources makes subject-related foreign language training more vivid and intelligible, emotionally and psychologically comfortable thus improving the effectiveness of instruction.

One more measurable reserve of using Internet resources for developing subject-related communicative language competence of future IT specialists is that they make it possible to combine instruction and learning methods and techniques for different learners’ groups, vary the pace and the amount of tasks as well as the level of independence for each learner allowing for his or her individuality (Schwienhorst, 2010: 6). Moreover, using Internet resources gives excellent opportunities to engage active and interactive learning methods and teaching techniques, corporate modes of study and cooperative learning (Dudeney, Hockly, 2007: 44-60) that reduce the sense of failure, create positive emotional background, stimulate the acquisition of subject-related language contents.

Taken together, the above-mentioned factors contribute to the creation of special language information communication environment while teaching students subject-related foreign language and facilitate the process of developing subject-related communicative language competence of future IT specialists.

Needless to say that due to the special features of future IT specialists’ occupation the use of Internet resources when developing subject-related communicative language competence is especially valuable for these students as the objects of their professional activity include information and networks, computers, software and programming, databases, information safety. So, their abilities and skills in the IT sphere are well developed, Internet services and resources are well-known to them and do not provoke any feeling of confusion or discomfort. Thus, employing Internet resources as the basis for developing subject-related communicative language competence of future IT specialists is reasonable and even essential.

The view of the integrative nature of the competence being formed and the learners of a foreign language as members of society who have to accomplish particular tasks in a specific multicultural professional environment makes it possible to define the process of developing subject-related communicative language competence of future IT specialists, to identify and describe its main constituents specifying their role in attaining the educational goal.

 

References:

1. Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Learning, Teaching, Assessment.  (1996). URL: http://www.coe.int/t/dg/4/linguistic/Cadre_1_en.asp.

2. Millrood, R., (2003), “Competence-based approach to ELT”, [in:] ELT reform in Russia: regional aspects. Proceedings of the 3rd Regional  KELTA Conference, Krasnoyarsk: Krasnoyarsk English Language Teachers’ Association, pp. 19-24.

3. Federal state educational standard, (2010), URL: http://mon.gov.ru/pro/fgos/vpo

4. Littlewood, William T., (1981), Communicative Language Teaching, Cambridge University Press, 124 p.

5. Harding, K., (2007), English for Specific Purposes, Oxford University Press, 179 p.

6. Petrova, A. P., (1999), Pedagogical fundamentals of developing professional communicative language competence in a technical college: candidate’s dissertation: 13.00.01, Yakutsk, 1999, 179 p.

7. Schwienhorst, K., (2010), “JEP 27127 – 2006: Updating the Language Policy of Russian Technical Universities”, [in:] Vestnik SibADI, Special issue 1 (15), Omsk:  Siberian State Automobile and Highway Academy, pp.5-6.

8. Dudeney, G., Hockly, N., (2007), How to Teach English with technology, Pearson Education Limited, 192 p.