Author: Issina Nazerke Temirkabylovna
Co-author: Assanova Dariya Nurtasovna
Karagandy State University named after E.A.Buketov,
Kazakhstan.
PROFESSIONAL
COMPETENCIES OF EFL and ESP TEACHER
Abstract
Reviews
of the work of several researchers dedicated to the professional competence of
an English teacher are presented
in the article. Also, aspects, components and indicators
of pedagogical and professional competence are classified. The problems
encountered by teachers during the teaching English for special purposes were
discussed, and on the basis of these problems, the objectives of their
methodological competence
were set forth.
Key words: professional competence, teacher of English
as foreign language, teacher of English for specific purposes, professional
development.
I. Введение. It is hopeless to increase the efficiency of training
and education of students and upgrade the education system of the country without
a high professional skills and great responsibility of teachers. Forming of
professional-methodical skills of the foreign language teacher is achieved
through mastering the basics of the methodology of teaching in the university
and constant self-improvement.
At the current
stage of the progress of the methodology of teaching foreign languages in
connection with the analysis of professional pedagogical activity, the
competence approach is becoming very important. This is due to the change in
the priority approach of the educational process - from the
receptive-reproductive method of instruction to the person-oriented,
developing, cognitive-activity orientation. "The competence approach is a
set of general principles for determining the goals of education, selecting the
content of education, organizing the educational process and evaluating
educational outcomes" [1]. The main goal of the competence approach is not
to transfer as much knowledge as possible, but to evolve the ability to use the
obtained knowledge and skills, also to get them independently. At present, the competent person is rather not
an expert with encyclopedic knowledge, but a specialist who is able to adapt
his knowledge to the realities of life and who is able not only to stand in
conflict conditions, but also to resolve problems.
The term "professional competence" began to
be actively used in the 90s of the last century, and the concept itself becomes the issue of a specific, comprehensive
study of many researchers dealing with the problems of pedagogical activity (N.V.
Kuzmina, A. Markov, T.I. Rudnev , G. N. Steinov, and others). Under the
professional competence of a teacher is known the set of professional and
personal qualities crucial for fruitful pedagogical activity.
Professionally competent can be called a teacher who at
an adequately high level accomplishes pedagogical activity and communication,
achieves consistently high results in teaching and educating students.
IІ. Постановка задачи. The advancement
of professional competence is the development of creative personality, the making
of receptivity to pedagogical innovations, and the ability to adapt in a
changing pedagogical environment. Formation of professional and pedagogical
competence is the ultimate goal of teaching students of pedagogical
universities. The basis of the criteria for the effectiveness of the
educational process in the university is the level of the formation of the
professional competencies of the future teacher [2].
V.A. Slastenin believes that the concept of professional competence of the
teacher expresses the unity of his theoretical and practical readiness for the
implementation of pedagogical activity and characterizes his professionalism.
He notes that the content of training a teacher of a particular profession is
presented in the qualification characteristic that is the normative model of
the teacher's competence that reflects the scientifically substantiated
composition of professional knowledge and skills [3].
The study of professional competence involved many
researchers: Yu.K. Babansky,
B.G. Ananiev, T.I. Shamova and others. In the works of these researchers, such
aspects of pedagogical competence are disclosed:
• managerial aspect: how the teacher analyzes, plans,
organizes, controls, regulates the learning process of the relationship with
the students;
• the psychological aspect: how the personality of the
teacher affects students, how the teacher takes into account the individual
abilities of the students;
• the pedagogical aspect: with the help of what forms
and methods the teacher conducts the instruction of schoolchildren. [4]
The main indicators of the professional competence of
a foreign language teacher include the need to develop communicative and
interpersonal communication among students, the components of which are
linguistic, thematic, sociocultural, educational and cognitive competence. In “Proposals
for the certification of teachers of a foreign language”, compiled by E.N.
Solovova with the participation of V.V. Safonova, K.S. Makhmuryan, it is proposed
to assess the professional competence of a foreign language teacher on the
basis of the following basic parameters:
• communicative competence
• professional competence
• general cultural competence [5].
Communicative competence includes language, speech and
sociocultural competence. Professional competence consists of skills: in
planning, organizational skills, skills in providing control and evaluation,
analytical, research and professional-communicative skills; Competencies:
psychological, pedagogical and philological; as well as personal
characteristics. It should be noted that the general cultural competence is
represented in various indicators of communicative and professional
competencies.
Methodists I.L. Kolesnikova and M.V. Tomashevich
presented the competencies included in the structure of professional and
pedagogical competence in the form of interacting components: general
pedagogical competence (includes psychological, pedagogical and methodological)
- general cultural - communicative competence.
Under the general cultural competence is understood,
as a rule, broad general humanitarian training of the teacher, his outlook, the
general level of culture and education. The communicative competence is
understood as the ability and willingness to carry out interpersonal and
intercultural communication with foreign native speakers. "Communicative
competence is not a personal characteristic of a person; its formation is
manifested in the process of communication "[6,
p. 79]. The degree of communicative competence is determined by the level of
knowledge and skills in the main types of speech activity.
Psychological and pedagogical competence is related to
the knowledge of the teacher in the field of psychology and pedagogy, as well
as the ability to apply this knowledge in his pedagogical practice.
Methodical competence is defined as the ability to
teach a foreign language with regard to the goals (practical, educational,
developmental) and conditions, as well as taking into account the age, level of
training and individual characteristics of students. The authors interpret the
methodological competence as an ability, proceeding from the following
definition: "abilities represent a high level of development of general
and special knowledge, skills that ensure the successful fulfillment of various
activities by a person" [6, p. 81].
Having become acquainted with the numerous
interpretations of the concept of "professional-pedagogical competence", we can conclude that "professional
competence is the ability and readiness for activity based on knowledge,
including moral, ethical, cognitive-creative, information-communicative and
technological components" [7] .
Thus, the concept of "professional
competence" at the present stage of the education system development is
multifaceted and constantly supplemented by new components. The teacher is now
mastering a new practice-transforming competence, the volume and quality of the
research component in pedagogical work is increasing, which is associated with
a change in the content and approaches to pedagogical activity [8,
p. 74].
III.
Результаты. The era of globalization has led to significant changes
in the structure of the training of future specialists. The development of high
technologies, close scientific and technical ties require new approaches to the
formation of a complex of competencies, including, in
particular, communicative and sociocultural ones
in the framework of native and at least one or two foreign languages. In this
regard, the need for fluency in a professional foreign language is growing
every day.
Currently,
the teaching of a foreign language for special purposes is being built with the
aim of forming a professional communicative competence in another language. The
main distinguishing feature of ESP (English for specific purposes) teaching at the university
is that the course is based on concrete professionally
relevant goals and objectives for students. This is expressed in appropriate
selection and organization of the material, as well as development certain
skills and abilities necessary for the future professional
activity.
There
are a number of problems in implementing the concept of teaching a foreign
language for special purposes. To begin with, in the process of teaching, the
teacher is faced with the fact that the requirements for a teacher in the field
of language proficiency and teaching methods are complemented by competencies
in the future professional activities of students. This problem is two-sided:
the vast majority of students, for obvious reasons, do not yet have the
professional knowledge obtained in their native language in the classes on
major subjects, and, naturally, do not speak the corresponding vocabulary in
English, respectively, expect from the lessons not so much acquisition of
language knowledge (however, many of them overestimate their level of language
proficiency), but rather the receipt of professionally relevant information. It
is no coincidence that the most promising now is the interdisciplinary
construction of a foreign language course, in the teaching materials of which
various subjects of the specialty are reflected. The idea, of course, is
correct. The concept of ESP (English for special purposes) is familiar to all
teachers,
but
the question arises as to who should and can correctly select the relevant
professional topics and relevant texts. Naturally, teachers-philologists are
engaged in this, in ideal cases, with the involvement of specialists from
profiling chairs. Faced with these problems, teachers are forced to study
special literature and teaching materials in native and English. So what
competencies should an ESP
teacher have?
The
specifics of ESP training require the teacher to have methodological
competence with the aim:
- development
of the training course depending on the goal;
-
use of the basic knowledge of the learner in a foreign language as the
basis for the acquisition of professionally significant knowledge and skills;
-
orientation of the content of the study course on a specific professional
area (business, economics, jurisprudence, management);
-
adjustments to the course program depending on the changing conditions
of training [9, p.43].
Thus,
the communicative competence of the ESP teacher in
addition to the basic skills of teaching a general foreign language, requires knowledge of the subject and
specific vocabulary of this
profession. In this regard, the ESP teacher should not only meet the general requirements of the English teacher, such as
professionalism, to know
the goals, objectives and interests of students, and
the ability to develop new teaching materials and use modern teaching
technologies. He should be prepared to:
- show interest in the professional field of students;
- have basic professional knowledge;
- determine priorities in the choice of types of proposed
activity;
- get acquainted with the complex of skills necessary to
implement
professional activity;
- be aware of the need for cooperation with teachers profiling
chair;
- determine the volumes of learned linguistic speech
material;
IV. Выводы . Thus, the proposed
structure of the professional competence of the ESP teacher, consisting of an
interconnected communicative, methodical and sociocultural competencies,
seems to us as the most appropriate one. In our opinion, these types of competence form
the style of pedagogical activity of the ESP teacher and ensure
his professional
development.
List of references
1.
Lebedev
O.E “Компетентностный подход в
образовании”// 2004.
2.
Karpushina E., Bezukladnikov K. «Оценка
профессиональной компетенции будущего учителя иностранного языка»//
«Иностранные языки в школе»// №6,2009 – 43p.
3. Slastenin B.A., Isayev I., Mishenko A.I// Педагогика:
Учебное пособие для студентов педагогических учебных заведений// М.:
Школа-Пресс, 1997
4. Shamova T.I “Развитие
профессиональной компетентности участников образовательного процесса как
ведущее условие обеспечения качества образования”//сборник
материалов ІХ международной научно-практической конференции// 2005
5. Solovova E.N “Методика
обучения иностранным языкам: Базовый курс лекций”
//Пособие для студентов пед. вузов и учителей. — М.: Просвещение, 2002. — 239 с
6. Традиции и
инновации в методике обучения иностранным
языкам. СПб.: КАРО, 2007. — 288 с.
7. Дидактика и
компетентность в профессиональной деятельности
преподавателя медицинского вуза и колледжа.
Руководство для преподавателей / Под ред.
М.Г. Романцова, М.Ю. Ледванова, Т.В.
Сологуб. Издательство «Академия Естествознания»,
2010.
8.
Belonozhkina E.G “Профессиональная
крмпетенция учителя иностранного языка”// «Иностранные языки в школе»// №7-2009-112 p.
9.
Karpushina E., Bezukladnikov K. «Оценка
профессиональной компетенции будущего учителя иностранного языка»// «Иностранные
языки в школе»// №6,2009 – 82p.