Abdualiyev N.K., 4-th course student

Kostanay State Pedagogical Institute, Kazakhstan

Theinternet media in teaching of foreign languages

Nowadays it is hard to imagine our society without computers and the Internet. It has become a usual thing to have a computer at home and at school. Once you have a computer connected to the Internet, you get an access to the infinite amount of information. You can read news or books. We look for any kind of information, download video clips, listen to the radio etc. In fact the computer is an interactive tool that can be used by anyone and almost in any field and means also for learning and teaching purposes.

The use of the cyberspace for education purposes is an absolutely new branch in didactics and teaching methods. In order to use the Internet in the teaching process the teaching style has to be reconsidered. It is a new method and in order to be applied it has to be thoroughly researched.

The computer itself is a very complicated structure that allows you to use it almost for any purpose. It is an interactive tool.

The most important aim of teaching a foreign language in the secondary school is making you able to communicate. The communicative approach means teaching the ability to communicate and the Internet has all the opportunities to do it. The Internet itself is an international cross-cultural society model where people share and exchange information through wire. If we use it in the lessons we create a model of real communication with the foreign culture.

When working with the Internet in the lessons pupils find themselves in real situations. And it stimulates them to use more of their imagination, to make spontaneous decisions. The highest priority is given to understanding the information so that a pupil could be able to understand and retell it.

Nowadays it is important to be acquainted with information technologies because it is a rapidly growing field that is becoming a thing for everyday use. And that is why the Internet needs more attention – it has the widest access to the information all around the world[1].

Being a system of information the Internet offers its users a wide range of different resources. The basic things the Internet can be used for are: e-mail; video conferences; publishing your own information, creating of your own web pages (homepage) and putting it onto Web servers; access to any kind of information; catalogues; searching for the needed information; chatting online.

Those resources can be actively used in the lesson. The virtual environment of the Internet allows you to communicate with real people in a foreign language, to discuss different topics with them and to use up-to-date information [2].

But we should not forget that the Internet is only a tool that makes your teaching process more vivid and interesting. And in order to be used effectively it should be properly integrated into teaching process.

The Internet is not a new thing for foreign teachers as well as for Kazakhstan ones. It is being used productively in the world. On the Internet you can find many articles telling you different opinions about integration of it in the teaching process. While searching the Web it was found that the Internet is used mostly as additional and interactive material. In scientific literature we can find some opinions of different methodologistsabout the Internet as a teaching tool.

As Kuang-wu Lee says that engaging in Computer-Assisted Language Learning (CALL) is a continuing challenge that requires time and commitment. We realize that technology as such is not the answer to all our problems. What really matters is how we use technology. Computers can never substitute teachers but they offer new opportunities for better language practice. They may actually make the process of language learning significantly richer and play a key role in the reform of a country's educational system. The next generation of students will feel a lot more confident with information technology than we do. As a result, they will also be able to use the Internet to communicate more effectively, practice language skills more thoroughly and solve language learning problems more easily. He also gives a list of reasons why to use the Network based activities.

The World Wide Web makes it possible for students to tackle a huge amount of human experience. In such a way, they can learn by doing things themselves. They become the creators not just the receivers of knowledge. As the way information is presented is not linear, users develop thinking skills and choose what to explore [3].

Computers are also most popular among students because they are associated with fun and games or because they are considered to be fashionable. Student motivation is therefore increased, especially if a variety of activities are offered, which make them feel more independent. Network-based instruction can help pupils strengthen their linguistic skills by positively affecting their learning attitude and by helping them build self-instruction strategies and promote their self-confidence. All students can use various resources of authentic reading materials either at school or from their home. Those materials can be accessed 24 hours a day at a relatively low cost. Random access to Web pages breaks the linear flow of instruction. By sending E-mail and joining newsgroups, EFL students can communicate with people they have never met. They can also interact with their own classmates. Furthermore, some Internet activities give students positive and negative feedback by automatically correcting their on-line exercises.

Using websites is one of the easiest and least stressful ways of getting started with technology in the classroom. There is a large and constantly expanding collection of resources on the web, at a variety of levels and covering an amazing array of topics. You can choose from authentic (written for Internet surfers in general) sources or ELT-specific sites (made by, and for, teachers), monolingual or multilingual sites, sites with multimedia, or just simple text, for those on slower connections.

The web is a source of content which can be used as a window on the wider world outside your class, and is - of course - a readily available collection of authentic material. As such, it is a much larger repository of content than would previously have been readily available to you and your students.

Perhaps one of the best tips we can give you at this point is to work as a team with other teachers in your center. Everybody has their favorite websites, and plenty of teachers will, at some point, have used websites in class, or taken material from the web and adapted it for teaching purposes. Take the time to share sources of content with other teachers and organize regular get-togethers where you sit down and discuss what you have found on the Internet and how you have used it in class. Collaboration like this can help to reduce the time you spend searching for good materials and the time spent preparing activities or making worksheets. Just as the Internet is becoming more of a collaborative medium, so should your use of it in your teaching.

During our research we have decided that using Internet media is the effective way inteaching foreign language.There are positive and negative aspects of using Internet media. The Internet, both e-mail and the World Wide Web, has a great potential to change our language instruction and students' learning of foreign languages.

References

1. The Facts About... 21st-Century Technology (2002). U.S. Department of Education (n.d.). Retrieved March 11, 2003 fromhttp://www.nclb.gov/start/facts/21centtech.html

2. Haury, D.L. and Milbourne, L.A. (2002). Using the internet to enrich science teaching and learning. Clearinghouse for Science, Mathematics and Environmental Education. (ERIC Digest Reproduction Service No. SE 062 506.

3. Coiro, J. (2003). Reading comprehension on the Internet. Expanding our understanding of reading comprehension to encompass new literacies. TheReadingTeacher, 56(5), 458 - 564.