Realization of a communicative approach in the process of learning a foreign language

Анотація. У статті доведено важливість формування іншомовної комунікативної компетенції у контексті професійної підготовки майбутніх фахівців, розглядаються умови ефективної реалізації комунікативного підходу у процесі вивчення іноземної мови. У статті висвітлюються проблеми, пов'язані із різними методами та прийомами реалізації комунікативно-орієнтованого навчання. Особливого значення набуває комунікативно-діяльнісний підхід до вивчення іноземних мов, який базується на тому, що процес навчання є моделлю комунікації. Розглядаються основні принципи його реалізації як комунікативного методу навчання мовленнєвої діяльності. Комунікативно-орієнтоване навчання можливе лише за умов діяльнісного підходу. Слід зазначити, що комунікативно-діяльнісний підхід до вивчення іноземних мов є одним із найбільш значущих і ефективних. Завдяки комунікативним методам званяття можуть бути цікавими та різноманітними. Комунікативна спрямованість процесу навчання є передумовою успішності практичного вивчення іноземної мови. У статті розглядаються принципові положення організації процесу комунікативного навчання. Комунікативно-орієнтоване навчання іноземних мов можливе в умовах автентичного процесу соціалізації студентів. Проблема навчання студентів університету професійно-орієнтованого спілкування іноземною мовою є важливим компонентом навчальної діяльності, який стимулює формування навичок та умінь іншомовної професійно-орієнтованої комунікації. Передбачається вільне володіння студентами іноземною мовою та здатність формувати ними нові знання на основі існуючих знань та різних когнітивних процесів. Саме сучасні вимоги до вищої освіти обґрунтовують використання комунікативно-діяльнісного підходу до викладання іноземних мов. Особливе місце в процесі навчання студентів займає мотивація, яка сприяє підвищенню ефективності та результативності навчального процесу у вищому навчальному закладі.

Ключові слова: іншомовна комунікативна компетенція, професійна підготовка, комунікативний підхід, вивчення іноземної мови.

Formulation of the problem. The need to improve and reform the education system in accordance with international standards is relevant for Ukraine's entry into the world community. The intensification of Ukraine's international relations became an impetus for the training of qualified specialists capable for communication with their partners in a foreign language. This is confirmed in educational and professional programs and requires new forms and approaches in the methodology of teaching foreign languages. The new tasks involve changes in the requirements for the level of language proficiency, the definition of new approaches to the selection of content and organization of educational process.

Modern requirements for the training of a qualified specialist first of all require him to be a participant in intercultural communication and to have the necessary communicative abilities in the spheres of professional and situational communication in oral and written forms, the skills of practical command of a foreign language in various types of speech activity in the scope of topics determined by professional needs; and be able to acquire the latest professional information through foreign sources. All this increases the demand for qualified graduates (specialists) who are fluent in a foreign language, in particular the language of international communication, and determines the need to study the "Foreign Language" course.

Recently, most teachers have been asking themselves the question of which approach to teaching a foreign language would be the best. It is necessary to highlight the communicative approach, because its main focus is teaching speech in the conditions of communication. This approach was determined as a result of the understanding of scientific achievements in the field of linguistics, in particular communicative linguistics, psychology and theory of activity, which was reflected in works on psychology and methods of teaching foreign languages (O. O. Leontiev, I. O. Zimnya, Yu. I. Passov, S.F. Shatilov, G.V. Rogova and others). The communicative approach is quite effective, so it needs further study and development.

The content of the foreign language course is determined by communicative goals and tasks, the direction of learning towards the development of communicative culture and socio-cultural education, which allows students to be equal partners in intercultural communication in a foreign language in everyday, cultural and educational and professional fields.

The purpose of the article. We believe that in the context of the study of communicative learning of foreign languages, further research needs to highlight the problems associated with various methods and methods of implementing communicative-oriented learning, identify their causes and ways of solving them.

Today, the ultimate goal of learning foreign languages is the formation of foreign language communicative competence, when a student is ready to use a foreign language as a means of communication and mental activity. Such training involves the acquisition of the skills to navigate freely in a foreign-language environment and the skills to respond adequately in various situations. In order to learn to communicate in a foreign language, it is necessary to create real life situations (what is called the authenticity of communication) that will stimulate the study of the material and produce adequate behavior. It is necessary to prepare students for participation in the process of foreign language communication in the conditions of foreign language communication created in the classroom. This determines the essence of communication, which is that the learning process is a model of the communication process.

Analysis of recent research and publications. Analyzing the process of education and training of future specialists in the system of higher education, the researchers came to the conclusion that insufficient attention is paid to the formation of skills and abilities of foreign language professional speech. The need to solve the tasks of optimizing the process of training specialists with knowledge of a foreign language stimulates the scientific search for ways to solve this problem.

Based on the research of scientists (I.O. Zimnya, Yu.I. Pasov, N.F. Borysko, I.V. Yeromina, A.A. Yemelyanova, L.B. Kotlyarova, N.D. Solovyova, G. Brown and others) a general strategy for teaching foreign languages in universities was developed, which provides for the formation of professional communicative competence of future specialists. Professional communicative competence is defined as the readiness and ability to master subject-matter and scientific knowledge in professional communication (Sura, 2003: 190).

Presenting main material. Modern requirements for the training of a qualified specialist first of all require him to be a participant in intercultural communication and to have the necessary communicative abilities in the spheres of professional and situational communication in oral and written forms, the skills of practical command of a foreign language in various types of speech activity in the scope of topics determined by professional needs; and be able to acquire the latest professional information through foreign sources. All this increases the demand for qualified graduates (specialists) who are fluent in a foreign language, in particular the language of international communication, and makes it necessary to study the course "Foreign language for professional purposes".

Recently, in the practice of teaching foreign languages in higher educational institutions, there has been an increase in the tendency to use different approaches to teaching professionally oriented foreign language communication. The approach is defined as a complex of paradigmatic, syntagmatic and pragmatic structures and mechanisms in cognition or practice, which is characterized by competing strategies and programs. There are behavioral, innovative, intuitively conscious, conscious, individual, thematic, activity, pragmatic, communicative and cognitive approaches (Nikolayeva, 2002: 38).

The communicative-activity approach was determined as a result of understanding scientific achievements in the field of linguistics, in particular communicative linguistics, psychology and theory of activity, which was reflected in works on psychology and methods of teaching foreign languages (O. O. Leontiev, I. O. Zimnya, Yu. I. Passov, S. F. Shatilov, G. V. Rogova and others). The communicative-activity approach is quite effective, so it needs further study and development.

The communicative-activity approach of learning foreign languages is based on the fact that the learning process is a model of communication. The communicative method of teaching speech activity is based on five principles:

1) the principle of speech and mental activity;

2) the principle of individualization with the leading role of the personal aspect;

3) the principle of functionality;

4) the principle of situationality;

5) the principle of novelty.

Communicative orientation of education is a prerequisite for success in students' practical mastery of a foreign language. As practice shows, this is greatly facilitated by the atmosphere of collective communication organized on the basis of communicative situations. Situations stimulate students to communicatively motivated performance of speech acts, and communication in such situations enables students to consciously learn foreign language material. Dialogic and monologic speech is of great importance. Several participants may be involved in this process. From the standpoint of the communicative-activity approach, the process of foreign language learning takes place adequately to the real process of speech communication, that is, the learning process is a model of the process of speech communication. The maximum convergence of learning processes and real communication according to the most important parameters, such as the communicative and motivated speech behavior of the teacher and students, as well as the objectivity of the communication process, is ensured by the careful selection of communicative and speech intentions, topics, situations that reflect the interests and needs of students. Communication is needed - emotionally colored, with experience, professionally colored, which brings joy, interest and creates prerequisites for success both in education and in everyday life.

The essence of the communicative approach for learning foreign languages is that the language learning process itself should be a kind of model of the communication process. In this case, communicativeness is considered not as a methodological principle, but as a methodological principle that subordinates all aspects of education: the correlation of knowledge with abilities and skills, the selection of teaching methods, the content of general educational and educational tasks, as well as the scope and nature of connections with other educational objects.

The main thing in communicative education is the focus of the educational process on the development of practical language skills as a means of communication in various life situations depending on the purpose of communication, that is, on the formation of communicative competence of a certain level. And therefore, the entire organization of educational activities must in a certain way reproduce the process of modeling fundamentally important parameters of communication, such as: the personal nature of the communicative activity of the subjects of communication, the relationship and interaction of speech partners; the situation as a form of functioning of communication, the substantive basis of the communication process; the system of speech means that ensure communicative activity, the functional nature of the acquisition and use of speech means, heuristics. Usually, this approach to learning a foreign language is called communicative and active. He, according to O.O. Leontiev, oriented to the interlocutor, since communicativeness is, after all, the optimal influence on the interlocutor.

According to the communicative activity approach, communication is the goal, method and means of learning a foreign language. This approach has deep psycholinguistic conditioning: it is based on the relationship between language and speech activity, the psychology of the generation and understanding of utterances, and focuses on language as a system and speech as an activity to actualize the opportunities that language provides to its speakers. Even F. de Saussure considered language as a sign system that arises and is used for the sake of communication and in communication situations, is its main means, that is, performs a communicative function, in addition, it is a means of transmitting information from the speaker to the listener. Therefore, language is related to the needs and conditions of human communication, constitutes the most important aspect of his social behavior, occupies a certain place in communicative and cognitive activity.

The process of communication is communication in oral or written form, the cognitive essence of which consists in the exchange of information, its storage and evaluation. Communicative competence is considered formed if "the future specialist uses a foreign language to independently acquire and expand his knowledge and experience" (Stepankova, 2008: 28).

Communicativeness involves the speech orientation of the educational process, stimulation of speech and mental activity, ensuring the individuality of learning, taking into account the functionality of the language, creating situational learning, observing the rules of novelty in the organization of the educational process. The parameters of communication are realized in the communicative behavior of the teacher, the active behavior of students, in the subjects of discussion, and the use of means of speech.

Communication-oriented learning is possible only under the conditions of an activity approach. Communicative learning is activity-based, since communication takes place through speech activity. The following should be included among the basic provisions revealing this principle:

- the activity essence of communicative learning of a foreign language occurs through activities, which are implemented with the help of teaching methods and create exercises;

- activity tasks are implemented on the basis of games, simulation and free communication; tasks of the following types can be distinguished: communicative games, communicative imitations, free communication (socialization);

- the activity essence of communication-oriented learning is implemented in the "here and now" situation, which is carried out during the lesson: conditions are created for students' communication and mental creativity; the process of foreign language speech thinking is carried out directly at the moment of development of the speech situation; foreign language communication is a spontaneous experience;

- methodical organization of study activity is of great importance; Today, a three-phase form of communication-oriented tasks is widely used, which consists in the fact that almost any task can be performed in 3 stages: preparatory (pre-activity), executive (while-activity) and final (post-activity);

- the activity essence of communication-oriented learning of foreign languages is realized in the conditions of a humanistic approach to learning: students get the opportunity to freely express their own thoughts and feelings, self-expression of the individual becomes more important than the demonstration of language knowledge, communication participants feel safe from criticism and punishment for mistakes, educational individual violations of language rules and occasional mistakes are considered the norm.

Communicative learning of foreign languages means getting communicative competence, which is formed in all types of speech activity - speaking, reading, listening and writing.

Communication-oriented learning of foreign languages is possible in the conditions of an authentic process of socialization of students. At the same time, the term "authentic" implies not only the use of educational material "taken from life" in class, but also the creation of methodologically appropriate conditions for natural educational communication. The key provisions that reveal the essence of this principle are as follows:

- use of speech interaction tasks (interactive activities), which are constructed in such a way that they cannot be performed without a partner;

- use of tasks involving "information gap" (information gap);

- authentic learning involves the use of speech and mental tasks, which can be based on: sequence of actions, critical thinking, guessing, finding similarities and differences, excluding the superfluous, etc.;

- the use of organized role-playing communication, which is implemented in a role-playing game, which often includes elements of social training, that is, practicing communication;

- authentic communication-oriented learning of foreign languages takes place with the use of spontaneous communication, when the learning situation turns into a natural one.

It is worth noting that currently the communicative-activity approach of learning foreign languages is one of the most significant and effective. Thanks to communicative methods, classes become more interesting and various. This means that students become interested in further knowledge and study of the language.

To date, it cannot be claimed that all the regularities that allow effective teaching of speech activity and cognition have been formed. But it can be stated that the basis of the methodical content of modern foreign language classes should be communicativeness.

Conclusion. It can be concluded that Ukraine's accession to the Bologna process led to radical changes in the educational process of higher educational institutions and set difficult tasks to improve the quality of knowledge of future foreign language specialists. The problem of teaching of university students professionally-oriented communication in a foreign language is an important component of educational activity that stimulates the formation of skills and abilities of foreign-language professionally-oriented communication. Students' fluency in a foreign language and their ability to form new knowledge based on existing knowledge and various cognitive processes are assumed. It is the modern requirements for higher education that justify the use of a communicative-activity approach to teaching foreign languages. A special place in the process of student education is occupied by motivation, which contributes to increasing the efficiency and effectiveness of the educational process in a higher educational institutions.