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C.p.s., Associate Professor, Anfimova L.A.

Pedagogical Institute of the South Federal University, Russia

Innovative high educational establishments - perspectives of innovative development and globalization

    This article highlights theoretical and methodological principles of competitiveness, discusses the concept of competitiveness as applied to the training of future specialists in innovative high educational establishments. The article presents technologies aimed at the development of the competitiveness of high educational establishments and future specialists.

     In modern Russia high education must achieve new hypercompetitive levels, which are characterized by highly developed science technologies and innovations as well as globalization of knowledge.  Hypercompetition is the possibility of innovative high educational establishments to meet the demands of the consumers of their services due to the implementation of innovative methods and the development of innovative activities of creative teams. It is impossible to achieve high competitive levels of education without the reformation of the work of foreign language teacher educators. Due to the global character of modern education we must admit that globalization of education is impossible without proper knowledge of foreign languages. So, if Russian universities want to stick to international standards and to compete with the renowned Harvard and Cambridge Universities we should implement innovative techniques and methods and technologies developed in the USA and Europe, particularly the Council of Europe, such as: European Language Portfolio, benchmarking, SWOT-analysis, R-A-C-E, PR-techniques and development of innovative e-Learning forms and models.

     Innovative high educational establishments guarantee competitiveness of cities and regions and attract not only large-scale businesses and enterprises but also talented youth. One of the priorities of the South Federal University activities is the popularization of the university and the achievement of global education standards. It’s impossible to do without promotion of plurilingualism.  

     According to Jacques Maurais and Michael A. Morris “theory and practice are integrated in assessing the present and future of the new global linguistic order while giving due attention to the historical legacy of language competition and interaction   [4, p. 2]. Mark Fettes argues for reversing the longstanding approach or practice where nations compete with one another to promote their own languages, which is all the more pressing in a globalising world where linguistic competition threatens to escalate. Instead, he advocates developing geostrategies of interlingualism, i.e. linguistic strategies to foster global communication in cooperative, equitable ways which promote linguistic diversity. A cooperative approach might take any of a number of forms including measured spread of ‘world English’, promotion of plurilingualism [2].

      So, nowadays the necessity to reform the work of language teacher educators is acute due to the globalization of linguistic order. Simon Borg argues that language teacher education presupposes an understanding of what specifically it means to be a language teacher, and therefore insight into the distinctive characteristics of language teachers is central to the work of language teacher educators. So the author points out some main characteristics of foreign language teachers, which he considers to be among the most vital ones:  knowledge and command of the target language; ability to organize, explain and clarify, as well as to arouse and sustain interest and motivation among students; fairness to students by showing neither favouritism nor prejudice; availability to students [1, p.6-7].

    Being a foreign language teacher is in many ways unique within the profession of teaching. Becoming a foreign language teacher, too, is a different process from that which other future teachers experience. This reality is rooted in the subject matter of foreign language itself. In foreign language teaching, the content and the process for learning the content are the same. In other words, in foreign language teaching the medium is the message [3, p. 302].

   Some authors point out the necessity of the development of new speech technologies based on the usage of a computer and devices such as CD/DVD/MP3/MP4 players. So, Norbet Pachler, the researcher from   University of  London, argues that in  order to appreciate the potential benefit and, importantly, understand its limitations and so resist the unwarranted claims of eager sales departments  it is useful  to know what (speech) technology is and is not yet capable of. Playing   audio recordings via a computer (or devices such as CD/DVD/MP3 players) – as opposed to a tape recorder- requires digital, rather than traditional   analogue   recordings. Digital audio has a number of advantages over its analogue predecessor [5, p. 54-55]. It is also important to take into consideration emotions of foreign language learners. Affective needs of learners should be taken care of. As E. Tschirner pinpoints, language learning is strongly linked with emotions. Emotions influence learner motivation and what is learned and how it is learned [6]. So, if we want Russian education to be highly competitive we should stick to international standards of foreign language learning based on competence approach.  The cultural component of FL competence should be promoted. To be useful, FL skills need be based on cultural knowledge.  Cultural competence (knowing how to interact with whom or how to be polite) is an integral part of communicative competence.

References:

1.     Borg, S. The distinctive characteristics of foreign language teachers // Language Teaching Research, 2006. ¹ 10. P. 3-31.

2.     Fettes, M. The geostrategies of interlingualism // Languages in a Globalising World / Ed.  by Maurais J., M.A. Morris. – Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004. P. 37-46.

3.     Hammadou, J., Bernhardt, E. On being and becoming a foreign language teacher // Theory into Practice. ¹ 26. 1987.  P. 301–306.

4.     Languages in a Globalising World / Ed.  by Maurais J., M.A. Morris. – Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004. – 345 p. 

5.     Pachler N.    Speech   technologies and foreign language  teaching and learning //     Language  Learning   Journal,  2002. ¹ 26. P. 54-61.

6.     Tschirner E.   Language acquisition in the classroom: the role of digital video // Computer Assisted Language Learning. ¹ 14/3-4. 2001. P 19-305.