Teaching a foreign language to the students of humanities: academic and digital literacies

Relevance. In the context of a new reality the Russian economy experiences a certain deficit of highly qualified young scientists. This requires improvement of foreign language teaching methods for training future psychologists and teachers in cross-cultural communication in the English language academic discourse.

Aim is to develop the training module “Formation of academic and digital literacy in the English language academic discourse: analysis of an academic article” to teach Master’s students majoring in psychology and pedagogy the basics of academic literacy. The main content of the study is the analysis of theoretical and methodological concepts of the foreign language academic and digital literacy formation. The paper presents the researchers’ views on the content and components of the concepts under study, acting as elements of competence profile of Master’s students in the psychology and pedagogy. The authors consider the technologies of CLIL and ICT as the tools for forming universal communicative and digital skills through teaching academic and digital literacy in the framework of the “Foreign Language” discipline. The author describes the training module “Formation of academic and digital literacy in the English language academic discourse: analysis of an academic article” and presents the results of its testing. Recommendations on the effective integration of the module into the educational process are given.

Methodology. General scientific and special methods were used in this study: dialectical, analysis and synthesis, comparison and analogy, systematic, comparative analysis, observation, interviews, statistical methods (Student’s paired t-test).

Scientific novelty and/or theoretical and/or practical significance of the article lies in the theoretical substantiation of pedagogical conditions of the module application, providing the creation of conditions that simulate the natural professional environment of scientific activity. The practical part of the research can be used in the foreign language teaching of Master’s students or humanities students aimed at forming the basics of academic and digital literacy.

Results. Based on the implementation results of the developed training module, the expediency of its use in the training of Master’s students in psychology and pedagogy has been proved. The module helps to develop competences of academic and digital literacy in the English language academic discourse, which is proved  by statistically reliable results of expert evaluation, as well as self- and mutual evaluation of the experimental study participants.

Conclusions. It is concluded that foreign-language academic and digital literacy competencies are important for young scholars. It is advisable to build the educational process in the English language at the university on the basis of technologies of CLIL and ICT, which is proved by the effectiveness of the module “Formation of academic and digital literacy in the English language academic discourse: analysis of scientific article”, implemented in the practice of the university foreign language education for students of technical and natural sciences specialities.

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