Elena S. Lukashenko

The article considers peculiarities of the process of teaching English for special purposes at Nizhny Novgorod State Linguistics University named after N.A. Dobrolyubov on the example of the discipline "Foreign (English) language in the professional field" for the major 38.03.01 Economics. The relevance of the article is due to the unflagging interest in the problem of teaching a foreign language to students of non-linguistic majors. Understanding that a foreign language should be an integral component of the process of acquiring professional competences by students is vital for efficient preparation for professional activity. The purpose of the study is a critical analysis of the designed work program of the academic discipline “Foreign (English) language in the professional field”, its content, which allows us to present a full picture of the existing practice of organizing professionally oriented education. The study is based on the analysis of the main components of the methodological support for the educational process. The study made it possible to identify the main features of the organization of the process of teaching English for non-linguistic students, the advantages of professionally oriented education, as well as the main problematic aspects. Well-thought-out, rational organization of the learning process significantly increases the level of motivation of students of non-linguistic majors to learn a foreign language, and also contributes to the preparation of a specialist who is in demand on the labor market. The article emphasizes the importance of collaboration between teachers of departments providing professional training for students and departments of language training through the creation of inter-departmental methodological associations; the author of the article also identifies the main aspects of interaction and areas of joint work. Professionally oriented English teaching is a step-by-step, multi-stage process, in which English classes on the one hand become more and more focused on the future profession, but on the other hand, represent a productive combination of language for special purposes and language for general purposes. The material of the article can be used for further development of the theory and improvement of the methodology of professionally oriented teaching of a foreign language. The given examples of tasks can be used by teachers of English.

Nowadays, the issue of teaching Language for Specific Purposes to students of non-linguistic majors and the necessity to form professionally significant competence by means of a foreign language are paid much attention to, both in our country and abroad. This makes the present article relevant. The purpose of the article is to show the peculiarity of mastering a foreign language by students of non-linguistic majors. This peculiarity determines the topics chosen for classes and the requirements for the training material. The authors of the article aimed at examining the effectiveness of sources of media content used in teaching Language for Specific Purposes to students of non-linguistic majors. The authors also offer questions and tasks based on Ted Talks. Ted Talks is an open educational resource comprising presentations at conferences on different topics. The research is based on the contextual approach to teaching Language for Specific Purposes, which presupposes that information should be perceived in context by modelling content area of professional activity at English classes. As a result of the research, the authors revealed and explained the advantages of Ted Talks. The research showed that such Internet resources help to form professional competence by means of a foreign language and allow students to use a foreign language successfully in their future profession and be ready for cross-cultural communication. Theoretical significance of the article lies in the contribution it makes to the creation of professional environment for communication by means of modern educational technologies that will allow students to plunge into foreign language environment, witness cultural-specific realities and hear modern foreign speech. The results of the research may be used for further study of the problem of teaching Language for Specific Purposes. Practical significance of the article is in the possibility to use offered tasks at English classes with 2nd -4th year students of economic majors depending on their level of English.