Лещенко В.В. The use of information and communication technologies as effective means of students’ multicultural competence forming

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Лещенко Вікторія Віталівна – студентка Педагогічного інституту Київського університету імені Бориса Грінченка, спеціальність «Початкова освіта», кафедра іноземних мов і методик їх навчання Київського університету імені Бориса Грінченка


У статті доведено важливість формування міжкультурної компетенції студентів ВНЗ в контексті глобальної інтеграції та інформатизації сучасного суспільства. Уточнено значення терміна «міжкультурна компетенція»; визначено компоненти міжкультурної компетенції студентів ВНЗ, які повинні бути сформовані в процесі їх іншомовної освіти; розглянено деякі види інформаційно-комунікаційних технологій, які можуть бути корисними в формуванні міжкультурної компетенції студентів.

Ключові слова: інформаційно-комунікаційні технології, види інформаційно-комунікаційних технологій, ефективний засіб, міжкультурна компетенція, студенти ВНЗ, реальні комунікативні ситуації, іншомовна освіта.


В статье доказана важность формирования межкультурной компетенции студентов вузов в контексте глобальной интеграции и информатизации современного общества. Уточнено значение термина «межкультурная компетенция»; определены компоненты межкультурной компетенции студентов вузов, которые должны быть сформированы в процессе их иноязычного образования; рассмотрены некоторые виды информационно-коммуникационных технологий, которые могут быть полезными в формировании межкультурной компетенции студентов.

Ключевые слова: информационно-коммуникационные технологии, виды информационно-коммуникационных технологий, эффективное средство, межкультурная компетенция, студенты вузов, реальные коммуникативные ситуации, иноязычное образование.


The article manifests the importance of high school students’ multicultural competence forming in the context of global integration and informatization of modern society. The meaning of the term “multicultural competence” is specified; the components of high school students’ multicultural competence which must be formed in the process of their foreign language education are determined; some kinds of information and communication technologies which may be helpful in students’ multicultural competence forming are observed.

Key words: information and communication technologies, kinds of information and communication technologies, effective means, multicultural competence, high school students, real-life communicative situations, foreign language education.


Зміст

Relevance of the topic

Modern information society cannot be imagined without the processes of globalization, innovation, and ever growing rate of intercultural interaction. Those processes have a great impact on our everyday lives, especially in the cultural, political, scientific, economic, and, particularly, educational areas, inspiring great interest among scientists and researchers in the process of cultural interaction and correlation, that is referred to as “the dialogue of cultures”.


The necessity of intercultural competence forming is dictated by the tendencies of our modern developing society and education. We live in the age of information technologies, which is characterized by the intensity of interactions between different cultures and the growing rate of intercultural and interpersonal communication, especially in the Internet environment. Such tendencies require the education system to prepare students for a live in the new conditions of a digitally focused society. It arouses the objective of forming basic competences which include a complex system of universal knowledge, skills, abilities, and experience of independent work that will help them adapt and efficiently use information resources.


The analysis of research

The issue of information and communication technologies usage for the purpose of multicultural competence forming has concerned a lot of native and foreign scientists and researchers in the fields of sociology, cultural studies, psychology, linguistics, philosophy, and education. M. Byram, H.R. Hammer, P. Hernwall, C. Manuel, E. Murphy, P. Seymour, T. Boldovoyi, A. Bordjuk, L. Bordjuk, M. Bukharkin, E. Karakulova, S. Nikolaieva, L. Panchenko, E. Polat, A. Sadohyna, V. Safonov, P. Sysoiev, S. Titova, and other researchers has dedicated their works to the abovementioned subject.


The purpose formulation of research

The analysis of the latest publications has caramelized that the problem of multicultural competence forming and the role of information and communication resources in the educational process of high school is an urgent topic in the scientific world.


Nonetheless, despite a wide range of studies which contain recommendations for applying information and communication technologies as an effective means of forming students’ educational competences in the process of foreign language education, the problem of forming particularly multicultural competence by information and communication means is paid not enough attention and needs further development.


Consequently, the aim of our research is to determine effective ways of students’ multicultural competence forming by means of information and communication technologies (ICT).


The main material

An integral part of teaching and learning a foreign language by high school students must be focused, in our opinion, on the forming of multicultural competence that results individual’s willingness to integrate into the modern multicultural space.


Multicultural competence is, as we believe, one of the most important skills of the modern professional. When using the term “multicultural competence” I. Shavkun suggests a set of professional qualities such as theoretical knowledge about national cultures and models of education, psychological personality traits (openness, flexibility, tolerance, willingness to work with other cultures), knowledge of foreign languages [4, p. 117].


S. Sallivan determines the following components of high school students’ multicultural competence which must be formed in the process of their foreign language education: – mental balance: emotional stability, minding cultural differences and characteristic of a particular country, the ability to deal with the effects of culture shock; – in the area of interpersonal relations: extraversion, ability to disagree with someone else’s point of view, the ability to find solutions to problematic situations using learned concepts of cultural differences; – in the perception of different situations: the openness to accept and to obtain new knowledge (communication, negotiation), honesty in communication, the ability to correctly and properly raise questions [7, p. 709-725].


It must be mentioned that multicultural competence assists in the development of practical communication skills when dealing with other cultures and always uncovered in practice, and in the context of global integration and informatization of society multicultural competence can be interpreted as the student’s ability to effectively face the challenges in the multicultural communication that involves dialogue, mutual understanding rather than clash of different cultures.


Here is the definition of the concept “multicultural competence”, which, in our opinion, reveals its contents in fullest. “Multicultural competence is a competence of specific nature, that is based on knowledge and skills, the ability to implement multicultural communication by creating communicators of joint significance to indicated present situations, and to achieve an ultimately positive outcome for both parties of the communication. The goal of forming multicultural competence is to achieve a level of linguistic identity that would allow to go beyond individual’s own culture and gain qualities of a “cultural mediator” without losing the individual’s cultural identity” [1, p. 218].


The ultimate realization of this goal obviously requires a native speaking environment of the foreign language and a real act of communication. The lack of those factors causes a number of specific difficulties in its implementation during foreign language practical classes.


The solution of this problem lies, as we believe, in accessing the modern means of ICT that will help students express themselves in curricular and extracurricular activities and in their private time and independent work. In this way students will be encouraged to actually use gained knowledge in real-life communicative situations.


ICT, among which the worldwide network of the Internet is the most effective nowadays – offer great opportunities for students to travel to different countries and continents and communicate with their representatives, allow each student to become a cultural representative of his own country, offer real access to the world’s cultural heritage and cultural achievements of different language communities. It has a significant impact on the educational process, and mainly, the formation of high school students’ cross-cultural communication competence.


The usage of various means of ICT in the process of foreign language education will assist students in mastering and formation of all common characteristics and skills of multicultural competence. For example, researchers K. Knapp and A. Knapp-Potthoff distinguished those characteristics as: – understanding the correlation of human thought, activity and behaviour, and communication activities and behaviours which are generated due cultural and cognitive circuits; – understanding the correlation of cultural dependency and their own thinking, behaviour, and activities, as well as communication activities and behaviour; – the ability and willingness to accept cross-cultural perspective; – knowledge of industries of both native and the target culture, in which they may differ; – knowledge of various communication styles of behaviour and the ability to identify them in situations of multicultural interaction; – the ability to interpret the phenomena of communicative activity and behaviour in terms of cultural determinants; – understanding of the basic principles of interpersonal communication; – possession of compensatory communication strategies; – possession of strategies to identify and analyze misunderstanding during communication on the basis cultural differences and their impact on communication activity and behaviour; – knowledge of strategies that avoid misunderstanding and clarify communication [6, p. 84-85].


The high level of computerization of our society and the growing importance of ICT as means of preserving and transmitting information forces a foreign language teacher to actively implement it into the educational practice. It in its turn causes the need of students’ linguistic and multicultural competences improvement, forming a culture of communication in an electronic environment, increases the information culture in general, and even develops computer skills such as searching, processing, transmission, systematization, and presentation of the researched results by students [5, p. 132].


Leading ICT means through which multicultural competence emerges nowadays is the worldwide network of Internet. The goals of a modern foreign language teacher is to create a model of a real dialogue that contributes to students’ natural desire and need to interact with others, boosts self-confidence and their ability to perform communication. The communicative approach involves training and communication with cultural interaction that is basic for operating the Internet. Without communication, the Internet does has no sense – it is an international multicultural, intercultural society whose livelihood is based upon electronic communication of millions of people around the world who speak simultaneously – basically, it is the largest in size and number of participants conversation, that ever took place. When engaging in this conversation, high school teachers must create a model of real communication.


When communicating in real language environment provided by the Internet, students find themselves in real-life communicative situations. Involved in solving of a wide range of meaningful, realistic tasks, students learn to spontaneously and adequately respond to them, this causes the creation of original expressions, rather than manipulation of templates and language formulas [5, p. 154].


Communication with peers from another country can be performed by electronic messaging (e-mailing), which gives students more time to analyse and reflect before responding to letters, and apart from that, communication can be performed not only individually but also in a form of a group conversation. Electronic messaging is a great tool that develops students’ communication skills, as well as writing skills. Communication with peers in a foreign language, regardless of whether they are native or foreign language learners, also contribute to the formation of multicultural competence of students and expanding their horizons [3, p. 5].


At a higher level of studying, if students possess the required speaking skills they can use technology that allows them to chat “on-line” with representatives of the culture whose language is studied. Currently the most common service that offers this feature is Skype (a free software that provides voice communication over the Internet between computers).


Similarly, online communication can take place through blogging. There are many educational online resources where students can communicate through blogs. An example is the service for English language learners, supplied by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) on pages www.bbc.co.uk. One of the most popular microblogging services is Twitter – www.twitter.com. After registering, members can post short messages (“twits”) on any subject. Any person may read your microblog and then answer it or continue the theme. Although Twitter is not intended to do so, it can be widely used to enhance writing skills. By posting entries in their microblog, students can meet with native speakers and continue communication.


However, it must be said that communicating itself with native speakers from other countries does not guarantee multicultural competence formation. Leading U.S. and German researches have shown that instead of enhancing multicultural competence it also may create false stereotypes about other cultures, which in turn will lead to disliking and rejection of the studied culture [5, p. 118].


The participant must realize that the representatives of another culture may have a different system of values, possess different set knowledge and norms, their thoughts and judgments most likely, will differ from the ones established in the native culture. Therefore, it is the high school teacher’s job to provide knowledge about specific situations and moments of communicating with other culture [2, p. 8].


It is also worth noting the benefit of using search engines (Google, Yahoo, Yandex, etc.) as most effective tools in shaping multicultural competence. Because of the search engines you can find a great deal of information, including information regarding that we study. The goal of a high school teacher is to provide in addition to the use of university textbooks and audio-visual materials, the actively usage of Internet resources, expanding their view horizon and constantly bringing something new to their lessons: interesting and unusual facts about other cultures, authentic audio and video materials, interesting photos, illustrations, lesson plans, workbooks in general. Anything that can increase students’ interest in the culture of the country whose language is being studied, will help them take a fresh look at the culture of their country, and therefore increase their level of multicultural competence [3, p. 8].


Conclusion

Thus, we believe that the use of ITC such as the World Wide Web and Internet resources when learning a foreign language is essential for a proper formation of students’ multicultural competence. That is why a high school language teachers should be more devoted to the ITC usage in their teaching practice, as using computers leads to the activation of mental activity, generates positive motivation for most students to attend classes, increasing the amount of information received, and organizes thinking.


Assuredly, acquiring multicultural competence is impossible without communication practice, and Internet resources usage in foreign language classes in this sense is simply irreplaceable. Electronic messaging, blogging, chatting through Skype encourages students to improve language skills, promotes outlook, gives self-confidence.


Undoubtedly, the article research material does not exhaust all aspects of the problem under our consideration. The next step is to study the problem of the methodology of ITC usage in students’ multicultural competence forming in the process of their foreign language education.


References

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  2. Сысоев П.В., Апальков В.Г. Формирование межкультурной компетенции учащихся средствами электронно-почтовой группы. [Электронный ресурс] – www.lib.tsu.ru/mminfo/000349304/05/image/05-102.pdf
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