Pushkareva Irina Yurevna, Martynova Anastasiya Aleksandrovna Psychological and pedagogical aspects of foreign language teaching on the basis of Internet technologies

Polskie Forum Psychologiczne, 2015, tom 20, numer 1, s. 122-127
DOI: 10.14656/PFP20150108

PSYCHOLOGICAL AND PEDAGOGICAL ASPECTS
OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHING ON THE BASIS
OF THE INTERNET TECHNOLOGIES
Irina Yurevna Pushkareva, Anastasiya Aleksandrovna Martynova
The Grammar School 14 “University”, Novosibirsk, Russian Federation

Summary. The advantage of the Internet technologies in the process of learning
a foreign language nowadays doesn’t cause any doubts and doesn’t require any
additional arguments. Directly the Internet resources are invaluable and are the
vast basis for creation informational, educational and training sphere, as well as
to satisfy their professional and personal needs. The economic development of the
country gradually makes the Internet a reality for the majority of Russian schoolchildren. However, the mere availability of access to the Internet resources is not
a guarantee of fast and high quality language education. In the world there are
many examples of how methodologically illiterate-built work of students with
the Internet resources has produced their wrong stereotypes and generalizations
about the culture of English-speaking countries.
The article explores the advisability of using computer technologies in teaching
and learning foreign languages, and explores possible ways of language learning
with the help of the Internet.
Key words: information technologies, the process of foreign language teaching, the
information-subject educational sphere, the quality of learning languages

Introduction
Relevance. The advantage of the Internet technologies in the process of learning a foreign language nowadays doesn’t cause any doubts and doesn’t require any
additional arguments. Directly the Internet resources are invaluable and are the
vast basis for creation informational, educational and training sphere, as well as
to satisfy their professional and personal needs. The economic development of the
country gradually makes the Internet a reality for the majority of Russian schoolchildren. However, the mere availability of access to the Internet resources is not
a guarantee of fast and high quality language education. In the world there are
many examples of how methodologically illiterate-built work of students with the
Adres do korespondencji: Irina Yurevna Pushkareva, e-mail, pushkarev73@mail.ru
Anastasiya Aleksandrovna Martynova, e-mail, anast.martinova2015@yandex.ru
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Internet resources has produced their wrong stereotypes and generalizations about
the culture of English-speaking countries.
In this project we’ll try to understand how to use computer technology in
learning and teaching foreign languages, what benefit or harm they will bring students and teachers, what the possible ways of language learning by means of the
Internet can be.
Purpose. To determine the most relevant and appropriate ways of learning English
by means of the Internet.
Objectives:
– to find the ways and the means of learning English in the Internet;
– distinguish their pros and cons;
– determine the most loyal and productive methods of language learning.

Communicative technologies
Despite the fact that the ability to communicate in oral and in written forms
is the main purpose of the study a foreign language, the proper attention may not
be given to communication skills training in the classroom. Communication in the
classroom with the teacher and classmates, different exercises that simulate conversations in different situations, is clearly not enough to prepare students to communicate in the real world. The possibility of communicating with native speakers
in the process of teaching is inavailable at an early stage. Until recently, this could
only be achieved with the help of paper letters, and they tend to be sent from the
recipient to the receiver for a long time. Such means of communication as telephone
or telegraph were extremely rare, and they were too expensive for the average person. So with the advent of rapid and affordable email correspondence, including
native speakers has recently been activated.
The most popular and widespread became asynchronous communication,
which was not limited only by traditional mail: there are systems of the exchange
of voice messages. Various systems of fonts don’t make any problems: e-mail messages may contain Cyrillic alphabet with the Latin alphabet, and hieroglyphics
(Dzyadevich, 2008).
For learners of English, non-synchronous communication has several advantages: the processes of drawing up, delivery and archiving of the text are not related
to each other. The received message can be read and listened as many times as it
is desired, using, if they need, dictionaries and other reference books, be printed,
and be saved in the computer’s memory. When the students write a reply, they are
not limited in time and reference material (Voevoda, 2009). Another advantage of
asynchronous communication is its low price.
Corresponding partners may from time to time appoint each other the meeting
in the network (synchronous communication). While chatting with the keyboard
and the screen is possible practically on any computer connected to the Internet for
the oral and visual communication we need up-to-date equipment and high-qualitied Internet connection. During the synchronous communication the costs increase
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greatly, because the communication of both interlocutors must be online, but it is
cheaper than the international telephone conversation.
The Internet web-sites
Global distribution of English, the active engaging over of practical teachers-workers and authors of methodological aids in the process of assimilation of
the Internet space led to creation of resource bases – Web-sites giving the newest
materials to the teachers, both in a textual format and format of the multimedia-programs for those, who teaches and studies foreign languages (Luchina, 2009).
Advantage of multimedia training programs, a few channels of information
transfer are incorporated in them at once, makes the study of a foreign language
more interesting and effective. Many learning sites contain the references to the
various pages on the Internet; where students get actual information about any
questions.
For some students the possibility to use the usual place for the usual work – the
computer and for the study of foreign language too becomes weighty arguments on
behalf of multimedia educational programs (Sotnikova, 2011).
Besides, such programs in educational process give the students additional,
auxiliary information and comments to the realised learning tasks, open new possibilities of independent study of foreign languages.
Samples of the sites: Lingualeo, Ling, InterPalsq.
Search engine
If we consider the language as a sequence of individual words, then if you try
to write or translate, you should make reasonable use of the dictionary. But this
approach often leads to errors, ambiguity and misunderstandings. Individual lexical units do not exist in the unit itself. They are linked by strong threads with these
words, and reject the other ones (Sysoev, Evstigneev, 2008).
Modern search engines provide unique opportunities for language research;
help to avoid errors, to find the best way to express the idea.
As a rule, the main part of the search system is a machine. This machine works
on clearly given criteria. One of them is the consideration of the morphology of the
language.
It is known that one of the tasks of the morphology is the definition of the Word
as a special language of the object and a description of its internal structure. Thus,
this term means the part of the language, which contains the rules of building and
understanding the words of a given language.
And in this way it is considered to be the concept of morphology in modern
search systems, for example in Google.ru. So during the searching the logical constructions are also used, they apply for the search of the most logical, and the most
frequently used linguistic constructions.

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Then the challenge comes:
If the creators of the search systems provide a framework of decision of the
main tasks of the linguistic objectives, why not use the reverse process by using an
Internet search to find the correct and the most frequently used linguistic form in
modern language?
Here is an example of a grammatical study: there was the task: to find out what
the negative form of expression “used to” are the most common, which are used
infrequently and which are wrong.
Sequentially enter the options in the search box, enclosed in quotation marks
(they will not let the search system divide the introduced phrase into individual
words), read the search results by the search system statistics.
We type the found data in the table of findings (table 1).
Table 1. The frequences of indications
№
п/п

Expression

The number of found
results

The ratio of results, %

1

Never used to

61700000

41,6

2

Didn’t used to

38900000

26,5

3

Didn’t use to

29100000

19,6

4

Used not to

10300000

7

5

Never use to

7640000

5

6

Usedn’t to

7530

0,005

1. The expression 1 and 2 are grammatically correct and the most widely-used in
English.
2. Expression 3 and 4 are grammatically correct, but are used in the language.
3. Expression 5 is not grammatically correct, however, occurs in English (of course
such quantification does not let you make a firm conclusion about the rightness
or wrongness of the grammatical forms; here we need to analyze links.
4. Expression 6 is not correct, as the following link indicated.

The reverse side of the coin
The Internet technologies have made a great contribution to the development
of distance education, which has gained popularity all over the world within the
last decade. The spread of this form of training has given conviction to some users
that you can master the language through the Internet without leaving home. This
common mistake is shared by numerous creators of multimedia programs and video courses.
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Most of such programs are addressed to beginners of learning a foreign language or “false beginners”.
On the one hand, there is progress in the use of computer technologies, but, on
the other hand, the students are not able to communicate with the teacher to find
out what mistakes they have made, that is, there is no feedback in learning, and
learning a language leads to self-education.
Learning a foreign language does not involve just memorization of the lexical
and grammatical units, drafting the sentences and translation of the text, as it is offered on many sites, but it also involves the skills of oral communication, listening,
reading and writing. The realization of this task without control of the teacher is not
possible because every person is a separate linguistic personality. So the mistakes
are individual. It cannot be denied that many errors are common, and students can
avoid them by doing different exercises. However, predicting what error a student
will make is not important. Consequently, any form of distance learning requires
the participation of the teacher.
However, there is still no definite opinion of how effective the use of Internet
resources is for the audience. Therefore there are certain methodological advantages and organizational risks.
The advantages include the ability to demonstrate some phenomena, including
language phenomenon, the ability to read latest press, news and etc.
But there are cases when trying to watch video news program in real time the
teacher faces the lack of understanding of the audience audio provider, which is impossible to repeat, if it is not the parallel to recording of a news block. This nullifies
the effect of listening and/or watching the material.

Conclusion
Communicative technologies. Exercises during English classes, simulating
conversations in different situations, are clearly not enough to prepare students to
communicate in the real world.
With the appearance of rapid Internet resources email correspondence with
native speakers has activated.
The most popular and wide-spread is an asynchronous communication, whose
processes of compilation, sending and archiving of the text are not connected with
each other; when you are writing an answer, you are not limited in time and reference materials.
Internet sites. Creation of resource databases of Internet sites that provide
the latest materials, both textual and multimedia programs formats for those who
teaches and studies foreign languages.
The advantage of multimedia training programs is that they combine multiple
communication channels, which make learning more interesting and effective.
Such programs throughout the educational process give the student additional, supporting information and comments to completed exercises, giving new opportunities for independent study of foreign languages.
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Search engine. Modern search engines provide unique opportunities for language research, help to avoid errors, find the best way to express one’s idea.
The reverse side of the coin. Distribution of learning through Internet sites
have generated some users’ conviction that language can be mastered through the
Internet from home. This is a common ignorance factor shared by numerous makers
of multimedia programs and video courses: students are not able to communicate
with the teacher to find out what mistakes they have made, in other words, there is
no feedback in learning, and learning a language leads to self-education.
References
Dzyadevich, V.M. (2008). The use of new technologies in teaching foreign languages. Bulletin of Moscow University. Journalism, 10, 1, 39-52.
Luchina, O.B. (2009). Didactic adaptation of Internet resources for learning English
language. Foreign languages at school, 6, 12-17.
Sotnikova, E.Yu. (2011). Technology use Internet search engines to learn a foreign
language. English language school – English at school, 1 (33), 5-19.
Sysoev, P.C., Evstigneev, N.M. (2008). Modern educational Internet resources in
teaching foreign language. Foreign languages at school, 6, 2-9.
Voevoda, E.V. (2009). Internet technologies in teaching foreign languages: the use of
internet technologies in foreign language teaching. Higher education in Russia,
9, 110-114. 

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