ANALYTICAL READING FOR STUDENTS-PHILOLOGISTS IN THE ENGLISH CLASS

Abstract

  The study aims to investigate the higher education students’ and teachers’ perception of using literary text in the foreign language course; to evaluate learners’ progress in the foreign language communicative competence throughout the experiment period; to outline the policies and strategies of using analytical reading in the English class, which lead to increasing motivation to learn foreign languages with a focus on literature. The study involves 85 Bachelor’s degree students and 35 teachers from linguistics and translation departments of three universities: Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute, National Aviation University, Kütahya Dumlupinar University during the spring term in the school year 2021/2022. The students from these universities were using analytical reading in foreign language learning during this term. The quantitative research method allowed us to assess the students’ progress in the development of their foreign language analytical reading skills, that included the understanding of the culture of foreign language, literary and aesthetic skills, vocabulary and foreign language skills, critical thinking and problem solving, inferential and interpretational skills. The qualitative research method was used to interpret the data of the experiment. Three questionnaires were employed as an instrument to assess teachers’ and learners’ perceptions of using literary texts in foreign language teaching/learning; to monitor the development of student’s skills in analytical reading. The students-philologists involved in the research increased their motivation to learn English as a foreign language through literary texts and showed progress in the development of analytical reading skills up to 16%. The results obtained can be implemented into the practice of foreign language teaching as literary texts enriched the language input in the classroom and stimulated language acquisition, and analytical reading involved students-philologists emotionally challenging their imagination and creativity.