Vol 18, No 4 (2020)

Due to the pandemic in the spring of 2020, all educational institutions in China had to organize distance learning. It was crucial to introduce effective teaching methods and to use distance learning technologies. The authors of the article described the way online education was organized during the “quarantine” semester on the example of teaching “Practical Russian grammar” at Jilin International Studies University (Changchun, China). The purpose of the research is to describe the three-step process of teaching “Practical Russian grammar” to foreign students and the way distance learning technologies were used. The teachers organized online classes on “Practical Russian grammar” using BOPPPS model for lesson planning (five teaching steps: B - bridge-in, O - objective, P - pre-assessment, P - participatory, P - post-assessment, S - summary). Lessons were based on this method and the educational process included three steps: 1) students used Xuexitong application to acquire primary knowledge before the lesson; 2) classroom work was organized through the Xuexitong and DingTalk applications - it was aimed at internalization and expansion of knowledge, the ultimate goal was to develop Russian grammar skills; 3) using Xuexitong and DingTalk applications after the classes, the students improved their grammar and communication skills. In addition, the authors of the article proposed the ways to improve the knowledge assessment system and the entire educational process based on the suggested online learning model. Results and scientific novelty are that a practice-oriented approach to language learning can be implemented on the basis of the proposed teaching method. Such an approach enables students to have constant access to a large number of educational resources and to be promptly informed of any changes, which meets learners’ individual needs and increases their motivation, self-learning abilities and self-organization. Apart from that, students learn better and improve their oral and written communication skills.

The significance of this paper is in its contribution to the innovative and rapidly developing research area of Russian as a heritage language (RHL) around the world. The purpose of the reported study is to explore Russian vocabulary development by bi-/multilingual children acquiring Russian as a heritage language in Canada. The materials come from vocabulary development and non-canonical lexical forms (NCF, earlier known as “errors”) in the speech of 29 bi-/multilingual children (between the ages of 5 and 6) from immigrant families in Saskatchewan, Canada (RHL group) as well as of 13 monolinguals from Russia (MR group). The study employs a method of a comparative analysis of vocabulary in picture-prompted narratives by children from the above two groups. The results demonstrate that bi-/multilingual RHL speaking children produced significantly more lexical NCFs as compared to their monolingual peers (MR), whereas narrative length in words, speech rate in wpm and vocabulary size did not differ across the two groups. Most NCFs in the RHL sample related to the use of verbs, followed by NCFs in the use of nouns. Unlike the speech of MR speakers, RHL participants’ language use exhibits some slight impact of dialectal forms, a few borrowings from English and code-switches to English. The study has applications for the theory of bi-/multilingualism as well as for teaching RHL to children of immigrants in North American and other contexts.

This article deals with the issues related to speaking skills development among advanced students outside the language environment. The importance of this subject is determined by the crucial role that speaking assumes in the light of communicative approach to teaching Russian as a foreign language. The goal of the study is testing the effectiveness of regular use of role-play activities when working on untrivial B2 topics with advanced students under conditions of few in-class hours. The paper presents an overview of the scientific methodological work on the subject and generalizes teaching experience accumulated in the sphere of higher education in Italy. The research demonstrated that the use of role-play activities as a key didactic technique leads to an increased amount of speech produced by Italian students in the Russian language classroom. The author stresses the importance of role-play activities as it represents an extremely flexible technique that can be successfully adapted to a wide range of topics and objectives. It also contributes to creating a more comfortable and stimulating atmosphere in order to involve students into a live communication process and to boost their motivation. Finally, the article reports on the results of the inquiry carried out among students that confirm the effectiveness of the applied approach.

The actuality of the undertaken research is conditioned by the necessity to study the role of Russian literature and journalism, separate linguistic programs of the middle of the 18th century in assertion of the main characteristics of the literary standard, which began to take shape in 80 years of this century. The aim of the scientific study is to analyze the similarities and differences between the linguistic theories of A. Sumarokov and V. Trediakovsky, to establish the place of this polemic in the history of Russian literary language of the 18th century, its significance for the formation of the literary standard. The language material is the original text of Sumarokov's article “To typographers” (“K tipografskim naborshhikam”), published in the May issue of the journal “Trudolyubivaya pchela” (1759). The system of views of scholars and writers of the mid-18th century on the Russian language are presented by means of descriptive and comparative methods with revealing the specifics of each language concept. An integral part of the methodology was the observation of the word usage in the texts by A. Sumarokov and V. Trediakovsky. The use of methods of linguoculturology made it possible to present linguistic polemics as a phenomenon of Russian culture. The extra-linguistic method and the method of reconstruction from historical sources were used to establish the phenomena of extra-linguistic reality that influenced the problems of the philological discussion. The results of the research showed that the extra-linguistic reason for writing the article was determined, the tradition of the writers' appealing to the typesetters in the history of domestic printing of the first half of the 18th century was traced, the group of works with which Sumarokov-philologist enters polemics was determined, the main concepts of the article were identified, the position of Sumarokov from the point of view of normalization of graphic, morphological, orthographic practice in the middle of the 18th century was fixed; the article by Sumarokov was considered in accordance with the concept of metatextual unity in the world. The prospects of the research relate to the fundamental theoretical development of the role of 18th century Russian literature in the formation of the Russian literary language standard.

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