Orenburg state university

English courses: simple and easy

Throughout the week, Kathryn Rexford, lecturer from Lancaster (Ohio, USA), hold an advanced teachers training course for English Philology and English Language Teaching Methodology Department staff.

Her visits have already become a good tradition. She comes to Orenburg in June to exchange experience with her Russian colleagues and to conduct practical trainings for the 15^th time in a row. The lecturer has been speaking about the modern English-speaking worldview for the whole week.

“Katheryn knows how to entice the listener — says Natalia Lashtabova, associate professor of the English Philology and English Language Teaching Methodology Department — she touches upon the aspects of the communication theory in different linguistic cultures, which is indispensable to modern linguists. The lecturer reveals a multitude of linguistic techniques that will be useful for working with students and for communication with native speakers”.

Course participants point out that thanks to real-life communication with Kathryn they understand better how to use in speech some American language rules.

“The lecturer never ‘just reads’ the material from her notes — says Natalia Lashtabova. — All her classes are light hearted, they are held in an informal manner, and she immediately finds the answers to all arising questions”. This year students and graduates of the Faculty of Philology and Journalism were also afforded the opportunity to practice conversational English being invited to attend her classes.

Meeting with Eduard Yasakov, head of OSU International Cooperation Department and Natalya Yankina, director of Foreign Citizens Office led the parties to discuss the issues of the further cooperation. Eduard Yasakov brought her up to speed on the new university partners, and Kathryn, in her turn, told about the lectures for the university staff and shared her plans for the upcoming year.

Kathryn also met with university professors and postgraduates of the General and Professional Pedagogy Department to discuss the classification of educational goals elaborated by the American educational psychologist Benjamin Samuel Bloom in the 1960s. It is noteworthy that school curriculum traditionally was designed to have the hierarchy “knowledge — comprehension — application — analysis — synthesis — evaluation”, however, now both Russian and American modern educational systems set teaching objectives in such a way that students at any learning stage from primary school go through all these stages at once.