Modeling of content and language integrated learning for students of economics

Abstract

The English language is considered to be the global language of communication and professional activity in the field of Economics. One of the effective techniques of professional communicative competence is Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL). The aim of the research is to elaborate the model of CLIL for students of Economics at the Volga State University of Technology. Such methods as theoretical (literature review, analysis, generalization, comparison, interpretation, analogy, modeling), general empiric (study and generalization of teaching practices), specific empiric (questionnaires, testing, observation, documents review) statistical (processing of questionnaires and testing results) proved successful in the course of research. The undertaken research allowed identifying the interest of the majority of teachers and students of Economics in using the English language when teaching and learning some subject-matter disciplines. Consequently, it is possible to make a conclusion concerning the necessity of taking some special measures such as preliminary language courses, meeting the organizational and financial requirements. The research results have allowed to establish that the intermediate (according to the scale ‘soft-hard’) subject-led model is the most appropriate for the implementation in the educational process of students of Economics at the Volga State University of Technology. For this purpose, the authors elaborated the conceptual didactic CLIL model.