2024/2025

English for General Communication Purposes

Type: Optional course

Delivered by: School of Foreign Languages

When: 1, 2 module

Open to: students of one campus

Instructors: Yulia Mikhailovna Chanturidze

Language: English

ECTS credits: 3

Contact hours: 48

Course Syllabus

Abstract

The discipline refers to the variable educational tracks offered to students of the curricula for bachelor's and master's degree at choice while mastering the optional course of English in accordance with the Concept of Development of English-language Communicative Competence of HSE Students. English for General Communication Purposes is a course that aims (1) to build students’ confidence in using English in different life situations and contexts, i.e. home, university, work, tourism, and (2) to develop students’ language skills and communicative competences. The course is designed to assist students in achieving the level of independent users through developing reading, listening, writing and speaking skills, attaining excellence in vocabulary management and grammatical accuracy. The course offers a variety of authentic materials that familiarize students with real English expressions and scenarios, provides an array of contemporary topics for discussion and develops 21st century skills such as critical thinking, text analysis, and digital literacy. The course develops a solid general English base for further success in learning English for academic or special purposes, taking international examinations, as well as future academic studies and research.

Learning Objectives

• Comprehensive development of skills and competences to the B2+ CEFR level (HSE Scale 60-69 points)
• Improvement of students’ command of English for interpersonal and intercultural communication
• Enhancement of receptive and productive skills related to general purposes
• Expansion of vocabulary on a variety of topics
• Expansion of grammar structures in use

Expected Learning Outcomes

• Produce monologues (descriptive/informative/reasoning); write down notes for later reference; communicate spontaneously their opinions and reactions, providing explanations and examples, and invite others to join in; participate in debates (debate on abstract, complex topics)
• Understand academic/ professional presentations which are linguistically complex; use basic listening techniques (predicting, understanding main ideas and details); participate in conversations and discussions on a range of topics
• Understand text structure; understand lectures; following extended speech and complex lines of arguments; give clear and detailed talks on a wide range of topics, expanding ideas with relevant examples, evidence, or arguments; write clear, well-structured texts on a variety of subjects expanding points of view, developing arguments, synthesising and evaluating information (essays, reviews)

Course Contents

• Life
• Plans and actions
• Events
• News

Assessment Elements

• Written assessment
  Written assessment includes minimum 1 reading test, minimum 1 listening test, and minimum 1 written work (graph description). The test tasks can be of different types. If necessary, the number of tests and works can be increased by a course instructor.
• Oral assessment
  Oral assessment includes minimum 1 monologue.
• Independent work assessment
  Independent work includes activities that students do at home and minimum 2 lexical-grammar tests.
• Final assessment
  The exam consists of 3 parts: Listening (30%), Reading (30%) and Writing (40%) respectively in the total mark for the exam. 0 points in case of cheating.

Interim Assessment

• 2024/2025 2nd module
  0.3 * Final assessment + 0.25 * Independent work assessment + 0.2 * Oral assessment + 0.25 * Written assessment

Bibliography

Recommended Core Bibliography

• Roadmap B2+ : students' book with digital resources and mobile app, Bygrave, J., 2020

Recommended Additional Bibliography

• A GUIDE TO EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION IN ENGLISH: Учебное пособие / Вертоградова Л.А., Манжелеевская Е.В., Милькевич Е.С. - Ростов-на-Дону:Издательство ЮФУ, 2016. - 160 с.: ISBN 978-5-9275-2004-6 - Режим доступа: http://znanium.com/catalog/product/990026
• A student's introduction to English grammar, Huddleston, R., 2015
• Комаров, А. С. A Practical Grammar of English for Students. Практическая грамматика английского языка для студентов : учебное пособие / А. С. Комаров. — 3-е изд., стер. — Москва : ФЛИНТА, 2017. — 243 с. — ISBN 978-5-89349-848-6. — Текст : электронный // Лань : электронно-библиотечная система. — URL: https://e.lanbook.com/book/100033 (дата обращения: 00.00.0000). — Режим доступа: для авториз. пользователей.

Authors

• CHANTURIDZE YULIYA MIKHAYLOVNA