ACTIVITY-ORIENTED STRATEGY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE ACQUISITION BY YOUNG LEARNERS

ACTIVITY-ORIENTED STRATEGY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE ACQUISITION BY YOUNG LEARNERS

Ayaulym Akylbekova

Master student, Faculty of Foreign language: two foreign languages University of International Business,

Kazakhstan, Almaty

ABSTRACT

It is much easier to gain new knowledge while being a child due to the fact that their memory is like a sponge which gets a lot of interesting information. Today, various modern foreign languages are always changing. It is believed  that the way we are learning foreign languages is changing, and the way we are teaching them is also changing. In the following years, foreign language acquisition was perceived as an important educational objective. A great practical role of getting familiar with the culture of the target language countries was emphasized. Therefore, scientists, methodologists and teachers faced the task to provide new aims, conditions and strategies for improving the process of teaching and learning foreign languages as a means of intercultural communication.

The organization of early learning and development of preschool children in the vast majority of cases is based on the fact that a foreign language is an isolated "subject", which is in no way connected with the general tasks of the development of different aspects of the child's personality.When assessing the success of teaching a foreign language, the child is required to know a specific number of words, the ability to answer a standard answer to a standard question, i.e., purely mnemonic skills, the child's memory are checked, but not the foreign language proficiency in the process of communication. Nowadays, it is impossible for a modern person literally “to survive” without knowledge of foreign languages. The age of students has also changed. If until now the methodology was focused primarily on schoolchildren, now parents are trying to start teaching children a foreign language as early as possible. [1,p.23]. Moreover, the preschool age is recognized by psychologists as the most favorable period for this type of activity. Early learning develops the child's mental functions, satisfies his cognitive needs, creates excellent opportunities to arouse interest in the linguistic and cultural diversity of the world, respect for the languages and cultures of other peoples, and promotes the development of communicative and speech tact.

It is not the knowledge itself that becomes necessary, but the knowledge of how and where to apply it. But even more important is the knowledge of how to extract, interpret, or create new information. Both are the results of activity, and activity is the solution of problems. If you are willing to shift the focus in education from the assimilation of the facts (of knowledge) to master the ways of interacting with the world (score – abilities), we come to realize the need to change the nature of the educational process. With this approach to learning, the main element of students ' work will be solving problems, i.e., mastering activities, especially new types of activities: educational research, search and design, creativity.[2,p.27]
In parallel with the development of the activity, the student will be able to form their own system of values, supported by society. From a passive consumer of knowledge, the student becomes an active subject of educational activity.

Activity aspect of the content of the learning activity model of learning is that learning content has activity in connection with the solution of the problem activities and communications as the mastery of the social norm, verbal activity and non-verbal types of expression, i.e. the educational process is:

• interaction,
• solving communication  problems.

"Environment teaching activities provide the necessary condition of relations in the educational environment, which is based on trust, cooperation,  protective, communication for the student. Solving a communication problem requires  first of all, forming  necessity (for example, in the form of questions), then – how to implement this necessity. The student can implement it himself,  in this case, he enters into communication: with himself or with someone. The answers to the questions solving the problem or leading to  new problems [3,p.69].For the organization of educational activities, the most interesting  tasks are  the intellectual and cognitive plans, which can be realized by the student himself as a quest for knowledge and the necessity to assimilate this knowledge  as a desire to expand the horizons can deeply  systematize the  knowledge.

This is an activity which is in accordance with a specifically human cognitivity, intellectual need  is characterized by a positive emotional background that contributes to the motivation of the student to work persistently and enthusiastically on the educational task, opposing other motivators and distractions. Teaching young learners is a very difficult task, which requires a completely different methodological approach if compare with teaching schoolchildren. The leading method of teaching a foreign language to preschoolers is a game. At this age most of the students are able to learn languages faster due to the luck of so-called language barrier and fear of failing. Another reason of fast learning of preschoolers is differentiation of flexibility and linguistic material memorization with help of association and natural explanation of communication;

In оur approaсh wе prefer an entertаining form of eduсаtion, using visual aids, sensory perception in order to develop creativity in students. In addition, playful form of teaching allows to make any language units communicatevly valuable[4,p.179].

All this allow at an early age to optimally combine the communicative needs and the possibilities of their expression in a foreign language by children of this age and thereby avoid one significant contradiction that constantly arises with a later beginning of learning this subject between the student’s communicative needs and limited language and speech experience. Preschoolers have good speech hearing and a tenacious language memory. They also have a strong emotional-figurative perception of language.

Teaching a foreign language to preschoolers allows you to develop in children:

• Interest in learning a foreign language;
• Creative independence;
• Ability to work in a team;
• Communication skills;
• Attention;
• Imagination;
•  Memory;
• Adaptation of children to school life [5,p.82].

The technology of the activity method considers learning as a specially organized process, during which the child carries out educational activities – performs educational actions on the material of the educational subject.

An important difference between a person-centered lesson is the organization of the educational material. For each lesson, the teacher selects didactic material (illustrative, handout, etc.), which allows him to use tasks of varying degrees of complexity in the course of the lesson. The ranking of tasks is carried out by identifying the objective complexity of the material, student’s interest in the subject content and their individual capabilities when performing training, creative, and problem tasks. An important feature of the personality-oriented lesson is the interaction of the teacher and the student. Educational dialogue in a person-centered lesson can be considered a specific type of technology. Educational dialogue is not only a method of teaching, but also an integral component, the internal content of any personality - oriented lesson.

The activity approach focuses students not only on the assimilation of knowledge, but also on the ways of assimilation, on patterns and ways of thinking and activity, on the development of cognitive forces and creative potential of the student. So, the technology of training in active learning models that focus on the individual student, with the position of the student is to implement different types of operations to solve problems with student's personal – semantic in nature, learning objectives become an integrative part of the activities, for which the student becomes an integral part of the activities for which the student becomes vital functions. An activity is adequate to the acquired knowledge if it is analogous to the activity of a person trained to it. In the general context of the theory of educational activity, the actions of goal-setting, programming, planning, control, and evaluation are distinguished from the position of its subject. And from the point of view of the activity itself-transformative, performing, control. Much attention in the overall structure of educational activities is given to the actions of control (self-control) and evaluation (self-assessment). Self-control and evaluation of the teacher contribute to the formation of self-esteem.

Teaching foreign language to young learners plays an essential role in all over the world. Moreover, students who study foreign languages also find themselves exposed to new cultures. Therefore, people say that language is culture and culture is a language. This builds a sense of empathy and cross-cultural competency in children, as they begin to understand and grow in curiosity toward a new people group. It means that in order to effectively learn a new language, students need to be as engaged as possible even when outside of the classroom.

References:

1. Çiftçi, E. Importance of Teaching English at an Early Age [Electronic Resource]. – Available on-line at:: http://eyasinciftci.wordpress.com/importance-ofteaching-english-at-an-early-age. Accessed: (2019, February, 22) [1,p.23]
2. Lenneberg, E. Biological Foundations of Language. New York: John Wiley & Sons.- 1967 [2,p.27]
3. Singleton, D. The Age Factor in Second Language Acquisition: A Critical Look at the Critical Period Hypothesis. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters Ltd.- 1995 [3,p.69]
4. Siraj-Blatchford, I., Clarke, P. Supporting Identity, Diversity & Language in the Early Years - Open University Press. – 2002 [4,p.179]
5. Teaching English As a Second Language to Preschool Students [Electronic Resource]. – Available on-line at:: http://www.eleducador.com/ecu/ index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=151:teaching-english-as-asecond-language-to-preschool-students&catid=45:ingles&Itemid=41. Accessed (2019, February) [5,p.82].