The application of the CLIL technology in the development of foreign language lexical and grammatical skills of students in digital educational environment

Abstract

Introduction. In a multicultural and multilingual society, it is hardly possible to find a modern person who does not speak any foreign language and is not able to integrate his language knowledge into the structure of his activity. The concept of applying CLIL digital technology in a foreign language teaching seems to be one of the promising areas of modern linguodidactics and is due to the conceptual ideas of modernizing the system of education. The purpose of the study is to verify the subject-language integrated learning in the formation of lexical and grammatical skills of students of German in a digital educational environment. Materials and methods. Quizizz, Wordwall, Learning Apps, MyQuiz (for tests and interactive tasks), Gamilab (for quest games), Boris Bot (for creating a chat bot), Podomatic (for podcasts) have been used as digital tools for compiling a set of exercises. 55 fifth year students of Kazan (Volga Region) Federal University, the major is "Teacher training (a double-degree programmme)" (bachelor degree course), have been selected to attend the pedagogical experiment. Statistical processing of the samples of the control and experimental groups has been carried out according of the Pearson’s chi-squared test. Study results. The following steps were observed in the process of lexico-grammatical skills formation with the integration of CLIL technology: introduction or presentation of new course content, training, speech practice and reflection. For each of these stages, a digital toolkit has been selected which enabled us to create interactive tests, games, web quests based on design kits and services for students. A step-by-step methodology for the formation of lexical and grammatical skills using CLIL in a digital educational environment has proven effective in developing the following skills: to group vocabulary semantically, to translate from Russian into German, to describe illustrations, based on the trained lexical and grammatical content, to present the result of the completed project work in written and oral form. The effectiveness of the methodology for the formation of lexical and grammatical skills using subject-language integrated learning in digital educational environment has been confirmed by a pedagogical experiment conducted with the university students’ participation (χ2 emp. = 7,30, p<0,05). Conclusions. The results obtained can be applied in German language teaching, in upper-secondary and high schools with advanced curriculum in German, grammar schools and lyceums. The developed educational and methodological technology for the implementation of integrated subject-language training can become the basis for creating a study guide. The results of the study contribute to the development of digital linguodidactics; the set of developed tasks can become an incentive for more intensive application of CLIL technology in a foreign language teaching.