Academic English

Relation to curriculum

• General competence course

Language

• English

Description

The course aims at the enrichment of academic vocabulary necessary in research settings and the development of professionally oriented communicative competences through the implementation of tasks inherent in the scientific environment.

The course provides activities efficient to disseminate a culture of scientific communication at international conferences, forums, symposia and in scientific publishing. It promotes the growth of international communication and cooperation between academics on a global scale.

The course incorporates activities that train learner’s ability to make presentations on professional, academic topics and to write research reports by effectively linking linguistic choices with their communicative intentions.

Learning outcomes

• Freely present (orally and in writing) and discuss the results of scientific research in English, understand professional, scientific and educational publications on relevant topics.
• Independently determine professional and personal development tasks, engage in self-education, consciously plan, and implement advanced training.
• Find and critically interpret the necessary information, using different language professional, scientific and academic sources, predict information using headings, subheadings, etc.; generalize, paraphrase and synthesize ideas from different types of texts (e.g., scientific articles, research projects).

Content

The content of educational material and the organization of the educational process focuses on intensive reading, grammar, scientific discussions and acquisition of academic vocabulary items generally used in research-related environment.

The module selectively covers: 

• World languages. English as the language of research and education.
• Communicating with scientific community. Academic vocabulary to establish a research territory. International communication style. 
• Speaking about academic culture. Cautious manner of academic discourse. Avoiding plagiarism.
• Features and elements of academic genres. 
• Describing and presenting data: interpreting graphs, charts, diagrams.
• Making a presentation on scientific research. Speaking about research and study aims. Planning a career in science.

Assessment

Formative assessment (50 points) + Final exam (50 points)