Project based learning in teaching communication skills in English as a foreign language to engineering students

The aim of this paper is to consider project based learning as one of the most efficient and productive methods used in teaching English as a foreign language to engineering students of Russian technical universities. Special emphasis is put on communication skills to be mastered by future engineers through project based learning. It is of great importance to note that highly developed oral and written communication skills are valuable for engineering students wishing to become successful and competitive in the international arena. Hence, engineering students must be trained well to develop their communication skills in English in the field of professional activity, mainly in the science research area. An inter-disciplinary project designed on the basis of project based learning for the second year students of Tomsk Polytechnic University is reviewed in this work. The authors come to the conclusion that project based learning is an ideal teaching method since it allows engineering students to improve significantly their oral and written communication skills as well as apply the content knowledge in the field of their professional activity within the English language course

Interactive technology in teaching English oral academic discourse to master students

Modern educational paradigm based on the principles of learners’ initiative, focus on competences, computer-aided instruction requires designing of appropriate educational technologies that promote accomplishment of up-to-date top priority objectives of foreign language education. In the framework of this study, the authors examine and describe an interactive educational technology that aims at engagement of learners in the process of their professional activity integrated with the context of foreign language communication in the newly emerged forms by appropriate means of interaction. The paper focuses on specific features of the interactive technology that define content, approaches, methods and principles of teaching. The problem of determining the aspects of learning and teaching activities is discussed. The teachinglearning algorithm developed on the basis of the interactive technology is proposed. The algorithm involves application of several interaction-based methods, namely the project-based learning, tandem method, event-based learning, cooperative learning, and includes 12 steps. The major specificity of the teaching model manifests itself in the new-type nature of the teaching-learning process which takes place in the project-based research coworking. The results of the approbation have demonstrated that the interactive educational technology is characterized by a number of features, such as integrality, eventfulness, productivity, contextuality, contributing to the actualization of the subject position of Master students and their active verbal interaction. The results of experimental teaching have proved the effectiveness of the interactive educational technology in developing new types of communicative skills in Master students aimed at their ability to perform the function of confident interlocutors in academic communication

Reproductive health as qualitative population characteristics

Reproductive health is an essential part of population health and qualitative characteristics of population reproduction. The purpose of this article is to estimate the most important characteristics of reproductive health in the last years in the socio-hygienic conditions of the Siberian Federal district. As the main indicators of reproductive health are considered the incidence of reproductive sphere of women, the prevalence of abortions, maternal, perinatal, infant mortality, infertility. It is shown that the prevalence of diseases that have emerged in the period of pregnancy and the postnatal period, the Siberian Federal district has steadily been in the top three of disadvantaged territories of Russia. Morbidity of pregnant women in the Siberian Federal district by 2010, above the Russian average: on diseases of blood circulation system - by 22,7 %, diseases of urine-genital sphere - by 13,8 %, violations of generic activity - by 12,8 %. In conditions of reduction of the level of reproductive health found a high level of oncological diseases of the reproductive system of women. Incidence of cancer of the mammary gland is growing. However, in the Siberian Federal district has been positive trend in reducing the number of abortions, maternal, infant and perinatal mortality. So, for the period of 2005-2010 prevalence of abortions has decreased by 20,6 %, the maternal mortality rate decreased from 54,5 in 2000 to 19,1 in 2010, per 100 000 live births. However, in spite of a relatively steady decline in the number of cases of maternal mortality, the difference of this indicatorfor the residents of the towns and villages increases. This unfavorable situation points to the need for greater availability of high-quality obstetric-gynecologic assistance to inhabitants of villages. At the present time it can be assumed violation of long-term dynamics of infant mortality rate due to more intensive inclusion in the procreation of marginalized groups of women (medico-social effect of the measures under the name of «mother's capital»). Thus, already in 2007, increased number of born full term children with a syndrome of intrauterine development, which may be the result of inclusion in the process of the birth of a new, qualitatively different groups of women, which leads to the transformation of the social structure of the parturient women. This has a tremendous impact on the dynamics of all reproductive indicators