Abstract:

At the present stage of the development of education the necessity to introduce new technologies and innovative practices in the educational process in order to increase students’ motivation and develop competitive and competent professionals has become unquestionable. Foreign language instruction in this regard can be viewed as the most fertile ground for the introduction of new learning platforms, given that most of innovations are presented in the languages that have gained the status of primacy in the international arena. The article describes the linguistic, methodological and cultural potential of media discourse in the modern professionally focused teaching of foreign languages, English and Spanish in particular. According to the authors, songs and advertising discourse can serve as highly accessible and most effective didactic material to use in the classroom in higher education institutions. Being an effective instrument of influence on the audience, songs, music videos and commercials have a significant potential in foreign language learning as they contribute to better acquisition of the material and the development of students’ communicative skills, allow teachers to modify the lesson content and organize the interaction with the students in a most felicitous way thus increasing the effectiveness of the educational process. Besides, the use of media discourse in foreign language teaching allows students to acquaint themselves with the cultural identity of a particular linguistic community, as media discourse possesses a certain cultural code.

The article presents a variety of tasks and exercises with fragments of media discourse that enable the formation and implementation of the communicative competence of students. It focuses on the most effective techniques that can be used in the classroom to improve the students’ language skills by viewing and discussing advertisements and song videos, listening to radio broadcasts and authentic records and others. This article provides guidance for English and Spanish instructors on the productive use of media resources in the classroom and ways of their incorporation in the educational process when developing different kinds of language skills.