Abstract:

In the Russian Federation there is a significant diversity of cultures of the peoples living in its territory. The North Caucasus is a unique cultural space and the most densely populated area, in which more than 6 million representatives of the North Caucasian peoples live. They speak the national (North Caucasian) languages.

Problem Statement: Caucasian children of primary school age at the time of the start of primary school education do not speak Russian. But, Russian, according to the Law «On Education in the Russian Federation», is the language of instruction in all Russian schools.

There is a pedagogical problem - the need to overcome barriers in the study of the Russian language among younger schoolchildren arises.
Methods and source base research are purposeful observation, pedagogical experiment, content analysis, comparison, thesaurus method of interpretation and generalization. We study the difficulties in learning the Russian language and the possibility of overcoming them among younger schoolchildren belonging to non-Russian peoples and living in Chechnya, Dagestan and in the South of the Rostov region.

Results and discussion:
Difficulties in the study of the Russian language by children of primary school age who enter the school from the linguistic atmosphere of the family, which is spoken in national languages, are established.
The phenomenon of linguistic interference, which is the main obstacle to children mastering Russian, is studied. Children, for whom Russian language is not native, try to transfer the structures of the national language to Russian, for which these structures are not peculiar.
The effectiveness of overcoming this phenomenon by pedagogical means is shown: using the lingua-social-cultural technique, didactic games, creating situations of speaking in Russian based on the use of drawing techniques and outdoor games.

Conclusion:
It is concluded that teaching Russian language as a non-native language can be effective and entertaining based on the formation of motivation for speaking. It is shown that the system of training primary school teachers for work in the North Caucasus should include elements of special vocational training, taking into account the peculiarities of children’s proficiency in the national language before mastering the Russian language.

Keywords:

Barriers, difficulties, overcoming of difficulties, non-native language, primary school, speaking situation.