Abstract:

The paper deals with approaches to teaching phraseological units at the English lessons and practical recommendations of how to improve speaking skills and encourage students’ further learning through phraseological units.

The role of the phraseology in foreign language acquisition has been recognized by many scholars. The fixed phrases of any language is an embodiment of the national consciousness because the language can be considered as the memory of the people. In this respect, phraseological units are of particular interest, as they often have national markedness. Moreover, they contain information about the people, their customs, traditions, values, about their past, present and future and are closely connected with the history, culture, traditions and literature of the people speaking the language. Currently, phraseological units play an important role in the communication of people by enlivening their speech. According to the researches, even Native speakers don’t know the meaning of phraseological units and their contextual usage. Meanwhile, they enrich our language. That’s why learning phraseological units and their usage in speech are so crucial nowadays, especially for students learning English.

The necessity of searching efficient methods to develop speaking skills of students who live in non-English speaking community, increasing their motivation, overcoming lingual-cultural barriers determine the motivation for the study.

Foreign language acquisition, in particular its speaking aspect, is a challenging process. One of the approaches to motivate speech, making lessons more interesting is developing speaking skills through phraseological units in various communicative situations.

The paper reviews state of the art approaches to teach speaking through the phraseology, presents the experience of teaching phraseological units at Kazan Federal University for technical students and practical tips of how to create real-to-life speaking situations and motivate students by introducing phraseological units. One of the main advantages of the above-mentioned approach is that having mastered speaking skills through phraseological units, students rarely face with problems, such as a lack of means of language and speech, transition to the native language. In addition, phraseological units make their speech more effective and lively.

The original contribution of our study is developing the approach to improve speaking skills through phraseological units as well as increasing motivation of students.

Keywords:

Phraseological units, teaching approach, speaking skills, English.