Abstract:

The aim of this paper is to describe the experience of forming the professional foreign language communicative competence (PFLCC) in postgraduate study in the field of "Earth Sciences" in RUDN University. In accordance with the Federal State Educational Standard (FSES) "05.06.01 Earth Sciences", postgraduate education in an environmental profile includes a set of competencies. The PFLCC is one of them. The PFLCC of an ecologist-researcher is the ability of a graduate student to perform in the mode of a secondary linguistic personality in the academic and professional situation of communication with colleagues/partners from other countries and the readiness to carry out intercultural academic and professional interaction in a multicultural environment in the field of ecology.
According to the definition of the PFLCC the tasks of teaching in postgraduate study of the ecological profile are determined as:
• development of the readiness to perceive and understand foreign scientific information, foreign scientific picture of the world;
• development of the ability to generate and perceive academic environmental discourse in the process of academic and professional activities;
• development of the ability to overcome communication barriers to achieve academic and professional goals;
• mastering certain cognitive methods, allowing to perform cognitive and communicative activities;
• development of individual psychological characteristics and abilities of interpersonal academic interaction;
• development of educational and compensatory skills, as well as the ability of constant self-improvement;
• stimulation of the intellectual and emotional development of an individual.
The model of training is maximally correlated with future professional research activities and is set by the situations of academic communication. An analysis of the intercultural academic communication of ecologists allows us to determine its components and build a training model focused on spoken and written forms of academic communication and presented in the learning process as mutually complementary modules. Accordingly, the following modules are included in the training model: annotating and abstracting (written and spoken) scientific texts of the ecological profile, scientific report, scientific discussion, business correspondence, scientific translation (written, spoken).
The practical application of this model for a number of years has shown its effectiveness, which is confirmed, in particular, by the publication activity in foreign languages in the proceedings of scientific conferences and journals, as well as giving reports at conferences, participation in scientific discussion during plenary and parallel sessions.

The publication was financially supported by the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation (The agreement No 02.A03.21.0008).

Keywords:

Ecologist-researcher, cross-cultural academic communication, professional foreign language communicative competence, postgraduate study.