Pokonferencyjna

THE IMPORTANCE OF DEVELOPING SOCIOLINGUISTIC 
COMPETENCE IN TEACHING EFL
Dina Mamirbaeva,
Ph.D., senior teacher of English Language and Literature Department, NukSPI
Shirin Aymanova,
2-nd-year master-student of Linguistics Department, KarSU
Ключевые слова: обучение иностранному языку, образовательные реформы, 
социолингвистическая компетенция, использование видео-материалов, 
аутентичный язык
Key words: foreign language teaching, educational reforms, sociolinguistic compe-
tence, using video materials, authentic language
Аннотация
В данной статье рассказывается об использовании видео как материал для 
изучения иностранного языка и роли развития социолингвистической 
компетенции в обучении английскому языку.
Annotation
This article deals with using video materials as foreign language learning material 
and the role of developing sociolinguistic competence in teaching English.

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  33 
PHILOLOGY,  SOCIOLOGY AND CULTUROLOGY №14
ment programme for teachers of English 
working in higher and vocational institu-
tions, including universities, institutes, 
colleges or lyceums in Uzbekistan. The 
course meets all modern international 
requirements for professional develop-
ment programmes and was developed 
jointly by the British Council, the Minis-
try of Higher and Secondary Specialised 
Education of the Republic of Uzbekistan, 
the Scientific-Practical Innovation Centre   
and under the consultancy of Rod Bo-
litho, British famous and experiences 
methodologist and expert expert in the 
area of education. The course consists of 
3 modules. They are: two face-to-face and 
one online learning modules.
The aim  of the programme is to im-
prove the English language standards 
across the country as part of the strategy 
of the Ministry of Higher and Secondary 
Specialised Education.  This strategy can 
be implemented only if the standards of 
the English language among teachers of 
English are raised.
The course materials are designed to 
encourage investigation into English and 
to give participating teachers an opportu-
nity to identify and work on areas of their 
own English that need improvement. Im-
proving language proficiency takes time 
and hard work, which is why Module 
2 online) is spread over a long period. 
It is worth noting that the role of PD 
programs is crucial. Teachers will be able 
to develop their communicative compe-
tences, as the successful language use for 
communication presupposes the develop-
ment of communicative competence in 
the users of that language and that the use 
of language is constrained by the socio-
cultural norms of the society where the 
language is used. [Ruzmetova N. Com-
municative competence in English lan-
guage teaching // Молодой  ученый., 
2017, №24]
Moreover, this course encourages par-
ticipants to raise their competences. All of 
us know, that now in the 21
st
 century it is 
not enough to develop learners’ language 
skills, we have to prepare not only skillful, 
but competent in terms of the language 
usage generation.
Sociolinguistics can be defined as the 
science that investigates the aims and 
functions of language in society. Lan-
guage differs from one context to an-
other across geographical borders and 
how people in one context communicate 
with people in other contexts, for exam-
ple, native speaker-nonnative speaker; 
nonnative speaker-nonnative speaker 
etc. So, developing sociolinguistic com-
petence is one of the requirements of 
educational standards and, naturally, re-
quirement of contemporary rapidly de-
veloping life.
Many various researchers are done by 
scholars, but sociolinguistics is a remark-
ably broad field and there are still lots of 
topics of current interest to investigate in 
our learning and teaching English con-
text.
In this article I would like to share 
here my experience of attending in pro-
fessional development program “EFT” 
and to share one of the sessions, devoted 
to features of spoken English language.
There were several objectives of the 
described lesson and one of them was to 

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34 
MONOGRAFIA POKONFERENCYJNA
identify different ways of developing so-
ciolinguistic awareness in learning con-
texts.
At the very beginning for involving 
students into the topic I have chosen lead-
in activity which asks students to think 
individually of five words (or short phras-
es) that make spoken communication 
different to written communication. (For 
that period of lesson my students were 
aware of types of discourse-written and 
spoken). A teacher asks students to com-
pare their words with a partner to find if 
they have identified any common quali-
ties of spoken communication. Then a 
teacher writes down students’ ideas on the 
board.
Possible answers may be:
•  spontaneous
•  emotional
•  non-grammatical
•  chaotic
•  interpersonal
•  situational
•  fragmented
•  improvised
•  physical
The next activity is devoted for rais-
ing students’ cross-cultural awareness. 
For this reason I have chosen a well-
known and popular enough movie 
“Mind your language”. Teacher tells stu-
dents that they are going to watch a short 
comic video focusing on mispronuncia-
tion typical of non-native speakers of 
English. Ask them to identify the situa-
tion, the characters and make notes on 
mispronounced words. For post-watch-
ing activity teacher distributes handouts 
and asks students to fill in the table and 
categorize mistakes according to their 
types (grammatical, lexical, phonetic 
mistakes).
This activity helps students to raise 
their awareness on sociolinguistic issues 
in spoken English and to be able to com-
municate effectively using appropriate au-
thentic language.
There is a close relationship between 
language comprehension and misunder-
standing. Besides, language comprehen-
sion is not purely cognitive process. Those 
interferences can clarify our interpreta-
tion of the linguistic input.
Using videos and extracts can be very 
helpful in teaching foreign languages. 
However, it is important to plan ahead of 
time what you hope your students will 
learn from the videos. Effective video-
based learning requires the ability to see 
and hear content clearly. Classroom tech-
nology must have adequate audio and 
quality image display:   
•  Facilitates thinking and problem 
solving
•  Fosters mastery learning
•  Inspires and engages students
•  Helps develop learner autonomy
•  Delivers authentic learning oppor-
tunities
Using extract from the comic inspired 
and engaged beyond students’ attention. 
It increased my students’ motivation and 
improved their grades.
It is not a discovery, that motivation is 
an important factor in moderating suc-
cessful English classes. Movies/films/car-
toons as a motivator, also makes the lan-
guage learning process more entertaining 
and enjoyable.

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  35 
PHILOLOGY,  SOCIOLOGY AND CULTUROLOGY №14
Using video is one of the popular and 
favorite activities of English teachers. For 
decades teachers used videos in their 
classes. Moreover, video/movie can pro-
vide a source of authentic language and 
real-life examples as well as real-life com-
munication.
Spoken English language is different 
to the written language and has many dif-
ferent varieties and features which have to 
be explored in learning and teaching a 
language.
Grammar makes language work, but it 
does not provide all the meanings depos-
ited in concepts that exists in different 
context due to different styles, degrees of 
formality, and language varieties. [Hud-
son, 1988]