Mechanisms of Forming the Experience of Reading in the French Language of Gymnasium Students: To the Question of Exercises and Tasks

Abstract

The article analyzes and compares the content of the pre-text exercises in the French language textbooks “Édito A2” and “French Language” for the 7th, 8th and 9th grades of Yu. Klymenko.
In the comparative analysis of pre-text exercises, the results of the survey of teachers of foreign languages of the National Education and Training Center of Ukraine, conducted in April 2023 by employees of the Department of Foreign Language Education of the National Academy of Educational Sciences of Ukraine, were taken into account, as well as the criteria for the construction of pre-text exercises in accordance with the model curriculum for foreign languages for grades 5–9. The main criteria that were taken into account when analyzing pretext exercises in French and Ukrainian textbooks were dialogicity, illustrativeness, preparing students for the level of text complexity, motivation, authenticity, quantization of information, individuality, promotion of cultural dialogue. The main shortcomings of the educational material, outlined by the teachers during the questionnaire, which testify to the insufficient implementation of the communicative approach to teaching foreign languages in the secondary schools of Ukraine, are briefly characterized: insufficient amount of educational material aimed at the formation of key competences of students, inconsistency of textbooks with the requirements of the competence approach, insufficient means of formation in students of 7th – 9th grades of intercultural foreign language communicative competence in various types of speech activity.
The textbooks selected as material for the article were analyzed from the point of view of compliance of the pre-text exercises available in them with the specified criteria. An insufficient level of compliance with the criteria for the selection of pre-text exercises in Ukrainian textbooks was revealed. It is caused by the lack of connection between the pre-text exercise and illustrative material with the specific topic of the lesson, insufficient attention to the personality of the student, a weak degree of dialogicity and clarification of culturally marked concepts and phenomena inherent in the French-speaking world. The article outlines the main directions in which pre-text exercises can be improved in the analyzed Ukrainian textbooks: strengthening the connection of pre-text material with the content of the texts, clarifying culturally marked phenomena, increasing the degree of dialogicity of pre-text exercises, appealing to the personality of the student, taking into account his/her age characteristics.