INCORPORATING CRUCIAL TRANSFERRABLE LIFE-LONG SKILLS IN AN UNDERGRADUATE ADVANCED ENGLISH COURSE AT SOUTH EAST EUROPEAN UNIVERSITY

Abstract

This paper gives an insight into the practical experience of designing and implementing an Advanced English course offered to first year undergraduate students from all Faculties at South East European University which included a research project as a grading component and resulted in an undergraduate student mock conference.  It elaborates on the rationale behind the need for incorporating crucial, transferable, life-long skills that students can put to an immediate use during their undergraduate studies, but also skills they can use long after graduating and leaving SEEU.  The paper also offers a detailed account of the practical day-to-day challenges faced by both language teachers and students. The peer- and self-evaluation completed at the end of the course reveal overlooked issues that require more attention, modifications and adaptations in the future. 

Along the way students were made aware of the importance of choosing the most appropriate research method, meticulously citing every source used, distinguishing between editing (as a process that begins as soon as one starts writing) and proofreading (as the activity left for the very end of the writing process when one double or even triple checks that everything is the way it should be before the research report is handed in), and avoiding plagiarism by summarising, paraphrasing and quoting. The Academic skills and research conference offered students practice in giving a well-structured presentation, whereas the follow-up self-evaluation helped them identify areas of possible improvements.

Hopefully, thanks to this long and challenging, but also rewarding process, when asked to conduct research on a certain issue, present the results, draw conclusions and recommend a possible course of action or offer possible solutions, the students’ immediate reaction will be: “A-ha, No problem! Been there-done that! I know exactly what I am supposed to do, and I know how to do it!”