Cultural Approach in Bilingual Training of International Students

Abstract

Bilingual training of international students is a vocational training of learners with the use of two languages – English/French and Russian where the latter is a foreign language. The cultural approach regards culture as a key component integrated in science classes and humanities as well as language ones, aimed at cultural awareness that the students will heighten through constant reflection about the Self and the Others in order to develop linguistic and intercultural competences and facilitate a better understanding of a broader range of vocational contexts (scientific, social, clinical, political etc.) that the students are exposed to. Questionnaires, oral and written reports, classroom observations and interviews were used to collect the data. The findings show student’s positive perceptions of the cultural approach and highlight the value of explicitly considering a cultural component in content courses. Most students found the cultural approach as an effective way of facilitating intercultural communication and understanding.