The “Recore” Methodological Case For Language Teachers Working With Cinematic Discourse

Abstract

The article addresses the problem of analyzing cinematic discourse as a means of training language teachers. The goal of the empirical research is to substantiate cinematic discourse as a didactic resource for the Russian language and literature lessons. In order to achieve this goal the experimental work was carried out and students’ achievements in solving methodological problems in the field of teaching the Russian language and literature were compared. The research is based on theoretical and experimental methods; the method of constructing learning situations was applied. In the course of the study, it was confirmed that in teaching philology students in Moscow and Taganrog the methodology of teaching the Russian language and literature in the digital space, it is advisable and productive to use creolized texts that emotionally affect the viewer and have a pronounced educational potential. The results of the study confirmed our assumption that the readiness to use creolized texts and media texts in the classroom allow meaningful and didactically correct formation of pupils’ subject and meta-subject skills, which include comparing texts of different nature, formulating a standpoint related to their content, as well as the ability to a produce detailed oral and written response. The study resulted in determining the structure of the methodological case, which can be used by teachers of the Russian language and literature at lessons involving the use of video content.

Keywords: Сinematic discourse, media pedagogy, text

Introduction

The choice of the object for our empirical study – the process of forming methodological competence of fourth year students of the Faculty of Philology – is determined by the need for high quality training of teachers of the Russian language and literature, who should be ready for professional activity in the digital space, have the skills associated with media pedagogy (media education), and digital didactics. The formation of new professional and pedagogical skills, which will allow a young specialist to act confidently at Russian language and literature lessons, makes us address the principle of selection of means and methods of training teachers in the course of university bachelor programs. International research of the last five years has recorded scientific interest in the organization of high-quality information and communication activities with students (Afanasyeva et al., 2019; Almuslamani et al., 2020; Ayres, 2015; Ebneyamini & Sadeghi Moghadam, 2018; Köksal & Gülten, 2019; Konovalova, 2020; Mahdi et al., 2020; Nachowitz, 2018). Scholars from different countries define communicative culture as a basic component of personal culture, preparing one for self-actualization, adaptation to reality. Information culture is viewed as the ability to work purposefully with information, using modern tools; acquiring it students have to master a set of communication skills, rational methods of communication, ways to transfer information, and the ability to retrieve and effectively use it (Bezanilla et al., 2020; Börü, 2018; Boussif & Auñón, 2021; Comerford, 2019; Corbisiero-Drakos et al., 2021; Fedorov, 2018; Law & Stock, 2019; Linds et al., 2020; Luton, 2021; Nilsson & Karlsson, 2019; Redfern, 2021).

The focus of the school course of the Russian language and literature on intensive intellectual and speech development of adolescents implies appropriate training of language teachers. A modern teacher focuses on the achievement by pupils not only of the subject results, but also of meta-subject results, as well as on the development of general academic skills demanded in the information environment (meaningful choice of reading, adequate interpretation of texts of different nature, situational analysis skills). A young professional takes into account the fact that flexible digital space, attractive in terms of free choice of media texts, influences the tastes and needs of adolescents and young adults, and forms their new habits (Buckingham, 2007; Fedorov, 2018, 2021; Felten, 2008; Goldfarb, 2002; Levitskaya et al., 2016; Roberts, 2019). A new communicative value gradually establishes itself in the information environment – the satisfaction of the communicative need at the moment of its emergence. This means that there is almost no boundary between a need for information, the information deficit that arose from this need, and the time of its satisfaction. As soon as an information need has arisen, it can be quenched, and the information deficit can be eliminated. In the classroom, this situation is dangerous because quick information gain leads to an illusion of understanding. However, it is impossible to speak about true knowledge without going into the essence of the phenomena of a particular area, without understanding cause-and-effect relations, without a knowledge of facts in their completeness. In our opinion, a didactic dialogue with cinematic discourse, which teaches not “watch” but “see”, can dispel such illusion of understanding. The notion of cinematic discourse in linguistics sets a new vector not only for the development of humanitarian, but also social knowledge, which includes didactics. In our study, we defined the points of intersection of media pedagogy and methods of teaching school subjects as research directions; we also determined the status of cinematic discourse as a didactic resource for formation of socio-cultural competence of students – both schoolchildren and students of philology. It is well established that cinematic discourse is a specific text, which has the same properties as a traditional text: it is informative, coherent, integral, and is supported by audiovisual means. At the same time, cinematic discourse is characterized as a product of production and consumption by the viewer (Almuslamani et al., 2020; Ayres, 2015; Buckingham, 2007; Comerford, 2019; Linds et al., 2020; Redfern, 2021). From the point of view of methodology of teaching the Russian language and literature we consider cinematic discourse as a complex of verbal and non-verbal means and expressive techniques used in the creation of specific media texts and creolized texts. We agree with the position of these researchers (Afanasyeva et al., 2019; Fedorov, 2018; Levitskaya, 2016) and believe that elements of media pedagogy (media education) should be included in the training of teachers of the Russian language and literature.

Problem Statement

The increasing volume of visual information and the growing role of visual communication in all areas of human activity make it necessary to reconsider the educational tools in both secondary and higher education. Most scholars agree that today the socio-cultural development of young people is not conceivable without media (Levitskaya, 2016, pp. 5–7). “One of the most effective teaching tools in this respect is cinema because, as the seventh art has become an integral part of the youths’ everyday life, it allows teachers to approach students while updating the methodologies they put into practice in the classroom” (Boussif & Auñón, 2021, p. 130). In 2021, the Federal Government represented by the Council on Culture and Art under the President of the Russian Federation and the Ministry of Education put forward a social order – the development of programs and methodological recommendations to support media education, more specifically, the study of the cultural heritage of national cinematography in Russian schools. However, a certain difficulty arises as to how and under what conditions to train a specialist who is ready to use media texts in the Russian language and literature classes in order to teach schoolchildren the basics of media literacy, and information and communication culture. The educational standard of higher education program 44.03.05 “The Russian language and literature” does not provide for special disciplines focused on the formation of special competencies of students. Hence, the research problem stems from the established socio-cultural contradictions. We defined theoretical contradictions that enter in dialectical relation of opposites (i) between the presence of specific didactic systems aimed at the formation of general educational competence of students, and the lack of their reflection in the training system of students of philological faculties, and (ii) between the need to form the basic skills in the field of media pedagogy and the lack of tools to form readiness of future teachers to specific actions in the digital space.

Research Questions

On the one hand, we attempt to find out how interesting it is for students to interpret media texts and to compare a literary work and a feature film in order to acquire skills in the field of media pedagogy in classes of methodology of teaching the Russian language and literature. On the other hand, we test whether the use of cinematography can really motivate philology students to set didactic tasks at lessons of the Russian language and literature. Achieving the goal and testing the hypothesis of the study involves solving the following practical tasks: 1) to identify students’ readiness to use media texts in educational situations at lessons of the Russian language and literature; 2) to design a reproducible case for working with cinematic discourse for teachers.

Purpose of the Study

The aim of the study is to justify the use of cinematic discourse as a didactic resource in the training of teachers of the Russian language and literature. The application of the specialized methodological case in practical classes is associated with the active involvement of philology students in the professional and pedagogical activities.

Research Methods

The study was based on theoretical and experimental methods, as well as the method of constructing learning situations. Theoretical research was carried out by the authors starting in 2018. At the same time, within two years the authors selected feature films based on works of Russian classical and modern literature. One-fifth of the more than 120 films reviewed were included in the content component of the ReCoRe case. These are the works of V. Basov, R. Bykov, A. Veledinsky, M. Kalatozov, A. Konchalovsky, V. Martynov, N. Mikhailkov, Y. Protazanov, E. Ryazanov, S. Samosonov, A. Sakharov, S. Solovyov, A. Tarkovsky, E. Tashkov, I. Heifits, K. Khudyakov, M. Schweitzer and other prominent Russian filmmakers. Experimental work in the period 2020-2021 involved 302 undergraduate students of the philology faculties of the Moscow State Regional University and A. P. Chekhov Taganrog Institute. Messengers, google-forms, and MOODLE - based features of online courses were used to collect and process the results. Questionnaires, students’ written texts, and audio messages of a given volume were used as digital footprints. The communicative approach was chosen as the didactic basis for organizing experimental work, which provided students with motivation, supported their professional actions, induced them to self-assess their own activity and to construct reflexive judgments. Over three thousand digital footprints were processed, including a) students’ prepared and unprepared oral answers on methods of formation of general study skills, methods of activity of schoolchildren at the Russian language and literature lessons; b) concise comments (5-8 sentences) in forum and wiki formats; c) free essays on the use of cinematic discourse at the Russian language and literature lessons (250-350 words); d) prepared reflective judgments and self-assessment of professional activity (audio files - 2 minutes). Twelve teachers of the Russian language and literature (schools of Moscow, Moscow region and Taganrog) were involved for expert evaluation within the framework of the ascertaining experiment. As an example of the realization of the didactic idea, we used the cinematic discourse of the 1962 film “Ivan’s Childhood” directed by Andrei Tarkovsky and based on the story “Ivan” by Vladimir Bogomolov. The reason for resorting to Tarkovsky’s work was its association with the world’s historical and cultural heritage. Studying the unique style of the great director inevitably leads one to the discovery and reinvention of cultural knowledge and acquisition of the primary skills of art historical analysis. The imagery of Tarkovsky’s films requires a great deal of emotional and intellectual work on the part of the viewer. What is important for interpretation of Tarkovsky’s films is that the master emphasized the depth of the frame and the symbolism of the visual series, rather than the plot of the film, as the centerpiece of his work (Baranova, 2019, p. 327-328). On the set, Tarkovsky carefully worked on mise-en-scenes, trying to ensure that every frame of the film was filled with profound meaning, and that references to acknowledged masterpieces of art were present. The experimental test helped to determine whether the students were aware of the didactic potential of the film for mastering the metasubject function of the school course of the Russian language.

Findings

The data of the ascertaining experiment confirmed that 76 percent of university students are not aware of the lik between creolized texts and the methodology of development of general learning skills of students; 84 percent are unable to conduct hermeneutic analysis of cultural content; 68 percent have no experience in analyzing the signs and symbols of cinematic discourse. Students themselves confirmed that they were not aware of how and what they were watching, whether they were able to read and understand cinematic discourse, and analyze audiovisual sequence and nonverbal media. The results helped to suggest the methodological feasibility of using a special tool when working with cinematic discourse.

Based on the opinions of the teaching community, we have identified that three spheres are important for the formation of personally significant results. The first sphere is the reality in which a learner finds him- or herself, which is defined by objective facts and events, by his or her own vision and sense of oneself in society, through the prism of global problems of humankind. These global problems are realized through perception, reading and interpretation of cultural signs, symbols that are enclosed in works of fiction, art, and cinema. In this sphere, the learner realizes him or herself as a part of society and connects to it with their emotions, feelings and attitudes towards each member of society. The learner’s reality “meets” the reality of the author of the work of art. The second sphere is the communicative code, through which everyone connects with other individuals. An understandable communicative code is a natural condition for one’s existence and development. Communicative code is necessary for reading and interpreting information, texts, and immersion in meanings. The third sphere is the relationship that arises between the viewer, the reader and the work of art. The quality of this relationship, the depth and openness of the dialogue with a work of art are determined by one’s level of education, the quality of one’s knowledge of society, history and literature, meta-disciplinary skills, personal experience, the ability to self-esteem and the need for self-development. Considering this way of reasoning, we conclude that the educational situation based on the use of cinematic discourse includes exactly three components:

• the reality (Re-), in which the viewer is situated, and the reality recreated by the media text;
• communicative code (Co-) that decodes cinematic discourse;
• the relationship (Re-) that arises between the viewer and the cinematic discourse.

The three-part structure allows covering different levels of work: informative, psycho-physiological, social and aesthetic. In the methodology of media education, the following are traditionally analyzed: the beginning and end of a film; the main character; sound and image; frame. For teachers of the Russian language and literature, it is important to pay attention to the means of verbal expression - speech, captions, written texts on the screen, song lyrics, and non-verbal expression - the correspondence of the text of a literary work to the film discourse. Together with students, through a didactic dialogue, we establish the components of the case: the purpose and content of the educational situation; methods of teaching the Russian language and literature; design of the educational situation. Filling the components with content is based on the book by A.V. Fedorov (Fedorov, 2021). We bring students to the conclusion that the use of new means of the digital environment in teaching the Russian language is not only aimed at developing interest and motivation for learning, but above all, at achieving personal results that form one as a part of society. We call this methodological case ReCoRe, thereby emphasizing its focus on directing the educational and cognitive activities of schoolchildren. The use of ReCoRe in classroom according to the methodology of teaching intensifies the formation of universal competencies as well as methodological competence of a language teacher.

Conclusion

Justification of the introduction of the concept “cinematic discourse” in the professional training of teachers is a significant result of our research, because it enriches the theory of methodology. The use of the methodological case reflects the didactic need for a special tool when working with cinematic discourse; the case itself can be generally used by teachers in the lessons of the Russian language and literature. The positive result in the organization of the educational situation is achieved when the teacher has an opportunity to arouse interest in learning through delving into cinematic discourse, which becomes the basis for language learning. Such interest makes schoolchildren want to conduct a mini-study in the lesson, to participate in a group discussion of cinematic discourse. The teaching experiment confirmed the hypothesis. The results of experiential teaching of students majoring in teaching the Russian language and literature and Russian and foreign language complement the author’s concept of training language teachers. Purposeful training of students to set new pedagogical tasks at the Russian language and literature lessons with the use of cinematic discourse develops socio-cultural competence, lays the foundations for methodological competence, and forms communicative skills and teacher readiness to implement the meta-subject function of the school subject “the Russian language”. Methodological case is a means of digital pedagogy for solving socio-cultural tasks. With the help of the methodological case ReCoRe, the interaction between teachers of the Russian language and literature and pupils is organized, the solution of tasks of media-pedagogy is achieved.

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