VKontakte Social Network as a Motivation Tool in Foreign Language Teaching

Abstract

Social networks can increase motivation in foreign language learners. The article describes an experiment in remote teaching during the COVID-19 epidemic of 2020–2022. The author had to look for new online methods of teaching German to university students and used the Vkontakte social net to organize the academic process. The platform proved to be an efficient tool in teaching students of the Institute of Philology, Foreign Languages, and Media Communications, Kemerovo State University (Kemerovo, Russia). The article also describes the processes that make it possible to assess the degree of motivation, the involvement of students in the academic process, the effectiveness of the task, the activity of students, etc. VKontakte proved to be an effective motivation tool that helps students of Philology and Translation Studies to master German as a second foreign language.

Keywords

• social networks
• motivation
• training
• foreign language
• german
• vkontakte social network
• academic process
• educational task