Valeriya Ryabkova: love of linguistics and self-regulated learning

This week we have one more big piece of news. In the staff of СЛОН research lab, there is a new colleague!In an interview, Valeriya Ryabkova tells about her career path - education as a philologist, foreign language courses at the Ministry of Economic Development of the Russian Federation, master’s degree in pedagogical sciences, and also what she will research in the Laboratory. Spoiler: Valeria’s academic interest relates to methods and strategies in learning.We are waiting for new publications and wish you success! And for those who are interested in how to integrate mobile technologies in the study of foreign languages – Valeria suggests reading several useful articles!

– Tell me, what is your education, what were you graduating from and where? How did you get into science?

— I graduated from «Moscow State Linguistic University» in 2013 with a bachelor’s degree in Linguistics (English and French), in 2015 I was awarded a master’s degree in Linguistics. My graduation papers focused on phonetics and English lexicology. Despite my love of linguistics, I was fascinated by lectures on lingvodidactics (general theory of language learning), so after graduating from university I decided to continue my postgraduate studies for further in-depth study of the theory and methodology of teaching foreign languages. In 2020 I successfully completed the postgraduate degree at the Faculty of Philology of the RUDN University and defended my thesis for the degree of Candidate of Pedagogical Sciences in “Theory and methods of teaching foreign languages”. 

– Where did you work before coming to the Laboratory?

— While receiving a postgraduate education, I began to work as a teacher, and then as a senior teacher at the English Language Department of Higher Foreign Language Courses of the Ministry of Economic Development of the Russian Federation. Thanks to teaching I have accumulated serious experience in conducting practical classes both in General and Business English.

 

– What research topics did you write about? What articles to read to get acquainted with your expertise?

— Almost all my papers are dedicated to the integration of mobile technologies in the process of learning foreign languages (on the example of English). I would recommend reading one of my first articles (surprisingly the most cited):

Рябкова В. В. Интеграция мобильных технологий в процесс обучения (начальный этап) // Международный научно-исследовательский журнал. – 2017. – No 05 (59). – Часть 2 – С. 63–66.

With articles based on experimental studies:

Ryabkova V. V. Mobile devices and apps for developing language skills (on the example of the English language)// Perspektivy nauki i obrazovania – Perspectives of Science and Education. – 2019. – 38 (2). – P. 320–326.

Ryabkova V. V. Mobile application as an additional tool for developing lexical skills// Higher Education Today. – 2019. – No 12. – P. 40–44.

Ryabkova V.V. Mobile Tests as a Tool of Formative Classroom Assessment/ Higher Education Today. – 2020. – No 8. – P. 44–46.

And the others.

– How did you know about the opportunity to work in the Laboratory? What attracted you?

— Before coming to HSE, I knew no one personally and did not collaborate. I was just familiar with the scientific articles of teachers and researchers of HSE on the topic of my interest. I learned about the Russian postdoctoral attraction program from those responsible for postgraduate and doctoral studies of the philological faculty of RUDN University. I explored the website’s information and decided to submit documents. I was fascinated by the opportunity to work in a real lab with experienced colleagues, and certainly a lot of positive reviews about the program.

– What projects will you do in the Laboratory? What topics will you write articles on?

— In the Lab, I am going to research a new topic for me: self-regulated learning. In a broad sense, self-regulation implies students' autonomy in determining learning goals, as well as their implementation. In a narrow sense, self-regulated learning is a complex system involving motivation, cognitive and metacognitive learning strategies. I think this topic is especially relevant in our time in light of the spreading concept of lifelong learning.

We plan to consider issues of self-regulation in close connection with the process of learning foreign languages. In my dissertation, I propose a step-by-step introduction to mobile technologies in the process of teaching Business English to adults. In other words, concrete steps on how to effectively use the functionality of mobile devices in the study of foreign languages. This is where my experience comes in handy because mobile technologies provide a lot of opportunities for self-regulated learning.

– If you have global plans or goals and you can share them, please tell me about them.

— To say globally, this is the development of the personality, of course. I have not considered something concrete yet, let everything go its own way. However, surely, I would like to discover something significant. It can be said that I am still at the beginning of the road, the main thing is to work more and not lose interest.