Файл: Базисные категории методики. Дидактические и методические принципы и содержание обучения иностранному языку в школе.docx

The nouns with homogenous number forms. The number opposition here is not expressed formally but is revealed only lexically and syntactically in the context: e.g., Look! A sheep is eating grass. Look! The sheep are eating grass

A plural noun indicates that there is more than one of those nouns (while a singular noun indicates that there is just one of the nouns). Most plural forms are created by simply adding an -s or –es to the end of the singular word. For example, there’s one dog (singular), but three dogs (plural). However, English has both regular and irregular plural nouns. Regular plurals follow this rule (and other similar rules), but irregular plurals are, well, not regular and don’t follow a “standard” rule.

Let’s start with regular plurals: regular plural nouns use established patterns to indicate there is more than one of a thing.

Irregular plural forms

Some nouns form their plural not by adding the ending s/es, but by changing the letters in the root of the word.

man – men;

woman – women;

child – children;

ox – oxen;

mouse – mice;

louse – lice;

foot – feet;

tooth – teeth;

goose – geese.

Note: The noun “brother” (a member of a family) has a regular plural form: brother – brothers. If the noun “brother” is used in the meaning “a fellow member”, it may have the archaic irregular plural form “brethren” (fellow members).

5. 
   English intonation phrase: its parts and notation symbols
   

Every language has its own intonation, or speech melody. Intonation helps you to recognize the language that you hear in the same way as the melody of a song helps you to recognize the song that you hear. If you change the melody of a song, it will be difficult for your listener to recognize and understand the song you are singing. The same is true in reference to intonation: if you speak English with Russian intonation, your listener will have a problem understanding what you are saying.

English intonation is a complicated and varied phenomenon. There are dialectal and regional differences in intonation; for example, there are quite a few differences between British and American intonation. Intonation may sound differently depending on whether the speakers have high or low voices, speak fast or slowly, loudly or quietly, energetically, emotionally, neutrally, or listlessly. Men and women may have their own differences and preferences in intonation. For the purpose of studying, this variety may be described in several intonation patterns characteristic of English speech.

In general, linguists distinguish several types of English intonation. Falling intonation and rising intonation are the two basic types used in different types of sentences. These types of intonation are described in Falling Intonation and Rising Intonation. You can listen to them in Listening for Falling and Rising Intonation (AmE) and Listening for Intonation in Questions and Answers (AmE) in the section Phonetics.

Language learners should master typical patterns of standard falling and rising intonation before studying other types of intonation. (Various types of intonation are described in Intonation and Tones in the section Phonetics.)

English intonation is based on several key components, such as pitch, sentence stress, and rhythm.

Low Fall

Usual melodic termination in English intonation. Voice falls in stressed syllables starts at mid or lower pitch down to the bottom.

Low fall is textually shown as a down dash below before stressed syllables as in \Lizzy. Low fall sounds categorical, reserves, confident and complete.

Low Rise

English low-rise termination starts at lowest pitch and smoothly rises almost up to mid pitch. Low rise is shown as an up dash below before stressed syllables as in ∕Ellie.

Low rise sounds hesitant, unconfident and incomplete. Low-rise sentences sound inquiring, ready to talk on, as a polite approval.

Step Fall

Gradually descending stepping scale is most common in monological and neutral dialogical speech. First stressed syllables are pronounced with a usual flat tone at high pitch. Following stressed syllables are pronounced lower forming syllable stairs. Unstressed syllables are usually pronounced at the same pitch with a previous stressed one.

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High Fall

In high-fall termination voice fall starts above mid pitch and ends lowest within wide fall range.

High fall is shown as a down dash above before stressed syllables.

High-fall phrases sound lively, friendly and well-wishing. This termination is often heard in dialogical speech.

26. 
    Etymology. Etymological structure of the English Vocabulary
    

Etymology is a branch of linguistics investigating the origin and development of separate words and morphemes.

The vocabulary in comparison with grammar and phonetic system is the most changeable and flexible part of any language. It is in the constant process of changing: some words are ousted by others, some words develop new meanings, the words that were formerly frequently used drop out of usage, new words appear.

The vocabulary is the product of several epochs and its development is closely connected with the history of people. English vocabulary at present is one of the richest in the world. According to its origin it can be divided into two large parts: native words and borrowed words.

The native element in the vocabulary of English comprises words of Anglo-Saxon origin brought to the British Isles in the 5-th century A.D. by the Germanic tribes of Angles, Saxons and Jutes. Here also belong words that were coined later on the basis of these Anglo-Saxon words by means of various processes operative in English.

The borrowed element consists of words taken over from other languages and modified in phonemic shape, spelling, grammatical paradigm and meaning according to the standards of English.

Speaking of borrowed words in the language we should distinguish between the terms “source of borrowing” and “origin of borrowing”. The first term is applied to the language from which the loan word was taken into English. The second refers to the language to which the word may be traced.

If we take the word paper as an example, we shall find out that it was borrowed from French. In its turn, the French word papier was borrowed from Latin. Before that the Latin word papyrus had come to Latin from Greek, where it had the form papyros. So, defining its etymology, we should say that the English noun paper is a French borrowing of Greek origin. In the same way the English noun table is a French borrowing of Latin origin, the noun school is a Latin borrowing of Greek origin.

26. 
    Explain and exemplify the lexical, grammatical and phonetic means
    

of expressing modality
Mood is the grammatical category of the verb which serves to express modality. That is the relation of the action denoted by the verb to reality from the speaker’s point of view. Modality may be expressed in different ways.

1. First of all it may be expressed grammatically by means of the category of Mood; e.g. It is autumn now /Ind.M./ I wish it were summer now /Sub,}. II/ They suggested that we should go to the cinema /Sup.M./

2. It may be expreised lexico-grammatically. i.e. by means of modal verbs /can, may, must/. In modal verbs modality can be expressed twice: it is expressed lexically by the modal lexical meaning of these verbs

and besides it is expressed grammatically by the form of the mood in which modal verbs are used.

e.g. They were in trouble, fortunately I could help them /Ind.M./

They are in trouble. I wish I could help them /Sub II/

3. It may be expressed lexically by means of modal words: perhaps, surely, may be, certainly.

4. The phonetical expression of modality is by means of intonation. It is possible to express assurance or doubt.

e.g. He is clever /I really think he is clever/

He is clever /I don’t think so

The category of mood in Modern English is a very complicated category and it has given rise to lot of discussions and a lot of contradicting opinions. In the book “The structure of English” Pr.Ilysh writes that only 2 things are clear with regard to the category of mood:

This category exists in the English language. There are at least 2 moods in this category and one of these moods is the Indicative Mood.

Pr. Smirnitsky considers that there are 6 moods in the English language:

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• 
  The Indicative Mood. They live in Moscow
  
• 
  The Imperative Mood. Help them
  
• 
  Subjunctive II. I wish it were summer now,
  
• 
  Subjunctive I. I suggest you help them
  
• 
  The Suppositional Mood. I suggest you should help them
  
• 
  The Conditional Mood. But for him they wouldn’t have finished the work in time.
  

Professors Barhudarov and Shteling in the book “Грамматика aнглийского языка” write that there are 5 moods of the English verb:

• 
  The Indicative Mood
  
• 
  The Imperative Mood
  
• 
  Subjunctive II. But for him I wouldn’t have done it. Pr. Barh. writes that in many textbooks on grammar this form of the verb is called the Conditional Mood.
  
• 
  Subjunctive II. I wish it were summer now.
  
• 
  Conjunctive Hood. I suggest you should do it at once. It is important that you do it.
  
• 
  In the book by Kobrina, Korneeva "English grammar" we find 3 moods:
  
• 
  The Indicative Mood. They live here.
  
• 
  The Imperative Mood. Do it at once.
  
• 
  The Subjunctive Mood. I wish it were summer. I suggest you do it in time.
  

Pr. Bloch in his book “a cours in theoretical English grammar” (1983) writes about 4 moods. First of all he points to the opposition of the direct mood /the Ind. M./ it which represents an action as a real fact and oblique moods which represent the action denoted by the verb as unreal. The Indicative Mood is the marked member of the opposition and has guite a definite meaning, it represents an action as a real fact. The Oblique moods form the unmarked members of the opposition. They don’t characterize - the action as a real fact and have a number of meanings:

The Spective Mood /subj.I/ . It represents an action as desired or hypothetical. The general meaning of desired or hypothetical action besides the meaning of desire includes supposition, suggestion, recomendation, inducement, command, order.

• 
  Do it at once.
  
• 
  I suggest that you should do it at once.
  
• 
  It is important that you do it at once.
  
• 
  It is important that you should do it at once. Let us do it at once.
  
• 
  May it all happen as we wish.
  

Pr. Bloch writes that the Imperative Mood may be included into Subjunctive I because they both express a command, a suggestion or recommendation, do it at once.

I insist that you do it at once.

The combination of verbs should+inf., let+inf, may/might+inf. are included into this mood because they also express - suggestion

The oblique Moods:

The Stipulative Mood /subj.II/. It denotes an unreal action on which other unreal actions depend:

• 
  If he were here he would help us.
  
• 
  If it were summer we wouldn’t be sitting here.
  
• 
  The Consective Mood /Subj.II/. It expresses an unreal action
  
• 
  which depends on another unreal stipulative action;
  
• 
  If he were here he would help, us.
  

The category of Mood is so difficult because in this category there is, no strict correlation; between the form and the meaning: /He is speaking, was asked, tables, the most beautiful / in many cases forms that sound alike express different modal meaning – i knew he would соme. If I knew that he would come I would come too.

In some cases, different forms are used to express the same modal meaning – I suggest that you do it. I suggest that you should do it. The forms do and should do express the same modal meaning and are used in the same syntactical constructions.

It is not always easy to draw the line beetween the grammatical and lexico-gramnatical expressions of modality, e.g. Sometimes it is difficult to say whether the verb should be a modal verb with the meaning следует or whether it is an auxiliary verb devoid of any - meaning and used to form one of the oblique moods.

e.g. I suggest he should do it.

But in some cases it is quite clear that should is an auxiliary verb which forms an oblique mood. It is annoying that the child should be naughty.

Due to the fact that there is no correlation between the form and the meaning linguists express their opinions about it.

Pr. Smirnov said attention to the form of the mood and that’s why he writes that there are 6 moods in English.

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Pr. Bloch took into consideration the meanings of this category and he finds 4 moods /Spective mood/ - his Subj. I expresses order, recommendation, suggestion and so he includes into Subjunctive I such forms as: do it, let’s do it, should do it, might do it, do it at once. In textbooks for schools pupils are given 3 moods: Indicative, Subjunctive, Imperative, but in the Russian language the subjunctive mood has only 1 form – the form which is homonymous with the past tense and the particle “бы”.

26. 
    Explain and exemplify the referential function.
    

Discuss the opposition of definiteness vs. indefiniteness, permanent definiteness

vs. occasional definiteness, referent usage vs. non-referent usage,

strong indefiniteness vs. weak indefiniteness
Roman Jakobson defined six functions of language (or communication functions), according to which an effective act of verbal communication can be described. Each of the functions has an associated factor. Our theme is referential function.

The referential function: corresponds to the factor of Context and describes a situation, object or mental state. The descriptive statements of the referential function can consist of both definite descriptions and deictic words, e.g. “The autumn leaves have all fallen now”. Similarly, the referential function is associated with an element whose true value is under questioning especially when the truth value is identical in both the real and assumptive universe.

It is denotative, cognitive function which is oriented toward the ‘context’. To show things or facts, the referential function is the most obvious function of language: for example: “The earth is round.”, “Water boils at 100 degrees.”

Category of Definiteness – Indefiniteness. By these category grammarians understand the definiteness or indefiniteness of the object named (обозначаемый предмет).

The notion of definiteness-indefiniteness can be expressed by lexical means and grammatically, i.e. by the articles and the determiners.

The indefinite article expresses the indefiniteness of the object named. The definite article expresses the definiteness of the object named and singles it out of a class of similar objects.

The absence of the article is also meaningful and occurs when we would expect the indefinite article to be used with abstract nouns and nouns in the plural with which the indefinite article is not used since it is associated with the idea of “oneness”.

Thus, the absence of the article means the absence of the indefinite article mostly and functions as such.

Indefiniteness – a man, men

Definiteness – the man, the men

The determiners this, that, each, every, some, any, which, no, either, much, the conjoint possessive pronouns my, his, etc. are used to express definiteness or indefiniteness. E.g. That room was small. I took off my hat. One day, when we were in love; one wonderful morning in May...

Proper names are identified well enough not to need the articles or the determiners. But as soon as they are not, they are used with the article or some determiner: e.g. The Browns are out of the town. She married a Jackson.

In English article is a sign which expresses the category of determination (definiteness - indefiniteness) grammatically.

It may get the meaning of determination or indetermination only in speech, all the other so-called meanings of the articles are its functions. The article itself cannot particularize or classify the noun. The article is a form word, which shows how the noun should be understood (a class noun, a unique thing, etc). So, the context plays the most important part in the use of articles in English Speech.
Definiteness is always referential (specific), presupposes the existence and uniqueness of the object in the general field of view of the speaker and the listener. Usually, they speak of two majorities. sources of certainty: permanent and occasional. Permanent definiteness arises at the addressee on the basis of information from the immediately preceding text (see Context); eg, "I saw this actress recently in one film (indefiniteness), <...> such a film (definiteness) is good, how is this film (definiteness) called?" (E.V. Grishkovets); "But I have a brother (indefiniteness), he (that is, the brother just mentioned - definiteness) is studying at the second year of the conservatory" (AG Aleksin). The reference to the object in question is a sample of anaphoric relations, which are among the most essential means of maintaining the coherence of the text.

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Occasional definiteness relies on knowledge of the world common to the ministry and the hearer, so that certain objects turn out to be uniquely derived from the situations obtained, even if they have not been mentioned before; eg, “There was no free private office in Aragvi, and we were given some sort of office room (uncertainty), the window (certainty) was sealed by newspapers”. (K. Ya. Vanshenkin).

Within the framework of reference specific indefiniteness, the so-called weak indefiniteness (semi-indefiniteness), when the fame of an object for a speaker is combined with its obscurity for the addressee [eg, “About what I am about to tell, I have very scant information, they only allow me to guess something, to guess something” ( A. N. Rybakov); “Ataman of this gang was a certain Gavrilenko, who called himself” the pupil of Prince Kropotkin himself” (DA Granin)], and a strong indefiniteness – the unknown of some object for both the listener and the speaker, when the existence of this object is combined with the impossibility of uniquely to identify him [eg, "Immediately someone hit me on the head with something, and when I jumped up, I came to, there was no bag" (VT Shalamov); “Once in Kiev, it was in the sixty-eighth year, I received a letter from some unknown lady” (V.P. Nekrasov)].

Non-referential usages associated with the expression of unspecified uncertainty are most diverse. Among them, in particular, existential uses are singled out, when the situations in which single, but not individualizers participate, are indicated. object: only the "search field" is defined-the class of objects or phenomena into which it enters [eg, “It will be advised to run to one of her friends, most likely to Larissa”. (Yu. V. Trifonov); “Each of Koltsov’s students chooses his favorite ideas in his works, each sculpts his image, creates his own portrait” (DA Granin)], and all-female, when all or at least typical representatives of the open class are meant [ for example, “Many, many years later, during the war and the blockade, I noticed that in dangerous, especially serious moments of life, women are often more economical, more reserved in intonation and facial expressions than men”. (VS Shefner); “I’ll tell you more: take a close look at any person, and you will see that he is not like everyone else” (I. Grekova)].

26. 
    Explain and exemplify the role of passive constructions in English
    

Passive constructions

All of the example sentences that we have considered up to this point have been in what is known as the active voice. However, this ignores a major type of sentence construction that is sometimes used in speaking, but is more frequently met in the written language – this construction is called the passive.

Contrasting the difference between ‘Active’ and ‘Passive’ voices:

Active sentence

• 
  George Bush started the war.
  
• 
  The people grow rice in Asia.
  
• 
  I heated the chemicals to 200 Celsius.
  

Passive sentence

• 
  The war was started by George Bush.
  
• 
  Rice is grown in Asia.
  
• 
  The chemicals were heated to 200 Celsius.
  

The first sentence uses an active verb because we are saying what somebody (or in other cases, something) DID: we want to say what Bush did. In the second sentence, we are interested in what HAPPENED, so a passive verb is used. In the first sentence, Bush is the object; in the second, he is the subject.

In the second active sentence, the focus is on who grows the rice; in the second passive sentence it is on the rice. Who grows it is unimportant.

In the third passive sentence, it is not important to mention who the person who heated the chemicals is and, following the convention of reporting of a scientific experiment, is not stated.

Form

We make the passive with the verb be in the tense that we require, followed by the past participle. Sometimes, in place of the verb be, we use get often with very little change in meaning, but get is usually preferred when the action is unexpected, unwelcome, or happens in the face of adversity. Get also tends to be informal than be. Here are some short examples of passive sentences.

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