Analysis of difficulties of foreign students in extracurricular activities in Russian education environment

The process of foreign students’ adaptation in a Russian educational environment is a complex multi-level phenomenon that combines educational and extracurricular areas. At the same time, extracurricular activities, as one of the components of a single educational process, are on the periphery of scientific interest. The purpose of the article is to analyze the difficulties of foreign students in extracurricular activities that contribute to the disclosure of their internal potential in the educational process and effective adaptation to the Russian educational environment. To achieve this goal, the authors used the methods of questioning, interviewing and reliability retest. The developed questionnaire is designed to identify and determine the difficulties experienced by foreign students in extracurricular activities. The calculation of correlation indicators of foreign students' answers to the questions of the questionnaire proved its reliability, since the coefficient is equal to 0.8. Foreign students were asked to indicate the problematic areas of extracurricular social activity. The study involved 100 students of various specialties from South Ural State University and Chelyabinsk State University. The results show that most of the problems are associated with insufficient knowledge of the Russian language and psychological barrier in establishing extracurricular interpersonal communications in the field of leisure activities. The data obtained can be used to improve the work of the university departments responsible for the adaptation of foreign students in the Russian-speaking education environment.