Web-based competition "Infocat": specificity and development prospects

despite being a relevant and efficient mechanism for the development of students' competencies, competitive activity is not devoid of factors reducing its effectiveness. Arranging the web-based English-language «Infocat» competition, teachers of the Resource Centre of Foreign Languages of Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University (the IKBFU) attempted to overcome such controversial aspects of competitive activity as the lack of development of methodological support of competition and out-of-competition events, limited audience, stressfulness of the competition environment. The article presents the pilot experience of the «Infocat» competition aimed at developing a set of key competencies of the contestants including cognitive, foreign language, information, design, evaluation and communication components. The «Infocat» competition is based on the project method involving the development of an intellectual and creative product, which is an «infomap» implementing the principle of visualization in training and representing a one-page electronic textual-infographic document that organizes and visualizes information in the indicated sections. The object of the current study turned out to be the products of competition activity created by the pilot contingent of contestants including the entire list of sophomores of the Institute of Living Systems of the IKBFU who were finishing the «English Language» course at the initial stage of training at university. A questionnaire survey of the contestants, an element-by-element analysis of competition infomaps, ranking, quantitative calculations, and a correlation analysis were employed to describe the results of the web-based «Infocat» competition. The article presents the results of evaluating competition infomaps in accordance with such criteria as «Content», «Text literacy», «Technical literacy», «Visualization», and «Sources». A correlation was established between the time spent by the contestants on creation of an infomap and the total number of points they received as a result of the competition. A list of methodological support is provided that contributes to the creation of an integrated web-based space simultaneously on the two electronic platforms - the university's online learning portal LMS and the competition site on the VKontakte social network. The «Infocat» competition appears to be a challenge-competition for both the contestants and the organizers. The specificity of the «Infocat» competition lies in the use of the web-based format ensuring visibility, entertainment and round-the-clock accessibility of all competition and out-of-competition events; in the environmental friendliness of the competition products developed in the form of soft copies; in expanding the competition audience by providing the opportunity to participate in the competition for absolutely all sophomores as well as by attracting freshers to out-of-competition events; in stimulating the situation of success by organizing detailed methodological support. Directions of further work related to the improvement of the pedagogical support procedure of the competition activities as well as the study of the educational potential of competition products were determined. The presented description of the arrangement, implementation and discussion of the «Infocat» competition results as well as the analysis of the problems discovered during the competition piloting and their possible solution in the future can be used by university and school teachers when arranging such competitions in their educational institutions as part of lifelong education.