Academic Presentations on Specialty at the Beginning Level

The course “English for biologists” has been designed and developed for the students of the Department of Natural Sciences of Novosibirsk State University. The course consists of four stages. It is intended to form some specific language skills: giving and receiving oral academic presentations. The paper deals with the formation of general and specific language skills at the first stage of the course. At this stage the students learn how to give an oral academic presentation on their speciality in front of the audience. They also learn how to be active participants of the audience during the presentation. The author considers what language skills are developed and how they interrelate and interact with each other in the teaching / learning process. The texts from the book Right Reading are taken as the material for presentations. As a result students obtain their first experience in giving and receiving oral academic presentations on biology.