The article deals with the instructional design of an integrative Business English course for master’s students of a technical university (a case study of the Saint Petersburg Mining University) for blended and/or flexible learning. The main goal is to design a course that can be used as a full-fledged online course in asynchronous learning and is at the same time adjustable to the existing offline Business English course. The research uses methods such as observation, focus groups, surveying, empirical research and analytical and descriptive methods. The authors see a solution in a special instructional design based on the integration of traditional teaching approaches in offline learning, information technology and elements of infotainment and edutainment. The article presents the results of the target audience analysis and the needs analysis, outlines the structure of the course, specifies approaches to enhance motivation in master’s students and presents an integrative system of assessment and evaluation of the learners’ knowledge and skills. The key features of the instructional design of the Business English course suggested include exposure to professional scenarios, learners’ reflection, multiple instruments encouraging learners’ cognitive activity and performance and an opportunity to apply their knowledge to actual performance rather than summative assessment.

Nowadays, companies tend to organize corporate courses and trainings upgrading their employees’ skills. The article aims to analyze the key challenges that face a corporate English course and solutions for them. Further the author highlights the psycholog

Personification and individualization in learning and teaching master’s students aims to mold high-level specialists able to integrate successfully to the international professional community. The article discusses a synergy of approaches such as system and matrix modelling of professional activity, learner-centered teaching techniques, adaptive learning, learning trajectories, event techniques, and formative assessment. These include the potential of an entrepreneur master’s programme leading to a startup. The researcher uses methods such are observation, case study, experiment, and instructional modelling. The study is based on the current Journalism, Advertisement, and PR master’s programmes at Saint Petersburg State University and a new one — Foreign Languages and Translation in the Media. The ultimate goal of this new approach is to enhance students’ awareness of taking a master’s programme as part of their successful careers. Further research will include developing qualitative and quantitative measurement tools to monitor student’s progress.

The era of digitization and post-literacy has changed many aspects of our life. This paper investigates into edutainment and infotainment as an approach to the instructional design of an English course for university students or adult learners, including distance learning. Apart from a brief history of edutainment and infotainment, the research attempts to realize the nature of edutainment, specify the concept, and point out its advantages and disadvantages. The article describes some instruments of edutainment and infotainment that can improve e-learning English. The findings may be interesting for the faculty engaged in synchronous and asynchronous e-learning and instructional designers creating online courses.