The article proves the necessity to develop interpersonal communication skills of engineering students for their successful functioning in the modern professional community. Current requirements of the Russian Federal State Educational Standard for Higher Education regarding the sphere of foreign languages insist on training competent interpersonal communication at EFL (English as a Foreign Language) classes. Teachers of foreign languages should involve the students into active communication and interaction through small group work. To divide the students into small interactional groups a survey was implemented in the spring of 2017 and targeted at the students of the National Research University of Electronic Technology (MIET). Four grouping criteria were used: language proficiency, an academic background, a personality type and a social status. Application of the criteria involved the methods of ranging the students according to their advancement with the help of Corporative Technological Information Platform for Distributed Data Exchange in Corporative Environment (DDECE), Eysenck Personality Inventory (EPI) and sociometric techniques. Eight group types obtained include four homogeneous and four heterogeneous ones. The authors consider the four heterogeneous group types to be more efficient in fostering the communicative interpersonal competence than the corresponding homogeneous group types. For overcoming communication difficulties, students learn to manifest extreme flexibility in the process of professional interaction, show empathy to each other, think critically, cooperate and collaborate, exchange information to mutual benefit and join efforts in order to reach a common goal.

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract