Transformation of knowledge representation forms in the didactic support of learning and instructing English in a transport university

In the article, trends in the development of didactic support for the profession-oriented English language course are determined. Social and economic conditions to update the development of advanced didactic instruments are stated. Moving from the competence education model to the cognitive one followed by searching for the effective forms of knowledge representation to their transit in the learning and instructing process is among them. The experience of the Department of Foreign Languages of Siberian Transport University in the development of education resources to show the opportunities of different forms of content representation for effective academic knowledge transition is summarized. In particular, the electronic learning and instructing support package “English for Railways” based on a hypertext technology (the history of development, its structure, forms of software interactivity) is described. As an example of didactic instruments for the cognitive education model, a prototype of the multilingual learning environment based on ontologies “Onto.plus” is presented. Onto.plus has been developed for students of railway universities through the request of the Training and Methodology Centre for Railway Transport. It is stated that ontologies are approved as the up-to-date international web–standard for knowledge representation by ISO/IEC. The advantages of Onto.plus refer to the following: a student enjoys an access to different forms of content representation (a linear text, hypertext links, ontologies) on a number of national languages. The need for methods to introduce the suggested solutions into the learning and instructing practice is underlined. The method for students’ cognitive skills development adopted for the profession-oriented English language course is given as an example. This article may be of practical interest for transport university instructors and students.