My Teaching Approach

I view my students and myself as a transformative community of learners who bring our unique experiences, knowledge, and interests to the table. As we engage in interactive activities with the subject matter, with each other, and with the world, we build rapport and question our own assumptions and beliefs together. This mutual support and exchange is crucial, as it reshapes our own identities and helps us become creative, responsible, and open-minded global citizens who can integrate knowledge from different disciplines and perspectives for the social good.

Courses I’ve Taught

University of South Carolina:

Linguistics:

Introduction to Language (LING 101)
Integrated Linguistic Skills for Non-Native Speakers (at the English Programs for Internationals) (LING 104)
Language Conflict and Language Rights (LING 240/POLI 240)
Introduction to Language Sciences (LING 300/PSYC 470)
The English Language (LING 301/ENGL 389)

Russian Language, Literature, and Culture:

Elementary Russian I and II (RUSS 121 and RUSS 122)
Advanced Russian I and II (RUSS 401 and RUSS 402)
Introduction to Russian Civilization (RUSS 280)
Russian Folklore and Fairytales (RUSS 350)
19th Century Russian Literature in Russian (RUSS 319L)
20th Century Russian Literature in Russian (RUSS 320L)

English:

Critical Reading and Composition (ENGL 101)
Rhetoric and Composition (ENGL 102)
The English Language (ENGL 389/LING 301)

Moscow Power Engineering National Research University, Russia:

English as a Foreign Language:

First, Second, Third, Fourth Year English
English Grammar

My Initiatives in Teaching Innovation

I have served in these teaching innovation initiatives:

Hybrid STEP (STudent Exchange Program) (2025 – current). Within this hybrid student exchange program between the University of South Carolina and the Arctic University of Norway, second language learners participated in an international Russian language learning online community, both practicing their language skills and exploring each other's cultures through the prism of learning a foreign language.
CALPER Center for Advanced Language Proficiency Education and Research, Pennsylvania State University (2024 – 2025). Within CALPER’s mission to promote language learning at advanced levels of proficiency, I collaborated with a group of researchers on developing instructional materials that improve literacy skills of Russian heritage learners. These materials rely on linguistic corpus data of Russian heritage learners’ writing and focus on raising awareness of morphological and phonological knowledge of Russian.
McCausland Innovation Fund, University of South Carolina (2023–2024). This program supports creative and innovative advances in interdisciplinary and interactive learning and teaching. In a group of teachers-researchers, we developed an online linguistics course on the relation of official and heritage languages to modern culture and society in the U.S.
Incubator for Teaching Innovation, University of South Carolina (2020 –2022). As a Graduate Student Leader and a recipient of the Graduate Student Teaching Innovation Grant, I helped develop and lead interdisciplinary teacher training workshops fostering creativity and innovation in the reality of “pandemic pedagogy”.

My Teacher Development Programs and Certificates

I have earned certificates from these professional development programs in teaching linguistics, language, and culture:

Heritage Language Teacher Workshop from the UCLA National Heritage Language Resource Center (2024). This workshop addresses the challenges of teaching heritage languages in mixed and heritage-specific classes. It focuses on project-based learning and the development of authentic materials and real-life activities for creating an inclusive language classroom. See the certificate here.
NYI Global Institute of Cultural, Cognitive, and Linguistic Studies (2021). This institute offers seminars, lectures, and workshops on underrepresented and interdisciplinary fields of study related to human language, culture, and society. See the certificate here.

I have completed several professional development programs for teachers of Russian:

STARTALK Institute at Middlebury College (2023–2024). This year-long intensive program for teachers of Russian provides proficiency-oriented training and pedagogical practicum, grounded in second-language acquisition theories and evidence-based teaching practices.
STARTALK Critical Language Assessment Program, Michigan State University (2021–2022). This program introduced best practices in foreign language assessment and focused on developing and implementing assessment tools for Russian and Arabic language classrooms. See the certificate here.
ACTFL OPI Assessment Workshop (2021). This hybrid workshop introduces the ACTFL rating scale, the structure of Oral Proficiency Interviews (OPI), and techniques for conducting and rating OPI in Russian.

I have earned a Certificate of Graduate Study in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL). See the certificate here.I have earned these teaching excellence certificates from the Center for Teaching Excellence at the University of South Carolina:

Teaching towards Inclusive Excellence Certificate (2021). This program provides strategies and resources for course design and assignments committed to inclusive excellence within and beyond the classroom. See the certificate here.
Fostering Proactive Learning Certificate (2021). This program focuses on building a set of techniques to encourage proactive learning, to foster students’ sense of belonging, and to avoid and address classroom conflicts. See the certificate here.
Integrative and Experiential Learning Certificate (2020). This program covers techniques and tools to bridge classroom learning practices and experiences beyond the classroom setting. See the certificate here.
Teaching Online for Graduate Students Short Course (2018). This course prepares graduate students to apply best practices of online course design for creating high-quality accessible and engaging online classes. See the certificate here.

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