Abstract: the article analyzes some of the most important problems of teaching the discipline «Foreign Language» in a non-humanitarian educational institution. The article studies the reasons for the unsatisfactory language preparation of students at the university. The research objectives include a review of the scientific literature on the subject matter and a generalization of the accumulated material. Among the most common reasons for the lack of interest in learning a foreign language, we should focus on the inactivity of students as participants in the educational process, their attitude to the language, primarily as a discipline, and not to the skill that needs to be developed, the lack of an environment of cooperation between the teacher and students, the use of uninteresting didactic materials, lack of extracurricular forms of work and motivation to learn a foreign language. We see a way out of this situation in changing educational paradigms in the higher educational system: from the knowledge and centrist paradigm to the humanitarian educational one, which involves changing the roles of participants in the educational process, the interaction of students and the teacher through cooperation and support, an independent search for didactic material and methods for working with sources. Therefore, at present, the need has arisen for comprehensive changes in the entire system of studying a foreign language.
Keywords: foreign language, teacher, students, interest, motivation, paradigm