Introduction. The article deals with the relevance of the problem of distance learning of students, the usage of Internet platforms for teaching practice and the formation of skills of all types of speech activity with a special emphasis on teaching speaking, listening and developing phonetic skills. The article provides an overview of the advantages and disadvantages of distance learning of English, suggests options for overcoming the existing difficulties. The purpose of the article is to reveal the benefits of using one of online platforms (Ed.TED) when teaching English to students.

Materials and methods. The main research methods are the analysis of scientific literature and information resources devoted to the problems of distance education, analysis of the advantages and disadvantages of using online tools while teaching English to students, as well as empirical methods, including observation, survey, testing, mathematical methods of data processing.

Results. The experience of 2020 made it possible to make sure that in the conditions of distance learning of students groups of the Faculty of Foreign Languages of English department the use of existing educational online platforms, instant messengers and social networks as additional teaching tools is an effective method of developing and improving all types of speech competences. The authors present the characteristics of popular educational systems, an algorithm for working with the materials of the Ed.TED platform, and provide possible practical tasks for teaching

students to listen, to read and hold a discussion in English.

Discussion. It is emphasized that modern Internet technologies, including the use of educational platforms, instant messengers and social networks, play a significant role in distance learning English, and the combination of these tools can form the basis of foreign languages distance learning.

Conclusion. It is concluded that the use of the Ed.TED platform will help to optimize the process of getting knowledge by students during the process of teaching basic speech skills.

Highlights:

A set of advantages of distance learning of foreign languages has been analysed to identify both strong and weak points of the usage of particular internet tools;

A number of guidelines has been developed for the use of educational online platforms with the aim of increasing the effectiveness of distance learning in English;

Examples of practical tasks have been developed on the basis of video lectures on the Ed.TED online platform are presented and analyzed in order to identify their advantages and disadvantages in distance learning  of English.

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