Abstract. Ukraine is on the way of integration to Europe and the main feature of the organization of studentsʼ learning activities is its focus on independent work. Independent work of students in a foreign language should facilitate the development of cognitive abilities of students such as observation, curiosity, logical thinking and creative activity and develop the need for constant self-education. To manage independent work successfully the following prerequisites are necessary: psychological readiness of students, the willingness of the teacher to guide and continuously evaluate the individual work, the ability of students to choose adequate methods and techniques for self-study and evaluate the results of their work, as well as training materials for self-study adapted to the needs of the course in a foreign language. Time must be given to students in the learning process for training independent tasks; awareness and correction of errors are required. The organization of the educational process in the universities includes the division of independent work of students into in-class and out-of-class. The focus has been made on the active learning methods. Active learning methods stimulate students’ intellectual emotions and encourage active mental activity. Active learning technologies are distinguished as imitational and non-imitational. The non-imitational forms and methods include problem solving lectures, laboratory works, seminar-discussions, outreach workshops, programmed teaching, course work and degree thesis. Imitational technologies include simulation or simulation game by playing different types of professional context of future operations in the learning process. The effectiveness of language acquisition is associated with the formation of cognitive motives of students. In the creation of learning motivation interest plays a particularly important role as it becomes the motive of creative activity and search. It should be emphasized that an important condition for human cognitive activity in learning a foreign language is the presence of attention. In order to control the audienceʼs attention, it is necessary to consider a number of its features: the degree of concentration, the distribution of attention, persistence or distraction (in the long-term focus on one subject). Memory also plays an important role in the intellectual and practical human activity. The most suitable type of memory for learning a foreign language for communicative purpose is combined memory with the dominant auditory component. The most important features of memory are length, speed of memorizing, accuracy, speed of reproduction and capacity. Memory training should harmoniously fit into the educational system and should consider the impact of such factors as motivation, emotions, attitudes to learning, interests, personality, level of development and health status on the productivity of the memory.