The 21^st century education might be characterized as interactive, cooperative, collaborative, inter – disciplinary process with clear priorities of competent usage of modern technologies, development of problem solving skills, abilities to evaluate learning needs and outcomes. Such characteristics highlight the active functioning of interactive education paradigm (Augustiniene, Ciuciulkiene, 2012) in all stages and forms of educational institutions.

Until recently education and especially the secondary education was organized according the needs of particular states. Today the attitude has totally changed. The development of mobility and labor market transformed the idea of the “closed national school” into the “open” institution, which strives to equip the young people with the tools helping them “to become integrated to the fullest possible extent in a society (Čiučiulkienė, 2004.). Integration to the fullest possible extent in a society is impossible without successful communication in a native and in a foreign languages. Moreover, while following Pink‘s (2005) ideas of future Conceptual Age it is obligatory to mention that „the essence of persuasion, communication, and self-understanding has become the ability also to fashion a compelling narrative” (p. 66). P. Descy ir M. Tessaring, (2001), on their turn, also highlight communication of high quality as the main competence of the XXI century specialist. Communication in a native tongue enhances ability to express and interpret phenomena of social reality orally and in written form. Communication in a foreign language is defined as the ability to understand the speaker, to support a conversation, to read and understand texts, while pointing out specific social aspects and cultural differences, to express personal feelings and attitudes, facts of life orally and in written form (2005). The latter elements of communicative competence definition such as pointing out specific social aspects and cultural differences, expression of personal feelings and attitudes implies the importance of the development of argumentative competence.

Learning is made especially attractive when students face a problem, and their responsibility is to solve this problem. Problem solving process is impossible without argumentation. The typology and structure of the arguments imply the vast range of language learning possibilities and methods, starting with the expansion of a simple sentence into an argumented one and finishing with argumentative reasoning in modern debates. For this reason the paradigm of argumentative reasoning is getting more and more important in teaching and learning of a foreign language.

According the research data of foreign language popularity in Lithuania, English may be defined as a Lingua Franca in Lithuania and functions for communicative purposes alongside with the native Lithuanian tongue.

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