New Teacher For A New School: Educational Process Participants On The Problem

Abstract

The research question considers a gap between modern requirements to education under the conditions of implementation of federal state educational standards of new generation and introduction of a new professional standard of the teacher and quality of pedagogical education. The article is devoted to one of the stages of a complex research, the main objective of which is creation of complete multilevel model of training of the teacher for the new school focused on implementation of modern requirements into the system of general education. The purpose of this stage is to detect the deficiencies of teacher’s training at the current stage from the point of view of various participants of the educational process, as well as to define the key ways to their elimination. For these purposes to be met the following was used: theoretical methods (analysis and synthesis of standard documentation and pedagogical literature), empirical (measurement, comparison), and also methods of statistical processing of results of a research. At this stage of the investigation, the result of this research is to define weaknesses in the existing system of teacher’s training from points of view of heads of educational institutions, practicing teachers and pupils and also to develop a system of measures aimed at the improvement of pedagogical education for the purpose of increasing quality.

Keywords: Society of knowledgegeneral educationtraining of the teacherprofessional teacher’s competences

Introduction

Problem Statement

The key issue of this research is the gap between modern requirements to education under the conditions of society of knowledge, implementation of federal state educational standards of new generation and implementation of new professional standard for a teacher and quality of education. In order to provide high quality of general education even the latest technical equipment is not enough: schools need new teachers, who are well trained, flexible, creative and ready to constantly improve knowledge and professionally develop themselves. Politicians working in the field of education understand it perfectly. So, since 2012 the Ministry of Education and Science in the Republic of Tatarstan provides a grant "Our new teacher" and searches for "talented, smart and purposeful" individuals (citation from the program commercial). As it appears on the website of the Ministry, those who received a grant get up to 500 hours retraining or professional internship, training abroad, fully equipped office, and social privileges. Other measures to increase the level of professionalism of teachers and bringing back the prestige of a teacher's profession are also introduced.

Nevertheless, this in a way "catch-up" approach aimed at "improving" teachers in office cannot solve the problem completely. Therefore, one of subordinated programs of Russian national project "Comprehensive Program of Growth of the Professional Grade of Teaching Employees of the General Educational Organizations" is aimed at upgrading pedagogical education itself: the system of supporting measures for preparation of pedagogical frames according to the professional standard of a teacher and federal state educational standards of general education are provided in it.

Constant search for ways to train new teachers takes place also at the Kazan Federal University. Here teacher’s training is one of the prior directions of development. (Gafurov & Kalimullin, 2015) Since 2014, KFU takes part in projects on modernization of pedagogical education, initiated by the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation. In 2015, KFU actively participated in the project of certification of graduate students with majors in pedagogy that is organized by the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Tatarstan in cooperation with the leading higher educational institutions located on the territory of the republic carrying out training of teachers. Currently, KFU also carries the project "Strategic academic unit is implemented: Teacher of the 21st century". Within this project, the problem of transformation of pedagogical education into the “4 T” format is offered to be solved: transformed student, transformation of education that is a transformed teacher, and the transformation of pedagogical education. The project maintains the idea of development of standard and legal base of functioning of CAE within structure of Kazan Federal University: innovative practice oriented model of pedagogical education realized in the conditions of Federal Universities; educational standards and variable vectors of a teacher’s training; organizational, methodical and scientific supplement of implementation of educational standards into pedagogical education in the conditions of Federal Universities.

The task within this research was to reveal elements in system of teacher’s training that require special attention. We realize that there are many positive aspects in the system of training that have to be kept; modernization should neither rearrange this system nor should it cancel all the accumulated experience. Crucial here is to set the priorities while concentrating on the main problems. As long as the most significant result of an activity carried out in the educational institution including the teacher’s training, are competences, our attention was paid to them. We have involved heads of schools in the Republic of Tatarstan, teachers and pupils from Tatarstan schools. At this stage it was especially important for us that this modernization has been initiated from above and is moved by managers and academicians. The university as an intermediate link (Figure 1 ) tries to involve schools and their representatives, children and parents to a discussion.

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Research Questions

In this research, at this stage we have answered two main questions: 1) what professional competences of teachers seem to the heads of schools, pupils and teachers to be highly important for successful realization of main professional functions of a contemporary teacher; 2) level of development of which of the competences chosen by the participants of educational process is represented to them in the most unsatisfactory way. Necessity of the first block of questions that is connected to allocation of the most important competences is caused by the fact that scientific and pedagogical literatures list dozens of general and private competences of the teacher that completely disorients practitioners. Besides, during the transition of educational standards to the next generation, all higher educational institutions in Russia will have to formulate professional competences of the graduates independently (in future the standard will only order universal and all-professional competences). Answers of respondents enabled us to range some of the competences and to allocate the most significant ones for the modern teacher from the point of view of the participants of this poll.

Purpose of the Study

Objective of the complex research we conducted is to develop a strategy of improving the existing system of teachers training in KFU and design a complete multilevel model for teachers training for a new school focused on implementation of modern requirements into education. Renewed training for new teachers for a school focused on realities of a knowledge-oriented society is to become the result of introduction of this model. Researches are supposed to be carried out in several steps.

At the first stage, we have decided to reveal deficiencies of pedagogical education at present times from the point of view of various participants of educational process, as well as to define main ways of their elimination. Attention of the authors was attracted to young teachers recently graduated from pedagogical institutions/faculties.

Research Methods

In the present paper, we relied on theoretical and methodological studies of Russian and foreign teachers on the problems of modernization of pedagogical education. We also generalized standard documentation, in particular Federal state educational standards and other documents of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation and Republic of Tatarstan. Moreover, innovative activities in the field of educational management in Russia were analyzed. As for research methods, we used theoretical methods (analysis and synthesis of standard documentation and pedagogical literature), empirical (measurement, comparison) as well as methods of statistical processing of research results. Authors developed two questionnaires: for the determination of the most important competences of a teacher of modern school and on allocation of deficits in the level of development of these competences from the point of view of various participants of educational process.

Research was completed from March to December, 2016. We interviewed teachers, pupils and heads of educational institutions. 210 teachers of physics, mathematics, history, biology and chemistry at an average and senior degree of training, and 25 administrators of schools in Tatarstan took part in the poll. Survey was conducted in the Volga Center of interregional training and professional retraining of educators. Questions were answered by 260 pupils attending senior classes of the KFU basic school – Lyceum of Lobachevsky and lyceum No. 159 of Sovetsky district in the city of Kazan.

When developing the questionnaire on depicting the most important professional competences of a teacher we considered Federal state educational standards of the higher education for the specialties 44.03.01 Pedagogical education (Bachelor degree) and 44.04.01 Pedagogical education (Master degree) and an approved draft of the Professional standard of a teacher as a basis. Questionnaire covered more than 70 particular competences concreting the general competences presented in educational standards. We were fully aware that such a quantity can lead to some confusion. On the other hand, our hypothesis claimed that most of respondents will likely choose approximately the same competences, level of formation of which is easy to observe in daily practical activities of a teacher. Respondents were offered to choose the main 10. On the basis of statistical processing of results, we could also allocate the 10, chosen by maximum number of participants.

The second questionnaire aimed at finding deficits of pedagogical education from the point of view of various participants of educational process. Core interest was concentrated not in the procedural part (methodology, organization, content) of teachers training, but the result in aspect of levels of their formation of three main units: subject, didactic and psychological competences. It should also be mentioned that not all the professional competences of a teacher were reviewed but only those that were indicated as significant within the first investigation.

Findings

In total 10 professional competences of a teacher on a 10-mark scale were estimated. Each question contained both quantitative and qualitative indicators. It is important that results of an assessment of all the participants of educational process represent no drastic differences, which in our opinion confirm he objectivity of respondents and validity of the developed questionnaire. So, average score of teachers of all competences was defined as 5.86, for pupils 6.51, and 7.16 for managers. As we can see, on average teachers estimate their level quite lower, than pupils and heads of schools. It is also remarkable that respondents oftentimes gave quite high marks and at the same time note that they are not satisfied with the level of the development of a certain competence. Blocks of competences and average value of an assessment of their development in three groups of respondents are presented in Table 1 .

Table 2 represents competences that were depicted by the respondents as the most important ones in the first questionnaire. It allows noticing differences and varieties in evaluating certain competences by different groups of respondents

Evaluation of the level of competence development and their ranging demonstrated only 2 competences that raise no questions for all the groups of respondents (˃8) ( Table 2 and 3). Level of development of all others was estimated as average (˂ 8) and low (˂ 6) ( Table 3), on the basis of which the conclusion on the presence of deficits in the system of teachers training has been made.

Thus, as a result of the conducted research, the following deficits in the level of formation of professional competences of a teacher at schools of the Republic of Tatarstan were revealed:

– pressure of traditional experience of teaching and the existing stereotypes of pedagogical thinking;

– inability to put and to diagnose educational purposes;

– inability to develop criteria of objective results evaluation of training according to real learning capacities of school pupils;

– insufficient creative potential of young teachers;

– inability to organize autonomous work of learners;

– inability to realize the principles of active approach;

– superficial knowledge of a subject and its scientific bases;

– insufficient possession of ways of creating harmonious psychological climate.

It should be noted that the questionnaire contained an open question to each poll question aimed at the qualitative analysis of each competence assessment. The most frequent argument used to ascertain a low score from the heads of educational institutions and teachers was an insufficient practical training of young specialists and lack of real experience in interaction with pupils

Conclusion

Current research paper enabled the authors to plan the system of measures for elimination of deficits in teachers training. In particular, the following is offered:

– It is necessary not only to strengthen the practical orientation of prospective teachers training but also to reconstruct all the structure of student teaching, its inner substance and the attitude towards it from all the perspectives of all participants of pedagogical process.

– For didactic preparation, the main emphasis should be transmitted to the development of interactive technologies of training focused on realization of an activity approach.

– For module structuring of educational programs, the role of competence modules should be strengthened (that is the certain professional and pedagogical competences aimed to train).

–To introduce the procedure of certification of higher educational institutions lecturers taking part in training of the prospective teachers.

– To introduce the procedure of certification of young professionals by experts from higher educational institutions and ministerial organizations.

Acknowledgments

The work is performed according to the Russian Government Program of Competitive Growth of Kazan Federal University.

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