Features Of The Teacher Image In Modern Educational Environment

Abstract

This article discusses about the pedagogical image as a set of ideas about the teacher and his or her role in education and shaping the student’s personality in all socialization institutions (external image) and the teacher’s ideas about his or her role and place in the education system (internal image). The image of the teacher includes rational (compliance with federal state educational standards) and irrational components (myths, emotional expectations). The authors note that a coordinated image of the teacher can be formed when the ideas about the teacher in the main institutions of the socialization of the individual coincide: family, school, media. The leading role in shaping the teacher’s external image is played by the media and the family. Image disagreement leads to the devaluation of the role of the teacher. The mismatched image of the teacher is a factor of reducing the psychological security of the educational environment. In the course of the study, the authors identify four groups of respondents, depending on their attitude to the role of the teacher in modern society.

Keywords: Teacherimagesocialization instituteschoolchildreneducationparents

Introduction

In the scientific literature on the problem of research can be identified several areas in the study of image formation. Thus, in the studies of Pocheptsov (2002), the image is considered as a system of sign characteristics, including form and content, aimed at forming an opinion about the subject. An image is a picture transmitted by the person to others and is the result generated by the mass consciousness. Image as a form of human life manifestations is considered in the works of Shepel (2002). Adhering to this interpretation, the characteristics of the teacher’s image include the audio-visual culture of the individual, the system of moral and ethical values of the teacher, teacher’s behavior in various aspects, pedagogical reflection, teacher’s status and self-assessment, a certain set of personal qualities.

At the same time, the process of forming the image of a teacher in various institutions of the socialization of the person is not sufficiently analyzed in the scientific literature. Most of the studies that reveal the psychological aspects of the formation of the image of professional activity, consider the mass media and the Internet as the main channel of targeted interaction with various groups of society. So, in the works of Shipulina (2010) analyzes the image of the teacher in the Soviet and domestic cinema. The researcher notes that from 50-60 years of the last century to our time there was a complete reorientation of the viewer in relation to the teacher. If in the first films the teacher is a representative of an extreme profession, the bearer of the highest morality, he understands and, as a result, attracts children to his side, then in the 80-90s other films appear in which the teacher’s image takes on different outlines: rigidity, detachment, frivolous attitude to the profession and to children, comic. In the 2000s, and already now, certain malice and cruelty are added to the teacher’s image. Now the teacher will not only not sacrifice his life for the sake of the students, he himself will be a source of problems and cruel treatment of the child.

However, parents, children and teachers participate in the educational process, creating an area of intersection of interests of various institutions of socialization: family, school, media, informal associations, the Internet.

The mechanism of formation of image ideas about the professional activity of the audience consists of several stages. At the first stage, a certain image of the teacher’s image is created in the psyche of the audience. At the second stage, the audience is formed a certain opinion and attitude to this image. At the third stage, the formation of attraction takes place, namely, the psychological attraction of members of the image audience to this object. There is a fixation of the image in the mind.

Problem Statement

The epoch of globalization, the rapid development of information and communication technologies, the dynamism of the world qualitatively change the content of all levels of education and put forward new requirements for the personality of the teacher. The accessibility of education, the transition from real to virtual space reduces the importance of the teacher, the teacher as a carrier and translator of knowledge, securing this role for virtual assistants, which reduces the teacher’s not very high image. Meanwhile, the absence of a psychologically healthy mentor, teacher, and low psychological and pedagogical literacy of the parent leads to the fact that children are left alone with their problems. Around the world, the incidence of teenage massacres has increased; Russia continues to lead in the number of suicides, including a considerable number of teen suicides; the number of victims of bullying in schools is not reduced. At the same time, on the part of the parent community, the media, thematic groups in the Internet space, the image of the teacher is extremely negative, which not only does not correspond to reality, but also damages the development of attitudes towards the teacher of schoolchildren.

In our opinion the problem of research in determining the specificity of the image of a modern teacher in all major institutions of socialization of a person, which will help create such a system of psychological support for a teacher that will allow forming an idea about him as a carrier of knowledge and spiritual values.

Research Questions

1. Pedagogical image is a set of ideas about the teacher and his or her role in education and shaping the student's personality in all institutions of socialization (external image) and the teacher’s ideas about his role and place in the education system. The image of the teacher includes rational and irrational components.

2. The coordinated image of a teacher can be formed when the ideas about the teacher in the main institutions of the socialization of the person coincide: family, school, and media. Image disagreement leads to the devaluation of the role of the teacher. The leading role in shaping the teacher’s external image is played by the media and the family.

3. The mismatched image of the teacher is a factor affecting the decline in the psychological security of the educational environment.

Purpose of the Study

The purposes of the study are to analysis of teacher’s self-presentations, his role in the life of students; to consider the image of the teacher as a set of ideas about pedagogical activity in terms of parents, its role in the lives of students; to study the image of the teacher in various institutions of socialization (school, family and media); empirical study of the rational and irrational components of the teacher’s image, including myths and expectations from the profession; identifying the typology of respondents depending on their attitude to the role of the teacher.

Research Methods

Findings

At the first stage, four groups of respondents were identified according to the modality of their perception of the teacher’s image: optimists who positively perceive the role of the teacher; weathervanes that do not have a sustainable opinion on the role of the teacher; dissatisfied who negatively perceive the role of the teacher; neutrals that are neutral or indifferent (Figure 01 ).

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As can be seen in Figure 01 , more than 80% of teachers in the sample consider the role of the teacher in shaping the personality of the student important and relevant. It should be noted, that about 25% of high school students and 24% of parents hold this opinion.

At the same time, 39% of parents and 30% of schoolchildren in the “weathercocks” group do not have a stable opinion about their parents; it depends on the situation, external factors.

In the group of dissatisfied with the role of the teacher and even leveling this role, the largest number of respondents are high school students and parents. The number of teachers does not exceed 8% of the total.

A less numerous group of indifferent respondents. They are not interested in someone else's opinion about the role of the teacher, but they have not formed their own.

The analysis of retrospective installations about pedagogical work has shown that the maximum number of installations of different intentional orientation is formed in the family (Table 01 ).

It should be noted that in 88% of respondents most of the installations were formed in the family. As can be seen from Table 1 , for the respondents of the first group, the settings “Teacher is the second mother” (42%), “Teacher cannot be mistaken” (31%), “Teachers need to listen” (23%) are the most significant. All of these settings were first broadcast in the family and the respondents followed them in the future. An interesting fact is that teachers, parents, and schoolchildren of this group more often found positive feedback on pedagogical work and school in the media than others (with ρ≤0.05).

The respondents assigned to the second group could not distinguish the attitudes about pedagogical work formed in the family. As a rule, both adults and schoolchildren noted that there are good and bad schools; teachers "in a good school are better, and in a bad school are worse." It all depends on how the respondent perceives his school. Most often, they paid attention to publications and films, where it was said that teachers do not understand children and losers work at school.

The third group of respondents in families received attitudes that determined their attitude towards teachers and pedagogical work. Thus, more teachers noted that the main installations were the installation of a duty in relation to parents and children. At the same time, parents and schoolchildren noted the installation due in relation to teachers. It should be noted that dissatisfaction with the profession of teachers and the school as a whole among the rest of the respondents in this group was the highest. In the media, respondents from the third group paid attention only to negative content.

In the fourth group, the respondents had unformed attitudes. We were treated as a forced measure. Publications in the media about the school and teachers did not attract their attention.

An analysis of publications in the media and the tops of the main news in the search engines showed that in the media (publications about teachers) over the past 10 years negative content prevails in relation to the teacher. The type of text is usually dark, which indicates an aggressive attitude towards the hero. The authors most often choose the role of prosecutors, destroying the cultural archetype of the teacher: the teacher does not understand children and adolescents, uses unauthorized methods of influencing them, hypocritical or stupid, lagging behind life. A similar situation in the Internet space on the pages of schoolchildren and students, as well as in groups of graduates of the type “Overheard in ...” or “Graduates of School No.…”. At the same time, in the professional pedagogical communities (informal groups) the teachers themselves form a positive image, focusing on high quality education. In educational institutions that are engaged in the preparation of teachers also note the high requirements for teacher training.

This should take into account the challenges of modern technological society, the traditional education system. In the trend asynchrony and variability of education, the creation of an international network of conferences, which is created by the participants themselves. In this case, the need for a teacher disappears. The second problem is related to the virtualization of children, adolescents and young people. Modern information and communication technologies allow you to make living space as convenient as possible for living: you don’t need to go to the library for a book, you can meet with friends on Skype, Viber, Vkontakte.ru, food and clothing can be ordered. You can also walk on the Internet. Any game can be stopped and returned to their original positions. Eternal values are depreciated: good and evil, life and death. You can remove from friends and then return. At youth, the relation to time and space has changed. The principle is all at once, here and now becoming fundamental in communication. Young people receive much more degrees of freedom than 15-20 years ago. At the same time, the changed system of values changes the very concept of responsibility for one’s actions. The number of young people who have their freedom and responsibility are at odds with each other is increasing. Moreover, to be responsible is to be unfree. What did it lead to? First, to the emergence of feelings of loneliness, alienation among adolescents and young people aged 13-18. Behind the social circle in classrooms and groups is a much larger number of children than 10 years ago. In addition, adolescents and young people outside the team, outside the reference group cannot exist by definition. Maybe this is why the cases of adjoining young people to groups with asocial orientation have become frequent. In addition, it is precisely the desire of young people and teenagers to be in demand, necessary is used not only in political actions by individual politicians, but for extremist and terrorist purposes.

Another resulting problem is to increase the weight of individual achievement values relative to collective values. After all, personal values do not form a sense of homeland, friendship, love. For the formation of collective values, an experienced teacher is needed, for whom respect is formed in society.

The study of the emotional orientation and the state of psychological security in each of these groups showed that “optimists” are characterized by an altruistic orientation regardless of age and occupation (ρ ≤0.05) (Figure 02 ). At the same time, among teachers of altruistic orientation, those who had worked for more than 5 years were characterized. 79% of respondents in this group indicated a high psychological safety of the educational environment. Associative row with the word teacher: education, children, love, professionalism, duty.

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In the group of "weathervanes", respondents with a communicative orientation prevailed. At the same time, assessing the psychological safety of the educational environment in which they are located, only 19% of teachers noted it as relatively safe. Parents assess the level of psychological safety of the educational environment as low (64%) or average (32%), which indicates a lack of confidence in the school in general and the teacher in particular. Associative row with the word teacher is diary, swearing, requisitions, absenteeism. At the same time, more than 60% of the parents participating in the interview during the interview did not confirm the facts of extortion or rude treatment but referred to a source in the media or the Internet.

Students also do not appreciate the level of psychological security of the educational environment (84%). Associative row with the word teacher are schoolmarm, homework, yells. As can be seen, an ironic, derogatory attitude prevails in the associations of students, which indicates implicit aggression. As in the case of parents, students note that teachers behave normally with them, but “they were told, they read ...”.

In the group of "dissatisfied" prevailing the need for competition and gloric orientation, which is associated with the need for accumulation, self-affirmation, and glory. At the same time, more than 87% of the group assess the psychological safety of the educational environment as low, associate the word teacher with a number: victim-executioner, freak, and loser. It is interesting to note that teachers themselves also have a low opinion of their profession, but as arguments against their choice and dislike educational activities lead low wages. Parents and students of this group treat teachers and school critically; they believe that teachers do not fulfill their duties.

"Neutrals" are characterized by need for competition, also praxical and gnostic orientations, which gives them an activity vector. Associative row with the word teacher: inevitability, duty, working off. It should be noted that the associative rows of teachers, parents and schoolchildren have similar sounds.

At the same time, all respondents in the group note a low level of psychological security of the educational environment.

It should be noted that apart from the respondents referred to the “optimists” group, all the others had an uncoordinated image: the discrepancy between personal role expectations from the educational activities and the perception of the profession by different social groups.

Conclusion

1. Four groups of respondents were identified in their relation to pedagogical work: optimists; weather vanes; dissatisfied; neutrals. In this sample, the largest number of respondents belongs to the group "optimists". Most parents and schoolchildren have either unformed or negative attitudes towards teachers and schools.

2. Respondents of selected groups have different emotional orientation.

3. The results of media content analysis about teachers and school showed the prevalence of dark texts and negative attitudes in society about the role of the teacher.

References

• Bayeva, I. A. (2002). Psychological safety in education. Saint Petersburg: Union.
• Dodonov, B. I. (1978). Emotion as value. Moscow: Publishing house of political literature.
• Pocheptsov, G. G. (2002). Imagology. Kiev: Vakler.
• Shepel, V. (2002). Imagology. How to be liked by people? Moscow: Narodnoe obrazovanie.
• Shipulina, N. B. (2010). Image of a teacher in the Soviet and the modern Russian cinema sector. Izvestia VGPU (Culturology), 8(52), 4-16.