Teacher Professional Readiness To Work With Adolescents With Antisocial Behaviour

Abstract

The paper analyzes the content of teacher training for working with adolescents of antisocial behaviour. Teachers cannot be trained without regard to the situation that the country is experiencing, without taking into account the achievements of pedagogical science. Currently, there are acute questions of improving the professional training of specialists for working with challenging children and adolescents with antisocial behaviour and developing a model for a specialist in the prevention of antisocial behaviour in adolescents. The complexity and inconsistency of the current situation of personality socialization exacerbate the problem of deviant behaviour in children and adolescents. Today, a vulnerable child’s body was affected by psycho-traumatic factors of socio-economic instability of society and family, and as a result, an increase in deviations in the behaviour of adolescent children. The solution to many problems associated with assisting adolescents with antisocial behaviour largely depends on the degree of real preparedness of the teacher for professional activities. The analysis of the problem of training specialists for educational work with children and adolescents with deviant behaviour allowed drawing several conclusions listed in the paper.

Keywords: Asocial behaviourdeviant behaviouraggressive behaviourprofessional trainingprofessional readiness

Introduction

Aggression has become one of the sad characteristics of our century. Today, one can hardly surprise anyone with statistics on the growth of juvenile delinquency. Adults sometimes do not know how to overcome the increasing teenage cruelty and hostility. In the prevailing socio-political, economic and cultural situation, children and adolescents were under the control of aggression. There is no need to prove how important it is now to find ways to cultivate peace among children. Many scientists and educators are trying to solve this difficult task. One of such ways is the targeted preparation of teachers for interaction with children and adolescents with deviations in behaviour.

Until the mid-nineteenth century, the problem of the antisocial behaviour of children and adolescents was not recognized by Russian science as self-sufficient, requiring special research attention. Scientific interest in it began to awaken indirectly: through studying the characteristics of the psyche and behaviour of under-performing and undisciplined students in a mass school, as well as marginalized groups of minors (homeless, street children who committed crimes).

The problem we are developing is closely related to solving the problem of deviant behaviour, which has deep historical roots. This issue is reflected in the works of major domestic scientists from the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries: psychiatrists Kovalevsky, Ankylosing spondylitis and Sikorsky, lawyers Drilya and Horses, teachers Kashchenko, Kufaeva, Makarenko, Perepelya. In classifications of forms of deviant behaviour, most authors identify the category of aggressive adolescents, adolescents of antisocial behaviour.

Problem Statement

Teachers cannot be trained without regard to the situation that the country is experiencing, without taking into account the achievements of pedagogical science. Currently, there are acute questions of improving the professional training of specialists for working with challenging children and adolescents with antisocial behaviour and developing a model for a specialist in the prevention of antisocial behaviour in adolescents. In connection with these circumstances, the methodological heritage of teachers and pedagogue of the post-revolutionary period is of particular interest.

Research Questions

The beginning of specialized training for students to work with abnormal children was facilitated by the appeals of the majority of representatives of psychological and pedagogical science to distinguish children from the category of "difficult children" with clinical impairments who cannot be taught in a mass school.

Purpose of the Study

The problem of overcoming pedagogical neglect and preparing a teacher to work with this category of children is the subject of a study by Barsukov (1996). Barsukov (1996) considers the specialist's willingness to work with pedagogically neglected children as the presence of systemic and organizational knowledge of particular psychology and corrective pedagogy and is armed with the technology of training and education of pedagogically neglected children.

Research Methods

Zavrazhin (1989) analyzed the methods of training teachers to work with hard to educate in the period under review. Zavrazhin (1989) notes the diversity of methods: lectures, discussions, interviews, consultations, colloquiums, conferences, writing essays, excursions, experimental work, conducting group and individual examinations, compiling psychological and pedagogical characteristics. All of the above methods were aimed at studying the problems of difficult childhood. In the post-war period, special attention in the preparation of students was paid to the formation of readiness to fulfil the educational function. This fact is explained by a large number of single-parent families, street children, and the school was supposed to help restore the mentality broken by the war.

Findings

Studies of the problem of practical preparation for educational work in the 60s have intensified significantly. The inadequate preparedness of students for educational work was explained by the lack of comprehensive knowledge about the child.

Unresolved problems are associated with the development of a single conceptual framework for teacher education, which was expressed in the inconsistency of approaches to the practical training of teachers and educators. The content of the practical training of students in the post-war period and until the mid-80s was of the nature of "coaching", and not armed with knowledge and skills of organizing a holistic educational process.

The research of scientists in the field of practical preparation of students for educational work since the mid-80s has intensified significantly.

In the works of Bezdukhova, Makarskaya, Raevskoy, Surudina, Khmurich and others highlighted the moral aspect of educational work with children and adolescents.

The works are ideologized, which is explained by the time of their writing (the end of the 80s). However, their theoretical value lies in the definition of criteria and indicators characterizing students' readiness for moral education of students, diagnostic methods of students' level of preparedness. The authors consider the adoption of moral standards by children and adolescents as a process of conscious, active and diverse practical activity. This approach to solving the problem of moral education for adolescents allows forming a moral habit of acting under established norms and rules of behaviour.

Khmurich’s (1987) research is devoted to the problem of preparing students for the prevention of deviations in the moral development and behaviour of younger students. The author defines the place and role of diagnostic and preventive preparation in the formation of the student's general readiness for educational work at school. The following leading indicators determine this kind of will: the student's need for the prevention of personal qualities, knowledge of the theory and methodology of preventive work, the abilities and skills of conducting organizational and educational work to prevent and correct deviations in moral development. Based on the analysis of psychological and pedagogical literature, the author identifies the main directions in preparing a teacher for preventive and diagnostic work with hard-to-educate younger students: the formation of personal qualities, the teacher's behaviour style, teaching him the diagnosis and prevention of deviations in moral development.

The instability of our society, the deterioration of the social situation of vulnerable groups of the population again raises the problem of preparing students for educational work. Misses in educational work are too expensive for both teachers and pupils since often educational tasks are carried out in isolation from the learning process. In this regard, starting in the 90s studies of the problem of "difficult" childhood have acquired relevance and practical significance. This significance is mostly due to the restructuring processes of our society (democratization, humanization, market economy). Social processes entailed not only positive transformations, but also highlighted and exacerbated facts such as a lack of spirituality, a common culture, a sharp decline in the living standards of the people. The general crisis experienced by the country affected the crisis of the family and the education system. Problems of children's lack of education, vagrancy, homelessness, lack of spirituality, cruelty, which worried scientists and teachers in the post-war years of the civil and then World War II, require urgent solutions.

In the research of Bozhbanova (1992), Zhukenova (1990) studied the educational opportunities of the children's team and the methodology of preparing the teacher for work with the children's team. The authors focus on preparing a future specialist for working with challenging children through the formation of a children's team. Bozhbanova (1992) developed criteria and indicators of willingness to work with difficult children through the children's team. The concept of readiness is determined by the system of knowledge, abilities and skills necessary for regulating interpersonal relationships that contribute to the self-assertion of the personality and correction of negative qualities (Bozhbanova, 1992).

In the study of Burisov (1992) reflects the characteristics of preparing students for educational work with six-year-old first-graders, ensuring its effectiveness. Burisov (1992) identifies three interrelated tasks of preparing students for this type of work: fostering a positive attitude to the chosen profession and this type of pedagogical activity, arming with knowledge of the theory and methods of educational work with first-graders, the formation of skills reflecting the features of working with six-year first graders. The author does not consider the problem of deviations in the behaviour of children. However, within the framework of our study, the characteristic of students' readiness to work with children of a given age is of interest (Burisov, 1992, p. 37).

Barsukov (1996) raises the question of the need for a future teacher to have skills related to diagnostic and correctional work. The author considers pedagogically neglected children as "a category of students with pronounced manifestations of deviant behaviour, character accentuations, neurotic symptoms, and mental retardation" (p. 52). Based on the position of an integrated approach to solving the problem, Barsukov (1996) developed a system for preparing a teacher to work with pedagogically neglected children. The system of Barsukov includes not only primary education, as suggested in the studies analyzed above, but also advanced training on particular courses, methodological associations of teachers of intensive development classes for pedagogically neglected children, during which they become acquainted with the specifics of working with this category of children. The study complements the teacher's methodological tools for working with pedagogically neglected children with a set of teaching materials and programs that are widely used today in the primary education developmental education system ("Me and My Family" "Effective Communication," "Rules of Good Form"). The developed model of teacher training for working with pedagogically neglected children is designed for intensive development classes, which have recently become more widespread in the educational system. The idea of the author about the formation of a future teacher's diagnostic and correctional skills of working with pedagogically neglected children was the basis of the program for forming students' readiness to work with aggressive teenagers.

Adults often note difficulties in the behaviour and development of children during crisis periods, which are considered by scientists as a natural phenomenon of personality development.

Each crisis period is associated with both positive and negative neoplasms, which at that moment come to the fore. Negativism, willfulness, self-will, disobedience to the requirements of adults cause difficulties in controlling the behaviour of children. As Arapova (1994) notes in research, negative neoplasms during the crisis period are temporary, which is mostly determined by the social and psychobiological factors: parenting style, individual characteristics of the child, state of the nervous system. Overcoming the "growth difficulties" in many respects depends on how adults can assist in meeting the need for independence, conflict resolution because at this moment, the formation of self-awareness of the child. The task of the teacher is to form positive neoplasms and eliminate negative ones. According to Arapova (1994), the teacher's professional training for working with schoolchildren in times of crisis should include the formation of diagnostic, organizational and correctional skills that underlie the technology for constructively recovering a child from a crisis state. From our point of view, the author has put forward a valuable idea that once again confirms the need for arming specialists a system of integrated knowledge about the development of children in different age periods, taking into account the experienced crises, which will allow the specialist correctly identifying to elucidate the cause of difficulties arising in the behaviour and development of children (Arapova, 1994).

Many studies on preparing students for working with "difficult" children connect this concept with the teenage period. The study of Irkhin (1991) focuses on stimulating the orientation of future teachers to work with pedagogically neglected adolescents. At the same time, the author notes the importance of the teacher recognizing the concept of pedagogical neglect and its differences from similar concepts: deviations in moral development, poor education, deviant behaviour, maladaptation. The key concepts are "pedagogical neglect" and "difficult education", and the diversity of interpretations of the above concepts that are used for characterizing difficult children is emphasized. The question of the students' typification is essential since the diagnosis process and the correct selection of methods of pedagogical influence depend on its decision.

In the study of Chew revealed the components of the communicative skills of future teachers, necessary for communication with awkward teenagers (Zhadeteyte, 1990).

According to Kumarina and Paukova (1999), for practical work with problem children, the teacher must master the base of scientific knowledge about a growing person and the problems that arise during this growth, new pedagogical skills, technologies, new pedagogical thinking. One of the most important is the psychological, security function. It obliges the teacher to proceed, first of all, from the interests of the child, the protection of his mental, physical and moral health in the choice of forms, methods of teaching and upbringing, communication and interaction with the child. The implementation of this function requires the teacher to such a methodical arrangement of the conditions of the child's activities and communication. So that these activities and communication themselves become a factor in pedagogical therapy, would ensure a comfortable state of the child and thereby contribute to the harmonization of his development. The next important function that should characterize a teacher working with problem children is the social function. This function involves the implementation of qualified optimization activities in the interests of the child of the main areas of personally significant relationships for him (with peers, teachers). Awareness of the importance of this activity is one of the priority areas in the work of the teacher. Another significant function of a teacher is diagnostic. This function obliges the teacher to timely identify problems that arise in the child in various areas of his activity and behaviour, to give the primary qualification of the problem. It also requires an analysis of the problem based on a comprehensive study of the child and a specific socio-pedagogical situation, taking into account the history of its development. The fourth distinctive function of such a teacher is the correctional developmental function. The implementation of this function requires the teacher to work, based on the results of the diagnosis, to offer the child (or group of children with similar problems) the necessary type and amount of pedagogical assistance, correcting the conditions of education, training, organizing work to correct the identified deficiencies (Kumarina & Paukova, 1999).

The search for ways to prepare for diagnostic, correctional and developmental work with children with behavioural abnormalities is reflected in the psychological and pedagogical research and scientific and methodological literature of recent years.

Compensatory education classes are created at the school to solve this problem. However, as noted by Voropaeva (1993), this is not a solution to the problem. According to Voropaeva (1993), the effectiveness of pedagogical work depends on the content of the educational process. The author offers affordable tools for the diagnosis and correction of emotional development, which can be used both in the classroom and after school hours.

The possibilities of using game activity as a psycho-corrective effect on the personality of a younger teenager were identified in a study by Bezborodova (1997). Theoretical and practical provisions of Bezborodova are of value in developing the issue of training specialists for corrective and educational work with adolescents. Bezborodova's ideas allow comprehending from a psychological point of view the understanding of the essence of the concept of "psychological correction" and the possibility of the game in solving the problem of overcoming deviations in the behaviour of children and adolescents. The author considers the concept of "psychological correction" as "the interaction of teachers, psychologists, adolescents, in which an individual way of becoming a teenager's personality is maintained and supported, direct or indirect coercion to the choice of interests, preferences, forms of behaviour is excluded" (Bezborodova, 1997, p. 63). Thus, Bezborodova (1997) expressed the idea of the need for non-violent interaction with children as an essential condition for the effectiveness of corrective action.

Preparing students for educational and correctional work with minors Prozorova (1994) considers one of the priority areas of activity related to the solution of childhood problems. The problematic socio-economic situation contributes to the growth of socially maladaptive adolescents, whom the author considers as a particular category of children. By maladaptation, the author understands the totality of signs that characterize the mismatch of human interaction with the environment. Maladaptive behaviour is manifested in the inability to build relationships with people around them, to control their actions, in rudeness, cruelty, bitterness, antisocial orientation. Prozorova (1994) believes that miscalculations in educational work with dysfunctional children and their parents confirm the need for students to form correct ideas about educational and correctional work with minors. "Educational and correctional work is a complex system of influence on minor teenagers, which is combined with psychological and pedagogical techniques and activities, aimed at overcoming or mitigating deficiencies in personality development" (Prozorova, 1994, p. 21). A guarantee of such professional training is the assimilation by students of the general didactic principles of pedagogical work and the mastery of knowledge of the essence, forms, types of work with maladaptive teenagers in the process of studying the disciplines of the psychological and pedagogical cycle, anatomy and physiology of the child with the basics of their hygiene. Of great importance in training belongs to the active participation of students in teaching practice. The study expressed an essential idea about the need for a transition in interaction with children with deviant behaviour from administrative measures to psychological and pedagogical correction and rehabilitation.

The need for social rehabilitation of children with deviant behaviour is reflected in studies. Social rehabilitation is aimed at restoring in children broken ties and relationships or weakened properties and functions of the body, the personality of the child. In connection with the increase in the number of children of the so-called "risk group," scientists express the need for the creation and functioning of a social service system capable of providing timely qualified assistance. The risk group includes maladaptive children who occupy a borderline position between typically developing children and children with developmental pathologies. Thus, rehabilitative pedagogy is engaged in solving the problems of "difficult" childhood. Rehabilitation pedagogy is "the pedagogical impact on a sick or difficult-to-educate child and adolescent to correct his behaviour, optimizing his emotional state, intellectual activity, and eliminating pedagogical neglect" (Sikorsky, 1997, p. 63).

The pedagogy of non-violence is a new pedagogical direction that allows taking a fresh look at the solution to the problem of preparing specialists for working with children with behavioural problems. In his research, Sitarov and Maralov (1997) considers non-violence as one of the principles of humanistic pedagogy. Non-violent interaction with the child, based on subject-subject relations, helps to overcome negative forms of behaviour: aggressiveness, conflict, difficulty in communication.

We are interested in many requirements for the personality of the teacher, considered by Kazansky (1996) in solving the complex task of preventing and overcoming adolescent aggressiveness. Kazansky (1996) drew attention to ways of solving the problem of mutual self-disclosure of participants in subject-subject relations: a high level of the intellectual development of a teacher, moral-volitional development of personality, development of abilities and skills of pedagogical communication, organization and management of the joint creative activity, creating an atmosphere of goodwill and respect. In communication with students, Kazansky (1996) recommends avoiding words that offend pupils, trying not to scold them and, if possible, not making comments. This process is not an easy task even for children who do not have any deviations in behavior but not to mention the presence of aggressive tendencies. Here we agree with Kazansky (1996) that "pedagogy is the very science that explores, analyzes, raises questions about how to help a person" raise "his soul so that a person" straightens up" (Kazansky, 1996).

In order to effectively solve the above problems, the teacher himself must have emotional stability, be proficient in constructive ways of expressing aggression. The fulfilment of this condition contributes to the development of the ability to nonviolent resistance. Currently, there are many practical recommendations for the implementation of this task.

Furmanov (1996) developed a program of "training the psychological competence of the teacher." The purpose of this program is to educate educators about the individual psychological characteristics of a teenager's personality and teach them how to interact with "difficult" teenagers. The author suggests that teachers be educated through game therapy and conflict management, which allow them mastering effective communication techniques. To relieve tension and master the technique of controlling negative emotions, Rakhmatshaeva offers lessons, which are based on a series of psychotechnical exercises. Psychotechnical exercises contribute to the formation of respectful treatment of anger and the assimilation of constructive ways of expressing aggression. Famous scientists-psychologists, pedagogical practitioners Leshchinsky and Kulnevich (1995) offers many suitable methods of Western business management, which allow developing the desired position in the communication of the parent, adult and child.

One of the common reasons for the formation of aggressiveness in children is a disciplinary model of interaction. A study by Sitarov and Maralov (1997) describes a program for reorienting teachers and educators from a disciplinary to a personal model of interaction. The personal model of interaction includes conducting theoretical seminars on the pedagogy and psychology of non-violence; assisting teachers in developing individual programs for self-improvement and professional development; conducting unique pieces of training that contribute to the formation of a position of non-violence and the provision of nonviolent resistance (Sitarov & Maralov, 1997). Sitarov (1997) notes the role of pre-vocational and professional training of a future teacher or educator. This role lies in the fact that these types of training are the main conditions for the formation of the teachers' orientation to the personal model of interaction with children. In the implementation of these conditions, the author gives a vital place to the search for new forms and methods of working with students that contribute to the implementation of these conditions. In the framework of our study, we are interested in a methodology for organizing nonviolent activities of children and methods for correcting negative forms of behaviour in adolescents. In this regard, there is a need for restructuring the professional training of specialists focused on the personal model of interaction. Sitarov (1997) identifies several conditions for solving this problem: the development of students' ability to formulate and solve pedagogical problems in the field of children's personality formation; overcoming pedagogical stereotypes prevailing in the field of training and education; training in the analysis of their pedagogical activity and the experience of building the pedagogical process. Analyzing the content of modern pedagogy and psychology courses, Sitarov (1997) makes a significant remark that they are oriented to the average student, but, as the study showed, the contingent of children attending schools has changed dramatically lately. The teacher's lack of the necessary pedagogical knowledge and skills to work with children with deviations in behaviour causes difficulties in organizing an individual approach to them (Sitarov & Maralov, 1997).

The need to establish mutual understanding in the relations of the teacher and pupils is emphasized in the works of the famous teacher Zankova. Zankov (1996), considering the problem of the teacher's love for his pets, analyzes the catchphrase "Love us with little black, and everyone will love us with little white" (p. 264). In this case, Zankov (1996) draws attention to violators of the discipline, inattentive, bold children with whom it is challenging to establish contact. Only careful attention to the child will help to avoid a misconception about him.

We have developed, experimentally substantiated, and tested a program for the formation of students' professional readiness for working with adolescents exhibiting aggressive behaviour (Istrofilova, 2014a). When constructing a specialist training program, we proceeded from the accepted definition of the readiness of a future teacher to work with aggressive teenagers. The willingness of the teacher to work with aggressive teenagers is determined by

- the presence of related needs and personal qualities;

- possession of knowledge of the theory and methodology of the implementation of pedagogical diagnostics, preventive and corrective work with adolescents exhibiting aggressive behaviour;

- skills to identify aggressiveness in adolescents and its elimination.

The program we developed is presented in three blocks: theoretical and practical, research, and technological. The theoretical and practical block in the study was presented by the study of the author's particular course "Methodology of technology for working with aggressive children and adolescents." The technological unit of the process of formation of the studied professional readiness is represented by the implementation of a teacher's activity model developed by us for correcting aggressive behaviour of adolescents, which contributed to students mastering the technology of pedagogical diagnostics and correction of aggressiveness in adolescents, forming the initial experience of eliminating destructive aggression in children's behaviour (Istrofilova, 2014b).

Conclusion

Thus, the solution to many problems associated with assisting adolescents with antisocial behaviour largely depends on the degree of real preparedness of the teacher for professional activities. The analysis of the problem of training specialists for educational work with children and adolescents with deviant behaviour allowed drawing several conclusions:

- The theoretical search and practical implementation of the solution to the problem of "difficult" childhood, laid down by famous teachers of the 20–30s of the last century, find creative rethinking in modern conditions;

- The difficult socio-economic situation in the country contributes to the growth of various disharmonies of the child's personality, which can be challenging to understand for an untrained specialist;

- In science, there is the experience in the practical preparation of students for interaction with adolescents with impaired behaviour and development, but in most cases, they relate to preschool and primary school age, slightly less than the studies in this direction concerning teenage school children;

- The problem of preparing future teachers for working with adolescents of asocial behaviour is essential and requires specialized training;

- A condition for the effective interaction of a teacher with adolescents of antisocial behaviour is to equip them with a knowledge system and methods of organizing pedagogical prevention and correction.

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