Patriotic Education And Children's Periodicals

Abstract

The authors of the article discuss patriotic education of the future generation; note the fact that periodicals are becoming the conductor of patriotic ideas in pre-revolutionary Russia. This is due to the fact that great attention has always been paid to patriotic education in Russia. Russian theorists and practitioners have made a serious scientific and philosophical substantiation of citizenship and patriotism. These qualities are indispensable and educated for the unity and prosperity of the state. In the Soviet Union, patriotism became more politicized, but retained its significance, and this significance has reached our days. The authors came to the conclusion that the Soviet pre-war children's periodicals largely demonstrate the continuity of patriotic education concepts of the younger generation. Children's magazines not only strengthened traditions, but also contributed to the formation of moral and ethical character of a young reader. The purpose of the study was to consider the historical and sociocultural aspect of the patriotic education of the younger generation in children's periodicals. Social institutions, such as family, school, mass media and information, public organizations are the main ones in upbringing of patriotic qualities, they were and are given special attention in society. Modern Russia is in the need of patriotic education and of its special significance, since there is a direct dependence of the state welfare on the strength of patriotic feelings of its citizens, on their ability to serve the Fatherland, and correct selection of funds, especially on printing periodicals.

Keywords: Patriotic education, periodicals, children's magazines

Introduction

Discussions of educators, public figures, and politicians are devoted to the patriotic education of the younger generation. Modern youth have distorted ideas about patriotic education as a relic from the recent Soviet past. And the problems of the patriotic education of the younger generation, raised at various levels, are perceived as a kind of propaganda act. However, turning to history, we find a reason to believe that patriotic education in pre-revolutionary Russia was given very serious attention, and that the best minds of that time justified it as a scientific, philosophical, and pedagogical foundation. Media was the channel through which moral and ethical ideas, ideas of citizenship and patriotism penetrated into society. In pre-revolutionary Russia, these are newspapers, magazines, and children's periodicals. The study and analysis of the historical, socio-cultural aspect of patriotic education of the young generation in children's periodicals in Russia retains its main role and task throughout the entire history of print media for children.

Problem Statement

The problem of patriotic education of children is at the forefront of upbringing and educational sphere of any state. Russian progressive thinkers and practitioners have made a serious scientific and philosophical substantiation of the problem of civic consciousness and patriotism as compulsory and educated qualities. The society paid and is paying attention to those social institutions where the upbringing of the future citizen took place or could take place – family, school, mass media, and public organizations (Marin et al., 2019). Children's periodicals serve as such a means. The main problem in the production of such products for children is a serious approach in the selection of material focused on patriotic education and available methods of presentation (text and visual).

Research Questions

In pre-revolutionary Russia, the family (at that time having numerous children) was given the primary place in education. The Emperor of Russia Nikolai Alexandrovich Romanov paid serious attention to the issues of education and upbringing, considering them “the main concerns” and “support in the future”. The union of the king (state) and the family will give birth to “the firm and faithful hope of the Fatherland”. The military slogan “For Faith, Tsar and Fatherland” lived in every Orthodox family in Tsarist Russia. The Fatherland personified not only the state, but also the family of the Russian people. Thus, patriotism as a deep, somewhere sacred feeling was born in the family (Pallotta, 2018).

The school, as a social institution of education in general, and of patriotic education in particular, was an important social institutions. Scientifically comprehending problems, it reflected the contents and dynamics of the development of patriotic education. A pre-revolutionary magazine, as a phenomenon, demonstrates the ability to express and determine value priorities, spiritual and moral searches, and influence the process of sociocultural regulation. It was read not only among the upper strata of society, but also by merchants, commoners, educated workers (Golovin, 2010).

The level of military danger is also a significant factor, which, it was transformed by both the family and the school into patriotic education. Here it is appropriate to recall the military conflicts that happened in the history of Russia. For example, the Patriotic War (1812–1814), the First World War (1914–1917), the Great Patriotic War (1941–1945). Patriotism as a quality of a citizen of a country is always in demand, but it is most relevant in the years of hard times. It is obvious that conditions preceding the highest rise in the spirit of Russian people, growth of national self-awareness are formed through the education of patriotism in peacetime. Thus, it is possible to study the evolution of children's periodicals’ development in Russia from the magazine “Children's reading for heart and mind” and to pioneer magazines of the USSR. It is complex and multifaceted, depending on the objective socio-economic, political, national preconditions that arose between the wars.

In the course of this evolutionary development, children's periodicals represent prototypes of modern magazines and newspapers, differ in their forms and content, and the level of technical performance. Printing industry, as a separate branch of capitalist production, contributed to the rise in the cultural level of the population. The printing process is actively improving. It is known that in the first half of the 18th century, the method of stereotyping was invented. In the early 19th century, the manual printing process was replaced by machine production. In 1828, a flat-bed printing press was built and increased circulation. In 1863, rotary printing equipment was invented to increase productivity and reduce the number of maintenance personnel. The process of improving print quality is actively underway (Kuraev et al., 2019).

In the middle of the century, the publishing house received a strong impetus in its development, the catalyst of which was the invention of photography. The era of illustrated magazines began. The appearance of magazine illustrations in children's publications dates back to the beginning of the 19th century, while the design of a children's magazine was formed in the 20th century.

A professional structure is emerging that requires staffing – publishers, artists, photographers, typographers, etc. The stylistic features of publications are being formed, which today we would call a corporate style, layout features that have given results, namely, the integrity of text and visual material in conditions of complete mechanization printing process (Lopasova, 2012). The industrial revolution in print was gaining momentum at the end of the century. The invention of machines for collecting sheets, book binders, new rotary printing houses, rasterized forms and phototyping, the development of chemical processes in printing contributed to an increase in the circulation and range of printed products, which had acquired enormous proportions by the 20th century.

The industrial revolution in the printing business in the 19th century contributed to an innovative phenomenon, akin to modern gadgets, which aroused the extreme interest of all segments of the population of the Russian Empire in printed publications. Its new forms corresponded to the content, and all together could not but become powerful tools for influencing people. Accordingly, the importance of periodicals grew steadily. The content of the publications was of an educational and edifying nature. The journals reported the available scientific knowledge, contributed to the development of children's literature, and recruited the best writers and translators, poets, teachers, scientists to work (Vasilenko et al., 2020). Since the middle of the 19th century, questions have been raised about the problems of the relationship between the children's magazine and the present, the possibility of actively influencing the formation of the worldview, the possibility of introducing children to culture, religion, and science. Publishers began to understand the importance of the age specialization of children's periodicals and, accordingly, the quality of content. This is how publications for young children, older children, youth, magazines for family reading appear – the main purpose of children's journalism of this period is education and upbringing. Many publications were aimed at propaganda, education of civil morality, taught to learn and be proud of their history.

Political events related to the Revolution of 1905, the Russo-Japanese War, the First World War were also covered in children's publications, which reacted sharply to socially significant events and facts. In the magazine “Children's Rest”, in 1904–1905 there was a section “About the war”. The magazine “Children's reading” with the heading “Various messages” published articles and essays of war correspondents and witnesses of the events with photographs of destroyed stations and sinking ships. Until 1917, there were several hundred periodicals for children and youth in Russia. After the Revolution of 1917, in the first four years, issues related to agitation and propaganda were of paramount importance for the Bolsheviks. Covering this period, contemporary notes the precarious situation and the search for support from the people, the search for means of spreading revolutionary ideas to the broad masses. As a result, they chose such means as propaganda and educational centers and clubs, cultural and educational work, military libraries, propaganda teams, posters, cinematography, radio broadcasting, gramophone recording, monumental propaganda, libraries and reading rooms, political education and raising the level of political literacy of the Bolsheviks, etc. The main source of information transmission were printed publication, such as leaflets, newspapers, and magazines. It should be noted that a significant part of the country's population was illiterate, but the Bolsheviks relied upon printed publications, especially publications for children and youth. In 1922, with the emergence of a public pioneer organization, which can also be regarded as a certain instrument for the propaganda of revolutionary ideas, children's periodicals reached a new level of their development. In children's (pioneer) publications, materials were placed on topical topics: party documents, significant dates, famous personalities, pioneer and Komsomol events and other information and political publications, which were interspersed with sports, culture, and science. Children were able to show interest in information and remember what they hear and see in detail. Periodicals use color combinations in print to influence children's perception of text content. Color and color harmonies create a certain psychological impact on a person. Gradually, in the pre-war period, an extensive system of printed publications for children and youth appeared, which covered the entire country. These are magazines with a general humanitarian orientation “Pioneer”, “Koster”, “Vozhatiy”, magazines for babies “Murzilka”, “Young naturalist”, “Young artist”, for older youth “Technology of youth”, “Around the world”, “Smena” and many others. They were faced with the task of shaping the worldview of a person of the new Soviet type, effectively influencing the development of the personality of future builders of a society of social justice, and instilling loyalty to party-communist ideas from childhood.

This is how the structural and content model of the pioneer magazine was formed as a new type of children's magazine, taking into account the age characteristics of the children's audience and ideological and pedagogical tasks, the main goal of which was communist education and, first of all, patriotism. However, despite the proclaimed removal from the previous history of Russian periodicals for children, the Soviet stage continued its most significant traditions of the 19th – early 20th centuries. Based on a study of pre-revolutionary domestic mass media for children and youth, the Pioneer print media, created in the early years of Soviet power, were organized, and functioned according to the same model as the scout media only with a different ideological content. At the same time, patriotic education of the younger generation remained the dominant vector in the new political system of coordinates. Soviet pre-war children's periodicals largely demonstrate the continuity of the concepts of patriotic education of the younger generation, but this is expressed in a new ideological and pedagogical task – communist education, where significant attention was paid to patriotism.

Purpose of the Study

The aim of the study is to analyze the influence of children's periodicals in Russia and its influence on the patriotic education of children. The formation of a spiritual personality and its artistic taste is achieved by the spread of national culture in everyday life, taking into account the influence of cultural elements on modern reality (Vasilenko, 2019).

Research Methods

The method for writing the work was an informational analysis of research on the history of periodicals for children and issues of patriotic education in Russia in the pre-revolutionary and Soviet period. The generalization of all the information received on the analysis of the history of periodicals for the children's audience in Russia for the period under study makes it possible to model the further path of development of printed materials for the purpose of patriotic education.

Findings

Periodicals were the conduit of patriotic ideas in pre-revolutionary Russia. This is due to the fact that Russian progressive thinkers and practitioners have made a serious scientific and philosophical substantiation of civic consciousness and patriotism as compulsory and educated qualities. Along with social institutions (family, school), where the upbringing of the future citizen of the Russian Empire took place or could take place, children's magazines not only strengthened Orthodox traditions, but also contributed to the formation of the moral and moral image of the young reader. The results obtained in this study indicate that the history of the emergence of such a phenomenon as children's periodicals (printed periodicals for children) have all the prerequisites for scientific research. The socio-cultural aspect of the designated historical period, it can be noted that children's periodicals are the brainchild of the Enlightenment, for which a belief in the ability to change a person is inherent. And the philosophical and pedagogical theories of the era declare humanistic ideals, pin great hopes on the mighty force of education (Kireev & Klimenko, 2017).

The scientific thought of modern times, both in Europe and in Russia, assigned a very important role in the education of a person to the education of a citizen and a patriot. In Russia the attitude towards the Fatherland has historically been considered one of the important criteria in assessing a person as a person. The formation of a person was determined by desire for a righteous life and struggle for the good and prosperity of the Fatherland.

The national trend in Russian pedagogy in the middle of the 19th century was represented by Ushinsky (2017). The upbringing system developed by him was based on the principle of nationality, by which he understood the originality of each nation, according to geographical, natural conditions, and historical development.

The pedagogical thought of the early 20th century was characterized by the continuation of the search for new forms of national education. It was based on the principles of anthropology in pedagogy, laid down by Ushinsky (2017). Education and training is considered in the aspect of the formation of an educated and spiritual and moral personality. Yelnitsky K. N., being a supporter of the apolitical nature of the school, an opponent of politicians' interference in its affairs, emphasized the direct dependence of the welfare of the state on the strength of the patriotic feelings of its citizens, on their ability to serve the Fatherland (as cited in Ovchinnikova, 2007).

Conclusion

Thus, we can say that periodicals were the conductor of patriotic ideas in pre-revolutionary Russia. The scientific and philosophical substantiation of civic consciousness and patriotism, as obligatory and educated qualities, is determined by the research of Russian progressive theorists and practitioners in the field of pedagogy and education. By social institutions such as family and school, where the upbringing of the future citizen of the Russian Empire took place, children's magazines not only strengthened Orthodox traditions, but also contributed to the formation of the moral and moral character of the young reader. And the Soviet pre-war children's periodicals, in many ways, demonstrated the continuity of the concepts of patriotic education of the younger generation, but this was expressed in a new ideological and pedagogical task – communist education, where significant attention was paid to patriotism. In modern Russia, the need for patriotic education is considered important, since there is a direct dependence of the state welfare on the strength of the patriotic feelings of its citizens, on their ability to serve the Fatherland.

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