Педагогика / 3. Методические основы воспитательного процесса

Shastova I.V.

Educational centre “Greenly”

Peculiarities of investigating changes in education

One of the hottest issues discussed in nowadays papers is changing demands toward modern education. The society develops quickly and tremendously so that universities and schools are not able any more to provide young people with needed skills and experience as well as to catch up with new educational targets. Nowadays many educators find it difficult to follow the tendencies and react adequately to them.

Ukrainian society - which is trying to join the European community - heads towards changes in the educational system by implementing key features of Bologna process by creating portfolios, implementing Module system and designing final school exams which would look like Cambridge IGCSE, etc. However, it seems that many Ukrainians merely cite some ideas which were development by their European and American colleagues and do not investigate this problem on a deeper level. This paper aims at finding out more about this issue comparing main items which are highlighted in various articles.

The question of changes in our world is a hot subject in many research papers. English-speaking authors share some ideas about changing society [7, 9], the Third Millennium peculiarities [15], how to make schools highly effective [8] and what helps students to learn better [14, 15]. However, Ukrainian researchers seemed not to be in the same stream. They mention about changing demands towards the education in Ukraine attempts to catch up with European education and how to create new curriculums which take into account nowadays demands[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6,].

Speaking about effective learning, some researchers comment on new shapes of schooling [10], new types of schools [12, 14], and that nowadays schools don’t work [11]. Ukrainian authors do not investigate these issues as deeply as their colleagues. O.Vasylchenko [3] cites D.Hopkins about the characteristics of effective schools and gives the definition of this type of schools and discusses the criteria to define them. It was considered that effective school: 1) develops all the time; 2) gets support from parents and government; 3) sets high standards towards students; 4) competes with others on the field of education [3].

On the contrary, Stoll and Fink use [13] two dimensions to characterize schools as: moving (effective and improving), cruising (effective but declining), strolling (neither effective nor ineffective), sinking (ineffective and declining) and struggling (ineffective but improving). Special attention is given to cruising school which can be sometimes judged as unidentified ineffective schools [13].

In researches of Ukrainian methodists the concept of a capable teacher and what is student learning are also different. A student is still an object in the process of learning [2], a teacher is supposed to be extremely well-qualified and know nearly everything because in other case he/she is judged as an unprofessional one [2]. The process of learning is viewed in a traditional way as a reliable law and different ways of increasing the effectiveness of learning in the classrooms are offered as they are rules, which shouldn’t be broken [2, 4].

In their paper Wang M.C., Haertel G.D.and Walberg H.J. [16] investigated the question of what changes student learning by analyzing many findings on this field. They identified 28 areas and listed them in order of the importance. The top five were: classroom management, metacognitive processes, cognitive processes, home environment and student\teacher social interactions.

Summing up the difference of issues which are highlighted in nowadays articles, it is necessary to note that Ukrainian educators do not investigate the new tendencies and concepts. The authors only cite some ideas of European and American researchers, share positive experience and criticize weak points.

References:

1. Алфімов В.М. Критерії ефективності виховання творчої особистості старшокласника: [Електронний ресурс] – Режим доступу : http://archive.nbuv.gov.ua/portal/soc_gum/Nsod/2008_1/Alfimov.pdf.

2. Артемова Л.В. Не можна навчити – можна лише навчитися : [Електронний ресурс] – Режим доступу : http://archive.nbuv.gov.ua/portal/soc_gum/vkmu/2010_1/Artemova.pdf.

3. Васильченко О.В. Сучасна загальноосвітня школа: від функціонування – до розвитку : [Електронний ресурс] – Режим доступу : http://archive.nbuv.gov.ua/portal/soc_gum/Postmetodyka/2010_1/vasulch.pdf.

4. Кохановська О.В. Основні підходи до визначення ефективності дистанційного навчання майбутніх економістів фахових дисциплін : [Електронний ресурс] – Режим доступу : http://archive.nbuv.gov.ua/portal/soc_gum/pedalm/texts/2011_12%20_3/019.pdf.

5. Ляшенко О. І. Оновлення змісту загальної середньої освіти : [Електронний ресурс] – Режим доступу : http://archive.nbuv.gov.ua/portal/soc_gum/znpkp_ped/2011_17/r1/r1_14.pdf.

6. Панкратьєва В.В. Територіально-часові особливості системи загальної освіти в Луганській області : [Електронний ресурс] – Режим доступу : http://archive.nbuv.gov.ua/portal/natural/vkhnu/Gge/2012_1033/Pankrati.pdf.

7. Bogotch, I. and Townsend, T (in press) ‘What are the essential leadership questions in a rapidly changing world?’ in Townsend, T. and Bogotch, I. The Elusive What and the Problematic How: The Essential Leadership Questions for School Leaders and Educational Researchers, Sense Publishers, Rotterdam and Taiwan

8. Codding, J. (1997) ‘Designing Highly Effective Programs for Successful Schools’. A keynote presentation at the Successful Schools Conference, Melbourne, June 3.

9. Hargreaves, D. (1994) The Mosaic of Learning: Schools and Teachers for the New Century, London, Demos.

10. Hargreaves, D. (2006) A New Shape for Schooling : Deep Leadership 1, London, Specialist Schools and Academies Trust.

11. Hood, D. (1998) Our Secondary Schools don’t work anymore, Auckland, Profile Books.

12. Stoll, L. (1997) ‘Successful Schools: Linking School Effectiveness and School Improvement’. A keynote presentation at the Successful Schools Conference, Melbourne, June 3.

13. Stoll, L. and Fink, D., (1998) ‘The Cruising School: The Unidentified Ineffective School’ in Stoll, L. and Myers, K. (eds) No Quick Fixes: Perspectives on Schools in Difficulty, London, Falmer Press.

14. Townsend, T. (1994) Effective Schooling for the Community, (London and New York: Routledge).

15. Townsend, T. (1998) ‘The Primary School of the Future: Third World or Third Millennium?’ in Townsend, T. The Primary School in Changing Times: The Australian Experience, London and New York: Routledge.

16. Wang, M.C., Haertel, G.D. and Walberg, H.J. (1993/1994) ‘What helps students learn?’ Educational Leadership, Winter, 1993/94, pp 74-79)