Nowadays education is considered as a kind of service that inevitably makes higher educational institutions correspond to the demands of competitiveness of the provided educational services, and it requires alterations in content and forms of educational process. Besides, change in paradigms of education from traditional to innovative requires improvements in a specialist´s training from a higher school.
At the modern development stage of our society social demand for non-standard thinking and creative people increased dramatically. A demand for creative activity of a specialist and his developed technical thinking, for his skill to construct, evaluate, rationalize technics and technology grows quickly. A solution to these problems much depends on content and technology of training future specialists.
Technology is the science of technics. Technic is an art, knowledge, skills, methods of work and their appliance.
Technology. Some claim that it is a synonym to the alder term «methodic». Others think that technology (unlike methodic) consist only of reproducing actions, but does not contain description of a pedagogue´s personality that is always unique, while methodic, apart from action algorithm, includes characteristics of its author´s personality, and without that a methodic cannot provide the desired result.
Some other people say that everything is about time: in previous century the term "methodic" was firmly linked to an academic subject. Now, in XXI century, it is used as "technology" in a wider, more general meaning (not methodic, but technology of training, upbringing, management development, etc).
As an education technology we imply a definite method of training, where a means of education carries out the main load of a function realization under a man´s control. In education technology the main part belongs to means of training: a tutor does not train students, but carries out the function of stimulating and coordinating their activity, and also the function of controlling the education means. Pedagogic skill of a tutor is his ability to select the necessary content, implement optimal methods and means of training according to the programme and his pedagogic objectives.
New demands of society for level of education and a person´s development lead to the necessity to alter education technologies. Today technologies that allow to organize educational process considering professional direction of education and also a student´s personality, his passions and abilities, prove to productive.
One of the most important problems of didactic is the problem of education methods, and it remains urgent in both theoretical and practical sense. The very educational process, activity of a tutor and students, and, therefore, an education results depend on its solution.
Method is a way to come closer to a truth. An education success mainly depends on direction and inner activity of the studied, type of their activity. Independence degree, expression of creative abilities must serve as an important criterion of a method selection. I.Y. Lerner and M.N. Snatkin suggested outlining methods of training:
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Descriptive-illustrative method.
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Reproductive method.
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Method of problem description.
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Partially-searching, or heuristic method.
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Research method.
Initiative, independence, creative search are expressed in research activity most completely. Methods of training directly grow into methods of scientific research. Y.K. Babanskiy outlined 7 steps of the algorithm «optimal selection of education methods».
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Decision if a material will be studied independently or under the guidance of a pedagogue; if a student can master a material independently without excessive efforts and time costs, then a pedagogue´s help is superfluous. In any other case such help is necessary.
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Defining correlation between reproductive and productive methods. If there are conditions, productive methods should be chosen.
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Defining correlation between inductive and deductive logics, nalytic and sinthetic way of mastering. If empiric foundations for deduction and analysis are prepared, deductive and synthetic methods are completely affordable for a grown man. They are, of course, preferable as stricter, more economical, and closer to scientific description.
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Measures and means of combining oral, illustrative, practical methods.
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Decision if it is possible to introduce a method of students´ activity stimulation.
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Definition of «points», intervals, methods of control and self-control.
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Thinking of reserve variants in case of real inclination of real training process from the planned one.
Whatever methods are used to increase efficiency of professional education, it is important to create such psychological-pedagogic conditions, where a student can take an active personal position and express himself completely as a subject of educational activity. Didactic principle of a person activity in education and professional self-definition conditions the system of demands to a student´s training activity and a tutor´s pedagogic activity in a single educational process. This system includes inner and outer factors, needs and motives. Correlation of these characteristics defines the selection of upbringing content, specific forms and methods of education, terms of organization of the whole process of forming an active and creative person. Recently we always read and hear: «It is necessary to use active and remove passive methods of education». A method can´t be active or passive itself, its implementer makes it such.
Everything depends on how a tutor uses one or another method.
There are no universally-effective or uneffective methods.
All education methods have their strong and weak points, and, therefore, depending on goals, conditions, available time, they need to be combined optimally. Therefore, it is correct to say: «An education process can be effective (when a student participates as a subject of his own training) or passive (when a student only serves as an object of someone´s influence). Education quality is made of training quality and upbringing quality. Training quality can only be achieved as the result of providing efficiency of each training step. In other words, the whole training process is built by the scheme: apprehend - comprehend - remember - implement - inspect. To achieve a training quality it is necessary to pass all steps of cognitive activity consequently. Using of different forms and methods during the training process provides for an increase in training quality».
Main forms and methods of training that provide for its quality increase are: role-playing games, business games, seminars, reproductive-generalizing lessons, conferences, disputes, dialogues, problem study, independent work, essay defence, individual work, creative composition, reports, lectures, testing, programmed control, research, etc. All mentioned technologies of training provide for the solution of the problem of education quality.
It is known that it is impossible to give a material for independent mastering right away in groups where students, unprepared for independent training prevail. If it is inevitable, a tutor must carefully develop a task, considering his group, its preparation level, formulate questions clearly, compose methodical recommendations, point out literature. And here one cannot neglect two principles of didactics: availability and training on a high level, difficulty.
References
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Bordovskiy G.A., Izvozchikov V.A. New training technologies: questions of terminology // Pedagogy. - 1993. - № 5. - Р. 12-16.
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Bogolyubov V.I. pedagogic technology: evolution of the concept // Soviet pedagogy. - 1991. - № 9.
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Glossary of terms on technology of education. - Paris UNESCO, 1986.
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Klarin M.V. Pedagogic technology in educational process (Analysis of foreign experience) . - M., 1989.
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Lerner I.Y. Attention to training technology // Sov. Pedagogy. - 1990. - № 3. - Р. 138-141.
The work was submitted to international scientific conference «Modern education. Problems and solutions», Thailand, Desember, 19-30, 2011, came to the editorial office 14.05.2012.