Problems of Education in the 21st Century

5-8

Authors: Vincentas Lamanauskas

The interpretation of the concept ‘value’ is extremely varied and brings a historic background. Values are fostered since childhood through the process of sharing and analysing individual experience based on certain concepts such as goodness, beauty, love, etc. Rules and standards are also important for value development. All people tend to seek values and their cognition (“When Values Change”, 1999). ‘The Dictionary of Psychology’ explains that value attitudes as if determine all human works, the main patterns of behaviour, different actions or even a single act (The Dictionary of Psychology, 1993). The revision of modern scientific information sources maintains that little attention is paid to the aspect of fostering value-based relations with nature as not enough research in the field has been carried out. Also it is important to elaborate the most appropriate model of fostering value-based relations with nature. All these questions are mostly connected with science education process in comprehensive school. It is important to shift our attention from fact-based knowledge to value-based knowledge at all educational levels. Science education today should be much more value-based than many years ago. It can not be neutral. It must contain a spiritual dimension. Generally speaking, it is obvious, if we want to improve education of the young generation, the process of fostering value-based relations and sensual perception of nature should be devoted more attention.

21-29

Authors: Nitza Davidovitch, Shmuel E. Schacham, Yuri Ribakov

Tutorials are an essential part of the academic teaching process. They play an important role in students' understanding of the material and have a direct influence on their final marks. Selection of a proper tutoring policy for improving students' success in engineering disciplines is a subject investigated all over the world. It is common to think that efficiency of tutorials in smaller groups is higher. However, financial considerations limit sub-division of classes into small groups. This paper is focused on the issue of the preferred teacher of these sessions – lecturer (faculty member) or teaching assistant. The current study examines the effect of this administrative decision on students’ performance, as measured by ratings of their teachers, and also by students' final grades. The influence of additional factors like class size, students’ grades, or majors are also examined. Our findings show that there is no significant advantage of tutorials taught by teaching assistants in small groups over those taught by lecturers in plenum.

38-46

Authors: Mona Holmqvist, Jane Mattisson

The present article describes how Swedish pupils in class 4 (nine to eleven years old) learn English as a second language. The study replicates a learning study carried out within the framework of a more extensive project known as “The Pedagogy of Learning”. The present study is aimed to find out if the results from one original learning study can be generalised to other teachers and pupils. The pupils participating in the presented study learn how to use “to have”. The original Learning Study Cycle (LSC) consisted of three lessons per cycle, each lesson carried out in different groups of pupils. The teachers focused on the critical aspects, i.e. the features which must be distinguished in order to understand a phenomenon. This process entailed investigating the contrasts between the specified learning outcome(s), i.e. the ability or knowledge targeted. The lessons were planned from a variation theory perspective. The LSC demonstrated that the use of contrast – applied in only one of the three lessons – between “to be” and “to have” had a positive effect on pupils’ generative learning, i.e. continued learning outside the classroom. In order to establish if the results of the present study are coincidental or repeatable the LSC was replicated. The first replicated study was conducted by a group of teachers with a good knowledge of variation theory. These teachers had previously applied the theory in mathematics lessons. A second replication was initiated by a group of teachers with no knowledge of variation theory. The results demonstrated that contrast is important for generative learning provided that teachers are able to focus on critical aspects and thereby elucidate contrast. In the group familiar with variation theory the results were similar to those of the original study, i.e. generative learning was promoted, while contrast had little effect on the pupils generative learning in the group of teachers who had no knowledge of variation theory. The study demonstrates that generative learning is dependent on teachers’ knowledge of how the critical aspects of the target knowledge should be presented to pupils. Such knowledge enables teachers to apply contrast as a means of developing pupils’ ability to distinguish qualitative differences. In this way, pupils continue to develop their knowledge beyond the classroom.

57-68

Authors: Irena Katane, Ilze Kalniņa

Global level various processes make us questions: where and in what way can we search the possibilities for sustainable development of society and how can we promote its competitiveness in the context of globalization and integration processes? The new ecological, synergetic paradigms in pedagogy enable to study a personality as a self-developing, self-organizing and self-evaluating system which develops during the educational process, plans and forecasts; constructs and accumulates its own experience; which is able to choose and to be responsible for the consequences of its own actions under the conditions of modern changeable environment. Methodology of Research. During the last three years (2005 – 2007) a subject of our research was new meaning of concepts in pedagogy: competitiveness, competitive personality and marketable specialist in the context of human viability in the changeable environment. It bases and builds on scientific sources which represent: 1) evolutionary and cultural pedagogy; 2) developmental, ecological and applied psychology; 3) human ecology, including educational ecology. The methods of theoretical research: the analytical evaluative studies of scientific literature; content analysis of documents; reflection of experience. The ecological and synergetic approaches enable to draw the conclusion that nowadays human as an individual of society, personality must learn to live and change in the interaction with the changeable environment, including changeable social, educational, economic, career environment etc. aspects. Therefore concept of competitiveness is becoming pedagogical category, which changes its traditional meaning during the last fifteen years. Nowadays it is very important to work out the theoretical background pertaining to the new content of competitiveness in pedagogy, analysing the concept in the context of recent changes which take place in the modern society and education as well. In this article new concept of competitiveness is substantiated in the following contexts and aspects: 1) various educational paradigms: liberal-rational, ecological and synergetic paradigm, 2) several approaches: functional, biometrical and structural approach.

81-91

Authors: Julius K. Maiyo, Joan A Owiye

The foundation of present day special education in Kenya dates as far back as 1968 when the government published sessional paper NO. 5 on special education. The paper laid out a public policy framework for children with disabilities such as hearing and visual impairment, mentally and physically handicapped and multiple handicaps (GoK, 2003). Among the key policies was the integration of disabled children into regular formal schools in order to enhance their participation in formal learning. Regrettably however, 40 years down the line, the government is yet to realize reasonable access of elementary education that can help liberate and make the disabled child self-reliance. The sector still faces challenges related to access, equity and quality. The study carried out in Webuye division, Bungoma East District, adopted a descriptive survey design specifically to analyze challenges facing provision of inclusive formal education to the disabled child. The relationship between the variables was explained using Rawlasian theory of justice. A total of 6 schools out of 104 were purposively sampled. Questionnaires and interview schedules and document analysis were used to collect data from education officers, heads and teachers of sampled schools. Analysis of data was done using statistical tools such as percentages and frequencies. Findings were presented using tables. It was concluded that, as much as the policy on special education is clearly laid out, for it has not been fully implemented. People’s attitude towards inclusive education remains wanting, and therefore, only a small fraction (3.4%) of public schools is offering inclusive education. The regular school curriculum is too academic oriented and the teachers are yet to embrace inclusive education. The study recommends that, the MoE adapts inclusive curriculum, examination and grading system. Comprehensive special schools should be established to cater for pre-school, primary school, high school and technical schooling to provide meaningful education to meet their needs.

100-108

Authors: Anne Uusen

Writing is the most visible and probably therefore the most criticized product of education, but often the teacher has not declared to him/her what is the essence of writing and what are the main goals of teaching and assessing writing. Usually, when teachers in Estonia claim about students` bad writing skills, they often mean spelling, which is actually only one element of writing. The present article is going to introduce the research, which goal was to convince teachers, that creating text is a complex process, which involves paying attention to numerous factors: choice of words, syntax, message, peculiarities of different text forms, language usage, etc. Therefore, analytical assessment is described more closely in named above research paper and in this article, with hopes to encourage teachers to use it more systematically and consciously. Analytical assessment model, worked out for the research and used for assessing 740 pupils written texts, gave complex information about pupils' writing skills, from what brief overview will be presented in the current article. The fact, that all pupils had their strong sides and weaknesses, confirmed the complex nature of writing and proved, that for assessing pupils writing skills we need to assess many aspects of writing, not only spelling and/or content.

124-132

Authors: Nikolay V. Gapanovich-Kajdalov

In the article we deal with the substantiating of the urgent problem of a psychologist’s satisfaction with the profession and the professional competence of a graduate. The basic theoretical approaches to the researching the satisfaction with the profession are analyzed. Professional competence of a psychologist is considered as the readiness of a graduate to realize the professional work in such spheres as psychological education, psychological preventive measures, psychological consultation, psychodiagnostics, psychocorrection, etc. The components of a psychologist’s professional competence are considered as the factors of satisfaction with the profession. Various models discovering the contents and the ways of the formation a psychologist’s professional competence are offered in modern researches. A graduate links the satisfaction with the profession with the feeling of his competence in the field of theoretical and practical grounding. As the achievement of a high professional level is impossible without the realization of professional self-reflexion, we have carried out the research of the professional graduates’ competence of the Gomel state university named after Francisk Scorina as a factor of satisfaction with the profession of a psychologist. On the basis of the generalized research results, we suggest the conclusions: what necessary grounding received in high school the future psychologists link their satisfaction with; and the recommendations how to carry out the perfection in the training of experts.

140-147

Authors: Natalya Zamkovaya, Irina Moiseenko

When studying any of languages foreign to some person and not considering this process as simple as an acquiring certain knowledge and skills volume only, but to the contrary – regarding it as purposeful activity which enables this person to expand his/her cultural background notably, it can lead the student outside the mastering of ready-made knowledge to unobstructed developing of creative mind. In order to achieve that it might be necessary to organize these studies by leading each student to accept the idea that any new knowledge proffered must be accredited with some individual significance valued by this person. This can be done by engaging some modern and innovative methods representative with new style of academic activity; these can provide both for various transformed ways of knowledge presentation as well as the different types of absorbing this new information by the way of putting the body of it into practice, engaging each student in this or that joint actions and frequent discussions. The most effective methods for studying Russian as a foreign language in our opinion are the following ones which have been put to test by us and by teachers in Estonia and proved to be fruitful. These are: some developing technologies as putting up the problem and subsequent solving of it; an individual project; also the process of unraveling any communicative task and getting the answers; the work in the master-classes and the last but not least – an RWCT technology. The novelty of this research presented by authors lies in the nature and specialty of educational materials accomplished using and developing the methods mentioned above, besides its introduction into the teaching practice taking place at the moment. The results of the research are published as two textbooks for Russian language teachers and students of the same profile.

156-170

Authors: Algirdas Čepulėnas, Lota Bobrova, Lauras Grajauskas

The article deals with the main psychosocial needs of students. It presents the results of empirical research of psychosocial needs among female students in Lithuania (Šiauliai University) and the USA (California University). The psychosocial needs of students are more oriented towards tangible values compared to spiritual humanistic values of life. Students tend to underestimate logical thinking, self-cognizance; they pay too little attention to self-education. The majority of students think that they cannot meet their psychosocial needs of fortifying their health, employment, self-actualization and implementing their goals. In order to strengthen the impact of university studies on the formation of students’ psychosocial needs we should orient our educational technologies towards the formation of a free and responsible personality of a student and the development of students’ creative powers and logical thinking.