Problems of Education in the 21st Century

419

Authors: Editorial Board

Cover page, Vol. 76, No. 4, 2018

422-424

Authors: Aleksandra Tłuściak-Deliowska

Contemporaneity, defined as post-modernity, is a stage of civilization changes, which in its nature entails changes in the sphere of didactic and educational thinking and practice. The rapid pace of social change, shaping new interpersonal relationships, progressive axiological chaos, enforce a kind of revision of views on the school as a place and the role of the teacher in it. Challenges in education are caused by a variety of factors, which have affected not only teachers and students and relationships between them, but also the school community as a whole. Challenges in education have changed over the social development and technological progress indicated above.

437-450

Authors: Marilou Ioakimidis, George Papakonstantinou

The ostensibly free university education in Greece actually has several private costs. A comparative research design was used to compare Greek families’ private expenditures for university education in 2014-2015 to families’ costs for the same education in the year 2000 to determine whether there have been any changes during ensuring years. Data were gathered from a 2014-2015 survey of a random sample of over 2.300 Greek first-year university students and compared to results from a similar survey of over 3.000 first-year university students conducted in the year 2000. Income elasticity of demand was the theoretical framework used to examine and compare results. As with the older survey data, it is shown that despite the “free education” supposedly available in Greece, families actually still spend more than the state in preparing students for and supporting them at a university. It is also demonstrated that lower-income families spend a higher share of income on a university education for their children, a discrepancy that has grown over the past 13 years. Finally, it is shown that private expenditures for a university education appear to remain a necessity in Greece, with income elasticity calculated at between 0.2 and 0.3. Results suggest the need to reallocate the Greek university budget to help relieve the financial burden on families of lower-income students. Results also suggest the importance of reducing the Greek emphasis on expensive preparation of secondary students for national university entrance examinations.

465-482

Authors: Helena Brožová, Jana Horáková, Jiří Fiedler

This research identifies the lecturers’ competencies which are the most important from the students’ perspective at the Czech University of Life Sciences Prague and compares students’ opinion and their change over the whole study period. It does not deal with the knowledge competencies of lecturers that students cannot objectively evaluate, but with lecturers’ managerial competencies that affect the organization, forms and ways of teaching. The examined competencies are hierarchically organized into three groups of particular competencies comprising of bipolar characteristics. Based on survey of students at the University, the evaluation of importance of managerial competencies using the Analytic Hierarchy Process was performed. The findings show that Innovative education, Good communication skills, Ability of improvisation, and Democratic way of teaching are the most important lecturers’ competencies from students’ point of view. Surprisingly, Oral based presentation is preferred to IT based one. Knowledge of the most important managerial competencies can help lecturers and universities to increase quality of educational process and attractiveness of the university for students.

499-519

Authors: Dalibor Gonda, Anna Tirpakova

The new method of teaching the problems with a parameter was designed based on the identification of the reasons for the low success rate of the kids in solving the problems. In order to identify these causes and to find ways of their elimination, pedagogical research was carried out in two phases at selected universities of Slovakia (126 students) in 2016-2017. In the first stage the validity of the research hypothesis was confirmed, that the cause of the kids´ poor success in solving problems with the parameter is an algorithmic approach to their solution, a misunderstanding of the concept of a parameter and a formal determination of solvability conditions. Based on this, a new method of teaching the tasks with a parameter was developed. Its main idea is focusing on understanding the term parameter and showing its creative use in solving multiple tasks. In the second stage of the research, the success of the new teaching method was also verified experimentally. The results of the experiment confirmed the success of the students in solving the problems with the parameter, confirming that the basis of the success in solving the problems is the understanding of the term parameter and the ability to find their own solution to the task. It has turned out that the transition from the method of solving equations with a parameter by algorithms to the solution method by understanding the basic concepts and possibilities of their use is one of the methods to improve the teaching of mathematics.

533-543

Authors: Miriam N. Kyule, Jacob J. J. O. Konyango, Agnes O. Nkurumwa

One of the major challenges of the 21st century is the increasing level of academic qualifications at the expense of relevance in education. School agriculture is one of the subjects which require teachers who as the principal implementers of the curriculum must be able to interpret agriculture curriculum objectives to meet societal needs. However, implementation of agriculture curriculum in Arid and Semi Arid Land (ASAL) secondary schools has fallen short of its expectations as it has not significantly influenced agricultural activities both in school and surrounding communities. Thus, the benefit of implementing agriculture curriculum in ASALs is yet to be fully achieved. The research sought to document the teacher factors influencing implementation of secondary school agriculture curriculum in ASAL schools in Kenya. The research focused on teacher training, teacher technical knowledge and skills about Dry Land Agriculture [DLA] practices and training and support. The research was carried out in ASAL counties of Baringo, Makueni and Narok. Survey research design was used. The researcher developed a semi-structured questionnaire to obtain data on the teacher factors from 88 agriculture teachers. The research results showed that most teachers were trained and professionally qualified thus expected to translate the curriculum objectives to learning activities relevant to ASALS. However, agriculture teachers were found to be deficient in terms of technical knowhow on DLA practices among them, insitu water harvesting and use of sunken beds. Agriculture teachers received insufficient support towards professional development. The support did not aim at DLA knowledge and skill enhancement towards agriculture curriculum implementation. Agriculture teachers’ inadequacy on DLA practices’ technical knowhow and lack of support towards professional development was impacting negatively on agriculture curriculum implementation in ASAL schools. The Government has a responsibility of ensuring that all ASAL schools are staffed with qualified teacher. Secondary school administrations in ASALs need to support teachers on continuous trainings that are relevant to agriculture curriculum implementation. Agriculture training program developers need to focus more on the acquisition of technical know on all DLA practices. Addressing the training inadequacies among agriculture teachers in ASAL schools will lead to a competent staff who can translate curriculum objectives into learning experiences that promote DLA in ASALs. This translation will in turn influence agricultural activities both in school and in the society for improved agricultural production.

561-574

Authors: Eva Stranovská, Mária Lalinská, Ivana Boboňová

A relevant field of research in teacher’s professional competence assessment is taking the factor of motivation into account, as this enables teachers to differentiate between, i. e. to be aware of the significance of the individual professional competences and their development through their assessment. This research supports the understanding of how important motivation is in the process of the (continual) development of a teacher’s professional competence, taking his/her perception of the importance of competences in the educational process into account. The emphasis of the current research lays on the perception of the assessment by the selected number of primary and secondary school teachers. The following is the range of teacher's motivation perception: 1) motivating, 2) discouraging, 3) unnecessary, and 4) unfair in the process of life-long development of their professional competences. The research aim is to find out the differences in the individual motivational degrees in mutual assessment (motivating, discouraging, unnecessary, unfair, and other) relating to professional competences and find out the differences between the perception of the importance of the respective professional competences in the motivational category. Seven hundred thirty respondents - primary and secondary school teachers from Slovakia – participated in the research. The results showed the difference between the perception of the importance of professional competences among teachers who consider assessment to be motivating, discouraging, unnecessary, or unfair concept. Motivation towards assessment supports student-oriented competences, educational process and self-development of the teacher.