In recent years, the educational system has undergone major changes. The teacher must strictly observe the orders and requirements of the Ministry of Education and Science, to comply with innovations in the system of learning processes.
The introduction of new educational programs, additional social responsibility, the presence of such a thing as unpaid hours, that is, in general, a mismatch between the level of wages and the assigned burden, reduces the attractiveness of the teaching profession. The system of motives for pedagogical activity is changing.
What guides applicants when choosing among other pedagogical universities, and what motivates graduates who have received a teacher’s diploma to go to work in this area?
Motivation for choosing a profession
Let us first understand why a person chooses a profession as a whole.
Doctor of Psychological Sciences E. Klimov, who has devoted a lot of work to the psychology of labor, has isolated factors of external and internal motivation :
External factors:
- The opinion of relatives.
- Orientation to friends.
- The recommendation of teachers.
- Orientation to the position of society.
Internal factors:
- Own expectations.
- Level of own capabilities, their manifestation.
- The presence of knowledge and skills in any activity.
- Addiction to business.
Consider what motives motivate those who want to prove themselves in pedagogical activity.
The choice of the teaching profession and the motivation of teaching
Undoubtedly, all these factors have an influence on the choice of the profession of a teacher. But the main motives for pedagogical activity due to its specificity are, first of all, the attraction to teaching - the desire to educate other people, transfer their own knowledge and experience, and the second - the level of awareness and ability to a particular science.
With a conscious choice of a profession in the educational sphere, the student has a clear understanding of the importance of teaching as a process of forming the personality of the student. With an aspiration to teach other people, the future graduate more deeply masters the subject that he intends to teach in the future. Among the personal qualities of such students, the ability to compromise, evenness in communication, a sense of tact, clarity of thought, the ability to reason judgments, and the presence of organizational abilities prevail.
"Non-pedagogical" motivational factors
A conscious set of motives for pedagogical activity means that a person shows enthusiasm and interest in this area. A number of applicants enter pedagogical universities under the influence of completely different factors. For instance:
- This is the only place where they managed to pass on the exam points;
- receipt of a deferment from army service;
- obtaining a diploma of higher education, the specialty does not matter;
- following peers (friends entered there);
- location in the hometown (there is no need to move to another locality and live in a hostel), etc.
Characteristics of applicants of pedagogical universities
Based on the choice of a pedagogical specialty, students can be divided into several categories:
- striving to increase the level of knowledge in the subject of interest, but not necessarily with the aim of further teaching;
- not having a clear motive in choosing a profession;
- having a penchant for educational activities with a predominance of organizational qualities;
- showing abilities and interest in teaching.
Motives driving students during their studies
During the educational process, students can form other motivational factors in themselves, both internal and external.
Internal - this is a deep knowledge of the subject, preparation for direct teaching, the formation of responsibility for students. External - this is the desire to stand out with the help of the effectiveness of training both among students and among the teaching staff, obtaining increased scholarships, diplomas with honors. External negative motives may also appear, such as fear of relatives and teachers in case of failure in the learning process, fear of being expelled from an institution, or being left without education.
Practitioner Motivation
In the implementation of teaching practice after graduation, other motivational factors also begin to take shape.
The internal motives of pedagogical activity include, first of all, satisfaction from working with students. An equally important role is played by advanced training as a way of self-assertion of a person.
Among the external motives of pedagogical activity, there are such as recognition of colleagues, taking a position in a prestigious educational institution, receiving awards and bonuses for professionalism and success in work.
Motive of power
The author of the book “Diagnostics of pedagogical abilities” N. A. Aminov also singles out a power motive that arises from the interaction of a teacher with a student. This motive is manifested in the right of the teacher to a positive and negative assessment of learning. Among the types of pressure on the student, Aminov distinguishes the following: the power of encouragement, punishment, regulatory and informational power, the power of the standard and expert. This need for dominance is manifested in such actions as:
- control of the social environment;
- influence on the actions of others through orders, arguments, persuasion;
- the inclination of others to act in the same direction with their own needs and feelings;
- stimulating others to cooperate;
- the conviction of the environment in the correctness of their own judgments.
Of course, the motives of power in the relationship between teacher and student are aimed at the benefit of the latter. With the help of dominance as one of the other motives of professional pedagogical activity, the teacher transfers to the learner his knowledge, skills, experience.
Social motivation of an education worker
Particular attention should be paid to the motives of socio-educational activities.
The teacher does not have the right to ignore the presence of signs of an unfavorable social situation in his ward (traces of beatings, external signs of the use of drugs or alcohol, a sharp decrease in academic performance, lack of attendance without good reason, etc.). Particular responsibility lies with social educators, class teachers (at school), curators, heads of departments and departments (in institutions of secondary specialized and higher education).
Classification of teachers by the structure of motivational factors
Satisfaction with teaching activities directly depends on the system of its motives. The predominance of internal and external positive and the absence of external negative incentives is their optimal ratio.
The American psychologist L. Festinger founded the separation of teachers on the basis of evaluating their student outcome.
The first category includes teachers who make conclusions based on his previous successes. The second category consists of those who give an assessment in comparison with another student. Conventionally, he defined the first group as “aimed at development”, and the second - on “effectiveness”.
Both Russian and foreign researchers in the field of pedagogy and psychology are convinced of the difference in methods, approaches and the final results of the activities of teachers aimed at development and effectiveness.
The former approach individual training, are concerned, first of all, with mastering the subject and are able to track the level of each ward. The second important indicator is the overall level of the group, its value is above average, while the degree of mastery of the program by each individual student is unimportant.
Thus, representatives of the development-oriented category practice a personal approach, not adjusting the student for the program, but the program for the student, which, accordingly, gives better results in the end of the training. In contrast to them, the second type clearly follows the methodological material, makes the same demands on the entire group of students, is aimed strictly at the result of the total mass, achieving a level of its value above average. The main motivating factor is the recognition of management and the receipt of remuneration.
But in general, it should be noted that, given the many motives for professional pedagogical activity, both external and internal, it cannot be denied that the teacher can be simultaneously motivated by both a passion for his work and a concern about raising earnings.
Teaching Performance Levels
The last link in the chain “motivation system - satisfaction with pedagogical work” is the productivity of this hard work.
The characteristic of pedagogical activity includes 5 degrees of effectiveness:
1) Reproductive - this is the minimum degree when the teacher brings the information that he owns.
2) Adaptive - a low degree of effectiveness, but there is adaptability of the transmitted knowledge to the characteristics of the trainees.
3) Local-modeling - the average degree, when the teacher has developed a knowledge transfer strategy.
4) System-modulating knowledge - a high degree of productivity.
5) System-modeling activity and behavior - the highest degree of effectiveness of pedagogical activity.
Representation of the structure of activities
Any activity carried out by a person consists of several components:
- The subject of activity is one or those by whom it is carried out.
- The object of activity is what it is aimed at.
- The goal is what it is for.
- Motives - what is the reason for the implementation of activities.
- Applied methods - with the help of which it is carried out.
- The result and assessment of activity is the result and its analysis.
In the absence of any component, the existence of activity is impossible.
The composition of the system of pedagogical work
The structure of the teacher’s activities includes the same elements as any other human activity.
Subjects are not only teachers, they are also parents and other representatives of the environment, exerting a pedagogical influence on the objects of activity.
Objects - pupils and students, on which the work of the teacher is aimed, as well as those people who participate in the pedagogical process.
The goals and motives of pedagogical activity are the transfer of personal knowledge from the subject to the objects, which has motivating reasons for this.
Means - knowledge possessed by the subject, methods of their transfer to the object using didactic and methodological material.
The result is the result of teaching, the assessment of which is the level of development of the transferred knowledge.
The functional composition of the structure of teaching
N.V. Kuzmina, doctor of psychological sciences, developed a model of the teacher’s activity, consisting of functional components: Gnostic, design, constructive, communicative and organizational.
The gnostic element of the structure is the knowledge that the teacher possesses, not only in the subject taught, but also in the field of communication with students.
A design element is the planning of one’s actions in the educational process.
Constructive - the selection of the necessary methodological and didactic material, the construction of a training plan.
Communicative element - building relationships between teacher and students.
Organizational - the ability of the teacher to establish both his activities and groups of students in the learning process.
Regardless of the functional or phased allocation of components, the structure and motives of pedagogical activity are closely related.
findings
We examined the motives for choosing a pedagogical activity. Undoubtedly, this work has a creative beginning. This socially significant work should be carried out by people who consciously made a choice in favor of the teaching profession. Behind him must necessarily be internal motives, such as a pronounced desire and need to teach other people the knowledge accumulated in themselves, and deep knowledge in the taught subject.