The aim of the chapter is the scientific justification and description of the school technology in supporting educational choice of senior students. The chapter uncovers three main directions: the meaning of the educational prospects of senior students as a philosophical, psychological, and pedagogical category; the project implementation technology and criteria for its effectiveness; and an overview of the project information resources, including the methodology for their search. The authors have unique experience in organizing the pedagogical support of the senior students' career choice in a number of innovative schools in cooperation with representatives of various businesses.
TopIntroduction
In 2014, we started a project that, in our opinion, should have influenced the openness of the school, the expansion of the circle of adults entering into a dialogue with adolescents, and the development of alternative educational practices. In this chapter, we presented ideas and techniques that were tested in several schools in St. Petersburg and Petrozavodsk – a town in Karelia, North-West of Russia. In addition, we have included several project technologies in the structure of the educational shifts “Nanograd” (organized by the School League of RUSNANO) and the Educational Center “Sirius”.
The effectiveness of modern school education is estimated, largely by the extent to which it forms the innovative educational behavior of the student. In general, this behavior can be defined as a willingness to effectively solve problems in the field of personal development throughout life. More specifically, this readiness could be reasonably identified through three “markers”, the endowment of which in a teenager and later an adult will testify to the formation of an internal personality setting for a constant search for solutions in the field of personal education, development, personal growth, internal motivation to reach a new skill and professional level.
Markers of innovative educational behavior:
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The desire to understand what it is necessary to learn,
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The desire to find the most effective way to learn,
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The desire to constantly apply what has been learned, in the flow of life.
Traditional means of school education can not fully ensure the development of innovative educational behavior, since they are oriented more toward learning operations, rather than senses.
Meanwhile, the task of involving the student in the process of managing their own educational resources becomes more urgent. In general terms, there appear to be such three resources:
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Personal time,
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Psychological activity: attention, involvement,
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Experience in making choice.
We emphasize that in addition to the independent management of the schoolchild by these resources, it is important to create situations where they will be able to discuss issues related to these resources in a dialogue with those who are interesting to them. Of course, there will not be a direct transfer of someone else's experience into the student's own life, but the very situation of the interested discussion will create an important internal setting for finding solutions in one's own life.
Unfortunately, the traditional involvement of the family in the adolescent's development of realities and, most importantly, the prospects for a global life process in conjunction with teenage destiny today is often very problematic. The reasons that parents do not always cope with the role of benevolent, prosperous experts are following:
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That the parents themselves have little trust in the position of the child,
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There is insufficient information on the labor market,
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Parents have different (with the child and among themselves) understanding of the goals of education,
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Understanding of “happiness”, “prosperity”, “success” differs,
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There is a fear of manifesting one's own irresponsibility,
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There is fear of suspense.
Meetings of schoolchildren with adults, successful, finally, happy professionals solve problems that often “do not fit” in the pattern of “lesson-homework” and “teenager-parents.” The open position of school in organizing such meetings can significantly bring schooling closer to realizing its key mission in the 21st century - the development of human capital, combining three ideas: high labor productivity in the face of constant changes; conscious and responsible attitude to the resources of human life; civil position in the context of the global challenges of mankind.
Thus, the system of meetings with professionals and entrepreneurs “from the adult world” is aimed at creating a complex system of motives for schoolchildren in the field of: