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4ПЕДАГОГИЧЕСКИЕ НАУКИ
Kalaur Svitlana Mykolaivna
Ph.D., associate professor, doctoral candidate of Pedagogy and Education Management department of
Ternopil Volodymyr Hnatiuk National Pedagogical University
COMMON APPROACHES TO THE TRAINING OF FUTURE SOCIAL SPHERE EXPERTS IN CONFLICTS RESOLUTION
Abstract: the necessity of future social sphere experts to resolve conflicts that may arise during their professional activities is justified in the article. The need of theoretical knowledge and practical skills in solving professional and personal conflicts for the future experts was analyzed. Contradictions, that are unresolved in the formation of adequate level of preparedness for conflict resolution for future social sphere experts were investigated. The main attention was focused on the characteristics of a systematic approach and development of the training system for conflict resolution of future social sphere experts. Practices, influencing the students' competence in resolving conflicts, were analyzed.
Keywords: future social sphere experts, conflicts resolution, systematic approach, system, method of formation.
Formulation of the problem. International educational space requires innovative transformations from higher educational institutions of Ukraine, related to the training of future experts. Taking into account the fact that today there are quite a lot of problems in the social sphere, first of all, fundamental changes must be applied to conceptual approaches in preparing a new generation of future experts, who will be able to successfully address them. Therefore, the theoretical knowledge and practical skills that students will gain (social teachers, social workers, psychologists and practical psychologists) while studying in higher education institutions must substantially improve their professionalism. As noted by V. Kremen [1], the strategic goal of higher education development in Ukraine is the training of the professional that «is capable of effective vital activity in the twenty first century» [1, p. 231]. We fully share the position of scientists [6], that today the strategy of training of experts with higher education is fundamentally changing, the principle becomes the search and selection of scientific information that is needed for further improvement of professional activity, and «competitiveness of expert with higher education is not based anymore on the amount of knowledge acquired during the training, but on the ability to use his creativity and ability to replenish and to gain the knowledge» [6, p. 23].
Social sphere of Ukraine fully reflects the current state and conflicts of the entire Ukrainian society. In particular, the practice of the organization and provision of social services shows that our country is the process of a fundamental reassessment of values, the rise of various social problems of clients of social services is observed. Accordingly, the primary need is to considerably improve the content and methods of professional training of future social teachers, social workers and practicing psychologists, based on consideration of competence in the field of conflict resolution.
The future expert in his professional activities will be tangent to solving of various personal and professional problems of his clients. So while studying in
higher education, it is advisable to form in students the solid theoretical knowledge and practical skills, as well as the abilities to prevent and resolve conflicts. From this position, the leading idea of the whole educational process in higher educational institutions can be considered the providing of continuous training of future bachelors and later masters in that field. We believe that the training of future social sphere experts should be focused on the development and improvement of personal qualities, professional mobility formation, as well as on innovative approaches to solving complex professional tasks that usually have conflictological coloring.
Analysis of previous studies. We can state the fact that the subject of numerous psychological and educational research of scientists were the forms of conflicts expression, investigation of main reasons of their causes, behavioral characterization of interaction subjects, mechanisms of conflict resolution. In particular, common approaches for coverage of the conflict culture of experts were scientifically justified in the writings of V. Andrieiev, N. Hrishyna, V. Zhuravlyov. Components of conflict competence were represented in the works of T. Kovshechnikova, H. Shchedrovit-skyi.
However, it was found that the author's interpretation of the scientific definition of the «conflict competence», «conflict readiness» is quite profound and represent a significant interest, but it does not include social sphere features and does not reveal all aspects of professional training of future experts in conflict resolution. As for today in Ukraine nobody conducted thorough and complex science research, which would be related to the development of an integrated system design of conflict competence during the continuous education in the system of «College - University - training»; methodology of design and organization of educational environment in the context of innovative educational technologies did not become the subject of a thorough study. Taking into account the abovemen-tioned, we consider it appropriate to examine more thoroughly the theoretical and practical approaches to
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the development and implementation of training system in resolving social conflicts for future experts.
The purpose of this article is aimed to study the nature and content of the system approach and analysis of the most promising methods for training of future social sphere experts in conflicts resolution.
Materials and findings. Note that in the most general overview the professional activities of social sphere experts are aimed at the implementation of government programs: social protection of the unemployed and the homeless; social adaptation of persons with mental disabilities; social guarantees to servicemen; employment and social adaptation of adolescents and young people; social care of patients with HIV infection; social adaptation of persons released from prison. In particular, social teacher, practical psychologist and social worker should be professionally competent and have profound and diverse knowledge (in philosophy, sociology, theory of social work, legal disciplines, psychology, pedagogy, political science and conflict studies), to be able to work with different social, age, religious, ethnic groups and individuals; know the basics of organizational management, research, analytical, scientific and educational activities.
In the beginning let's analyze the essence of «professional competence». We should note that the term consists of two terms - «profession» and «competence». Profession (from Lat. Professio - officially specified occupation) - type of employment of person who has a set of theoretical knowledge and practical skills obtained in the result of special training and experience. The scientific definition of «professional competence» O. Ovcharuk [5] states as the unity of theoretical and practical training of students, which involves a combination of knowledge with professionally significant personal qualities. V. Yahupov and V. Svys-tun [7] believe that professional competence is a complex integral professional and personal formation which is created «in the process of training during higher education, manifested, developed and improved in professional activities, depends on the types of theoretical, practical and psychological training, personal, professional and individual mental qualities, values, content and features of this activity» [7, p. 6]. Namely, only the combination of theoretical and practical training of expert for future career will contribute to his professional competence.
It is acknowledged that each type of professional activity requires from individual certain competencies, which are integrated into the process of setting up of vital competence and act as a result of development and self-identity. Professional competence is a manifestation of professional culture of an expert. It serves as the fundamental principle of professionalism, the main characteristic of personality and is closely linked to successful activities in professional situations. The global scientific community singled out four major professional competencies: ability to learn throughout life
- professional and methodological competence (learning to know); ability to perform professional activities
- competence of professional activity (learning to do);
the ability to live in society - social and communicative competence (learning to live together); incipience of a person as personality - personal competence (learning to be).
During the research, we came to the understanding that professional competence of future social sphere experts includes the level of basic and special education, the ability to accumulate vast life and professional experience, and to predict the possible consequences of their own activities. Professional competence acts as a significant positive result of the education and envisages expert's readiness to effectively organize his internal and external resources for the solution of professional tasks. Professional competence of future social sphere expert, in terms of competence approach, should be considered as an integral part, characterized by the culture of work and interpersonal interaction, the ability to proactively and creatively solve professional problems. A professional should be flexible, mobile, able to acquire and analyze the information, use it for the individual development and self-improvement, be able to generate new ideas, make unconventional decisions and bear responsibility for them, use knowledge as a tool for solving problems in life and professional and personal conflicts. Thus, the prominent place in structure of professional competence must be occupied by the competence in the field of conflict resolution.
It was found that during the practice an expert can experience possible conflicts with customers, as well as with his colleagues. On the basis of summarizing the scientific views of experts we believe that formed readiness for conflict resolution has to be the integral part of the professional competence of the future social sphere expert, which includes: theoretical knowledge of conflicts; diagnostic skills to identify the conflict in a professional environment at the initial stages of its emerging and application of constructive technologies to solve it; knowledge about the best way to resolve the conflict. However, full commitment to conflict resolution in students of following majors: social education, social work, psychology and practical psychology is not formed. They have no internal motivation for self-improvement in this area, cognitive and conative areas are immature, there is no reflection. We should note that our study did find some contradictions between: the requirements set by the organization of professional training in connection with the modernization of the educational sector and the requirements of the employers (during the modernization of social services) and requirements of society (review of professions image) and somewhat outdated approaches that take place during experts' training; the need to design a coherent process of continuous professional training in accordance with the state educational standards, educational and qualification characteristics and lack of preparedness of lecturers for this subject-methodical activity. On a practical level we found the contradictions between: the development of the conflict science, general content research of professional competence and lack of development of modern scientifically based approaches and methods of professional competence formation of
future social sphere experts in conflict resolution; strengthening of the positions of acmeological, system and competency approaches in the educational paradigm and inert traditional system of professional training of future social sphere experts; the perspective of the use of teaching methods based on cloud services in the disciplines that form the students' willingness to resolve conflicts and insufficient level of usage of interactive methods in their implementation.
Resolving these contradictions and multidimen-sionality of determined questions cause purposeful scientific search of the optimal educational solutions. First of all we note that stated stage of pilot study was organized on the basis of Ternopil Volodymyr Hnatiuk National Pedagogical University; Khmelnytsky National University; Sumy Makarenko State Pedagogical University; Zhytomyr Ivan Franko State University; Kharkiv Humanitarian Pedagogical Academy. The results of complex survey showed that graduates of the fourth year, acquiring education level «Bachelor», have quite low theoretical knowledge in the field of conflict, they cannot find the best way out of difficult conflict situations, «Self-concept» is not formed.
Based on the fact that the conflicts will inevitably accompany the social sphere where future experts will work, teachers must master the technology of behavior in conflict situations and train their students: correctly identify real participants of conflict situation; analyze the possible consequences, motives, goals, aims, interests, clients' character features; determine the professional competence of all parties of the conflict; on the basis of valid methods quickly detect the interpersonal relationships of conflict parties; be competent to determine the true cause of conflict, which arose in life of clients; reveal attitude to conflict of the persons who are indirectly involved in a conflict situation, but interested in its effective resolution.
In the study, we have put forward a working hypothesis that the significant perspective in improvement of the professional training of future experts in conflicts belongs to using the simulation situations in form of a game, which should be directed to: compliance with delicacy during the dialogue with clients; holding from imposing of their own position to clients; forecasting of possible pressure consequences from the side of clients; using the most appropriate strategy for the conflict behavior, providing a choice between compromise, cooperation, competition, concessions, avoidance; controlling their emotions; using of assertive behavioral strategy in their future careers.
Note that adjustment of possible understanding between the parties of the conflict in the social sphere is not simple, use of certain methods can contribute to solving the conflict, namely: the method of introspection, empathy, logical analysis. In particular, the method of introspection is the ability to put yourself in the place of opponent, to imagine his thoughts, feelings, and draw conclusions about the motives and external irritants of his behavior. This method is effective, but it borders with the threat to falsely consider your own thoughts and feelings as the thoughts and feelings of
another person, also to improperly recreate the image of your opponent and his desires and expectations. When putting himself in the shoes of his opponent, the student must learn to adequately compare the performance and behavior of the individual with real impression of him. At the workshops students have the opportunity in the form of a game to exchange positions with clients. The method of empathy is based on technique of penetration into the feelings of another person. This method is useful for emotional personality, capable of intuitive thinking that allows full trust to his intuitive sense. Its application on practice will enable the student to stop in advance the intelligent interpretations and understand the claims of client, with whom he will work in the future, providing a certain social services. The method of logical analysis is focused on people with rational thinking. It provides an opportunity to understand the interlocutor, to recreate a system of intelligent ideas about him and specific difficult life situation in which he was caught temporarily. Using logical analysis will help future social teacher to predict and correctly prevent a large number of professional conflicts that may arise during the delivery of social services to the clients of social institutions.
In practice, in formation of high level of professional readiness of the future experts to resolve conflicts that arise in professional activity the important role is played by scientific and balanced approach to developing and implementing a systematic approach and developing on its basis an integrated educational system. This assumption was put forward by us, based on the analysis of works of L. Bertalanffy, V. Brusin, A. Dakhin, N. Kuzmin, H. Schedrovytskyi, which explored fundamental questions of designing the educational systems.
Based on the main objectives that we set ourselves, we can consider the central point in our study the usage of a systematic approach that involves «epistemological perspective or a particular dimension of reality» [4, p. 8]. The essence of the systems approach is that additional sub-models are introduced based on the expansion of the system, taking into account a variety of factors and trends in the dynamics of the study. System approach allows building a clear and logical sequence of forms and methods of students' training to work on resolving professional conflicts. It provides a clear logic and it is based on the sequence in the educational process organization. Based on a systematic approach the training of future social teachers and social workers should be considered in connection with purpose, objectives, organization of training and methodological support aimed at concrete results - a high level of preparedness for this type of activity. Our vision of systematic approach involves: a clear definition of the «system» concept; research of the system components; usage of modeling procedure to design and build a model of system of future social sphere experts training for solving conflicts in professional activities; experimental verification of its effectiveness.
System approach implies that the conflict knowledge and skills, which are formed in the course
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of training, should be inextricably linked and should form a coherent system. Based on works of V. Yahupov [8], specific rules were singled out, while implementing this approach in the training of students, such as: structuring the content of theoretical material and its logical distribution; transition from simple forms and means to more complex; a clear separation of the main topic in educational material that students learn; consideration of future careers specifics in the study of theoretical material about conflicts. The systematic approach is the basis for development of training system of future social sphere experts to resolve conflicts in professional work. The scientific definition of «system» in a philosophical dictionary is interpreted as a category that reflects not something separate and indivisible, but involves contradictory unity of many and integer at the same time. From an educational point of view, the system is a set of a certain number of elements, where each one affects the behavior of a system, but none of the specific elements in the case of independent existence has this kind of impact. In the Education Encyclopedia it is stated that «training system is a means aimed at implementation of objective» [3, p. 516].
Summing up the information provided, the scientific definition of «system» we can describe as a set of specific elements that determine the activity and contribute to the overall objective achievement through interconnection and interdependence of the constituent elements that are used. In the study, we strived that our developed and implemented system of professional training had a significant influence on the formation of a high level of readiness of future social sphere experts for conflict resolution in professional activities. Thus, the professional training system of future social sphere experts to resolve conflicts in professional activities must have a specific structure and consist of certain structural elements. We will stop briefly on the characteristics of approaches to the isolation of the structural components of the system that will be sufficient for the formation of a high level of readiness of the future social sphere experts in that direction. In the context of
List of references:
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the structural characteristics of the system it was based on the understanding of Y. Halahuzova, stating that the system should include «a set of interrelated tools, methods and processes, required to create an organized, purposeful and intentional pedagogical influence on identity formation with desired qualities; ensure the implementation of value-semantic, regulatory, technological and procedural productive functions; contributes to the goals of human development» [2, p. 73].
Structural components of the system should reflect internal and external connections between components and ensure the effectiveness of the whole process of formation of professional readiness of the future social sphere experts for conflict resolution. It means that developed system of future social sphere experts training for solving conflicts in professional work must include a specific set of interrelated principles, approaches, methods, forms, that should have a significant influence on the formation of all components, criteria and indicators of readiness.
Conclusions. Study of the nature and specifics of professional conflicts that may arise in the social sphere by students will increase their general professional competence. We believe that the theoretical knowledge and practical skills will allow future professionals, who work in the social field, to prevent the emergence of conflicts and to provide professional qualified practical recommendations; to avoid destructive conflicts; to solve the conflicts by reaching a consensus; to defend their position and find arguments to stay on the chosen path while helping the clients. Forming a high level of professional readiness of the future social sphere experts for conflict resolution presupposes the existence of subsystems of a united system, each of which has to combine specific components. We can predict that introduction of the system approach and development and implementation of a system in the training of future social sphere experts will have a positive impact on the formation of their readiness for conflict resolution.
