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PRINCIPLE OF CONTINUITY IN THE CONTEXT OF EDUCATION AS AN AREA OF PUBLIC RELATIONS
N. А. Rybakina
In today’s environment, the concept of lifelong education becomes a new paradigm of education that determines the conceptual bases of the pedagogical science, and practical activities. However, the new paradigm together with the new type of practical education should receive “civil rights”, so, they should be based on the psychological and pedagogical theory with the necessary power of understanding and explanation of a large spectrum of the scientific and empirical data and facts [1]. In our opinion, the choice of the psychological and pedagogical theory capable of become a conceptual foundation of the lifelong education paradigm and, finally, determining the model of pedagogical practice is difficult due to the uncertainty of the notion “continuity” in the context of education as an area of public and economic relations. Lifelong education may be considered in two aspects: as a system, and as a process, where the main difference is in a focus area. The system of lifelong education is a set of educational programs of different levels and focuses, together with the educational institutions and management bodies that implement them. The process of lifelong education means an increase of personal, general cultural and professional potential of a person during his/her lifetime [1].
The essence of continuity in the context of education most commonly means the character of education at different stages of life of a person, and search for principles of their “coupling”, which are most commonly expressed in such concepts as “consistency” and “succession”. In our opinion, such an approach results in a confusion of the two meanings of lifelong education considered above, and does not reveal such a notion as “continuity” and in some senses is even inconsistent with it.
In mathematics, succession is an aggregate of the elements of a certain collection of elements. In Russian language dictionaries, there is no such a notion as succession, but instead a notion “successive” exists, which means one continuously coming after another. The above mentioned explanations of such a notion as “succession” imply a finiteness of elements, arranging a certain collection of elements. This fact allowed us to make a supposition that in the previous paradigm of “lifelong education”, succession was a necessary link of stages of education (from preschool up to professional). In the new paradigm of “lifelong education”, succession, as a characteristic of the system and the process of lifelong education, has lost its meaning. Within the scope of the lifelong education system, it is difficult to establish any succession between, for example, general education programs, education in sports, and music received by a person simultaneously. There is also no succession between education in the humanities and mathematics received by a person at different time, for example, when a person wishes to change his/her profile of education and/or profession. In the process of lifelong education, it is difficult to convert personal, general, cultural, and
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professional increments of a person’s potential into a certain set of successive elements. Consistency, as a characteristic of the system and the process of lifelong education, which means the link between phenomena in the process of development, also lost its meaning, when new things replacing old things preserve their certain elements.
Based on the above-mentioned examples of individual educational trajectories within the system of lifelong education, there is no need for consistency of content, and forms and methods of training for the purpose of successful study of the educational programs. In many cases, as, for example, between education in mathematics and in the humanities, it is absolutely impossible to talk about consistency between the academic programs. Social science disciplines are an exception, which are not so much successive as congruent in terms of their content, forms and methods of training. As for the lifelong education process, in terms of its content, this notion is close to such a notion as “continuity”. The increment of personal potential means the transition of a person to the new stage based on a dialectic law of the negation of negation.
Brief analysis of such notions as “consistency” and “succession”, as characteristics of lifelong education, demonstrated that, first of all: they cannot be used without taking into account the dualism of the lifelong education concept (system and process); secondly, they can be used for the characterization of the classical paradigm of “lifelong education”, and cannot be used for characterization of the essence and structure of the “lifelong education” paradigm. In today’s context, such notions as “consistency” and “succession” that characterize the specific features of the system of education at a certain stage of switching from paradigm of finite-path education to the paradigm of lifelong education, have only become well-established expressions, which overshadow the problem of understanding the essence of the new reality and the notion “continuity” itself in the context of education as an area of public relations.
The arithmetic model of any continuous objects, including lifelong education, consists of a set of real numbers geometrically interpreted as a complete number scale. Each point on the number line is as continuous as the number line itself. Each point on the number line is in accordance with a number, being part of one of the sets of numbers, which in its turn is a part of a set of real numbers (natural, set of integers, rational, irrational). The location of these sets on the number line is not so much continuous as put in order. Each set of numbers serves for the measurement of a certain class of values, and each subsequent set of numbers includes a previous set of numbers.
In philosophy, continuity is considered in dialectical unity with discontinuity. Discontinuity characterizes the structure of the lifelong education system, highlights the discreteness of its space and time construction, and relative independence of the existence of its stable elements (educational programs of different level of formal education, availability of non-formal and informal forms of education). Discontinuity of the lifelong education system explains such a phenomenon as finiteness of education for a specific person at the moment of finishing education according to a certain educational program. Discontinuity makes it possible to replace and amend individual elements of a system, i.e. organize education in formal, non-formal and informal forms.
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Continuity is a characteristic of the process of education as an increase of personal potential. Continuity of the process of education of a person is a reflection of several elements of the system of education as an organic whole according to a certain rule, i.e. for a specific person the process of increment of its potential depends on the results of the activity of the lifelong education system. It means that in the same way that a set of real numbers, being an aggregate of different sets of numbers, has a common purpose - a measurement of values - a set of components of the lifelong education system should contain an invariant component, which shall not be changed in the course of the movement between different structures of the system of education, and allow students to study different programs of education with different subject matters using different forms, methods, means.
Such invariant components, which are the reflection of the lifelong education system in increment of a person’s potential, in our opinion, include activity, communication and values. Thus, the main purpose of education within the context of study of the educational programs of the system of education in any form should be focused not on the specific components of content of education, but on mastering the cohesive activities in the course of inter-personal relations, where the content of education is a recommended sequence of activities. It means that if a student acquires the skills of performing activities based on knowledge within the scope of one component of the system of education, he/ she may improve them within the scope of other components. The rule that reflects a variety of components of the system of education in the course of the lifelong education of a person, resides in the ability of each element of this system to develop the skills of cohesive activities in the course of interpersonal relations. In our opinion, this explains the requirement to switch to the module-based programs providing for the development of professional competences as continued types of activity in the system of professional training.
To ensure the development of this process at each stage of professional training, it is necessary to allow the educational process model to develop the skills of cohesive activities in all other components of the system of education (general, advanced), which will be the basis for the personal, general, cultural and professional increment of a person’s potential.
Bibliography
1. Вербицкий А.А. Новая образовательная парадигма и контекстное обучение. - М., 1999. - 75 с.
Translated from Russian by Znanije Central Translations Bureau
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