Conference:
ECER 2008
Format:
Paper
Session Information
PRE_G2, Preconference; Paper Session G2
Paper Session
Time:
2008-09-09
10:00-11:30
Room:
C E33
Chair:
Jonas Emanuelsson
Contribution
Our research deals with the comparative characteristic of teacher education systems in Ukraine and Scandinavian countries. We realize that in general teacher education is a very broad term covering many variations of training, learning, activities that fall between formal degree granting programs. More over we view systems of teacher education in our countries as moving and changing entities where efforts to solve problems are changing constantly.
In our research we come to the conclusion that teacher education in Scandinavian countries takes place almost simultaneously in such institutions of higher education as:
- universities, which provide academic, research based pedagogical education;
- university colleges or Centers for Higher Education (especially in Denmark), which represent the link between colleges and universities for those, who want to continue pedagogical education from professional Bachelor to higher scientific degrees of Candidate (European Master) and Doctor (PhD);
- colleges of education, which provide professional teacher education. Speaking about the structure of Ukrainian teacher education system, we must say that since the Declaration of Ukraine’s independence in 1991, the whole system of Ukrainian education has experienced continuous process of reforms , thanks to which the former (Soviet) system of education has been ruined and modern structure of pedagogical education has been built. As the result:
1)Teacher training colleges has gone into past.
We can hardly call this fact to be the significant achievement because we think that teacher education system must have professional based institutions of higher education which can provide medium-cycle programs for secondary school teachers, especially at present situation in Ukraine, when we faced with lack of teachers for village schools.
2)Pedagogical universities occupy the dominant position in the Ukrainian teacher education system.
Programs of teacher education in Ukraine may be divided into four main branches:
- Bachelor branch (professional training, going on 4 years of studying in the university, at the end of which future teachers receive professional Bachelor degree and is competent for teaching one subject in the secondary school) ;
- Specialists branch ( transitional stage of professional training, going on 5 years of studying in the university after which student may choose to go on studying to receive Master degree or to come up to teaching practice at school );
- Master branch ( academic and professional education, going on 6 years of studying, at the end of which future specialists receive scientific Master degree);
- Post- graduate branch ( academic education for researchers, going on 3 years of specialized research based study, when a post-graduate student is writing a thesis and at the end receives Candidate degree ( which stands for Doctoral degree in Scandinavian countries , PhD).
3) In-service teacher training programs in Ukraine became highly centralized and formalized so that the state has no real figures of the situation.
4) The sphere of post-graduate research is developing successfully bringing to the system of teacher education in Ukraine new scientific approach.
Analyzing peculiar features in Ukrainian and Scandinavian system of teacher education, working with state programmers and documents we came to the conclusion that from one point of view there are a lot of similarities. We notice that most of the same subjects are offered, that teachers use the same methods of standing before classes and conducting the dialogue with children, that students use almost the same textbooks and so on. From another point of view we understand that even what appear to be similar and simple problems , are different and complex questions of historical traditions, cultural achievements in the internal system of education which bring to different results in the level of teaching and knowledge. To learn these peculiar features and to use the most important of them in practice is the aim of our comparative analysis.
Method
In my research I use different theoretical methods as:
- scientific methods of synthesis, analysis of scientific sources, state documents, acts and laws;
- historical retrospective methods of defining main stages of reformation in teacher education systems ;
- systematic-structural methods of teoreticl data classification;
- problematic methods of comparison and analysis
Expected Outcomes
Despite the large differences between countries, issues and problems of teacher education are remarkably similar. An examination of different countries issues brings an international perspective to decision and policy making in one own's country.This is likely to produce a broader, more detached viewpoint toward one own problems in education of teachers.
References
Article: "The System of Teacher Education in Higher Educational Institutions of Denmark"
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