Psychological Competence of Educator as a Prerequisite of Effective Developmental Interaction with Students

Abstract

The purpose of our article is to substantiate theoretically and prove empirically that the level of psychological competence of educators-researchers influences significantly on the quality of organization and effectiveness of full-fledged developmental interaction with the students in modern Institution of Higher Education.

Methods of the research. The authors used theoretical methods of cognition (critical analysis, theoretical synthesis, ranking, abstraction, criterion comparison, methodological generalization, theoretical modeling, etc.), as well as empirical methods of factual data recording (closed questionnaire, psychological and pedagogical experiment, psycho-diagnostic techniques: the questionnaire «Who will pick up the paper?» by A. Furman, the «Self-Actualization Test» (SAT) by E. Shostrom etc.). 65 teachers and 511 undergraduate students (1–4 years of studying) of the Faculty of Law of Ternopil National Economic University (TNEU) were involved in the experiment started in September, 2017 and finished in September, 2019.

The results of the research. This article outlines the current tasks and innovative ways to improve the psychological training of educators of modern Institutions of Higher Education, in particular, reveals the authors’ experience in implementing the training program of educator-psychologist-researcher (690 hours), that is accompanied by the increasing of expert-mental conditions in the teaching staff’s innovative activity; five groups of experimental changes (innovations), which led to the positive restructuring of the educator-researchers’ inner world, are characterized; the growth dynamics of psychological competence of educators of the Faculty of Law of TNEU is being observed experimentally for two years of fundamental experiment; the total coefficient growth of the educator-researchers’ self-actualization is empirically substantiated on 13 scales of measurements. The obtained quantitative indicators convince clearly that both total indicator of the coefficient of self-actualization of the faculty teaching staff (from 43.2% to 48.8%) and its structural components (rapport – 9%, self-acceptance – 7.7%, flexibility of behavior – 7.5%, synergy – 7.3%, sensitivity – 6.2%, spontaneity – 6.0%, etc.) have significantly increased for two years of fundamen tal experimentation. The fact of increasing tendencies to self-realization of educators due to the basic scales of time competence and support, the total growth of which is 15.6%, is particularly positive.

Conclusions. The modular developmental system of education has a number of advantages in comparison with the classical academic system. In particular, it enables the training of educators for professional activity with psychological and pedagogical content of the current educational process and due to the appropriate technologies it allows the more thoroughly implementation of the multilevel developmental interaction with students in the practice of modern Institution of Higher Education. The effectiveness of this interaction primarily depends on the psychological literacy of an educator, the humanization of tasks, the content and style of educational activities and the implementation of original technologies for a holistic modular developmental process conducting. The qualitatively higher professional and psychological training of an educator can be achieved when the educational process center is not the content of studying, but the interaction of mentor and student, that does not only humanize the educational environment, but also predicts the position changes of each subject of relevant relationships. The integral psychometric indicator of the development of culture and educator-researchers functional literacy is the coefficient of self-actualization, the growth of which indicates a significant boundaries expansion of the constructive expression of freedom, altruism, creativity, self-esteem, persons’ mutual understanding and mutual acceptance in the individually oriented educational process.