Primary school age age-related neoplasms. Psychological neoplasms of the younger schoolchild. Development of thinking of younger students

In early school age, a child experiences many positive changes and transformations. This is a sensitive period for the formation of a cognitive attitude to the world, learning skills, organization and self-regulation.

cognitive development. In the process of schooling, all spheres of a child's development are qualitatively changed and restructured. This restructuring begins with the intensive development of the intellectual sphere. The main direction in the development of thinking at school age is the transition from concrete-figurative to verbal-logical and reasoning thinking. According to the provisions of L.S. Vygotsky about the systemic nature of the development of higher mental functions, at primary school age, thinking is the “system-forming” function, and this affects others

Mental functions that are intellectualized, realized and become arbitrary.

Unlike a preschooler, when solving problems based on spontaneously formed ideas about the sensually perceived properties of things or on “worldly concepts” learned in communication with adults, the schoolchild has to take into account such properties of things that are reflected and fixed in the form of truly scientific concepts.

But the level of assimilation of these concepts can vary significantly depending on the organization of training. The developing thinking can be empirical, abstract-associative, reduced to operating with predetermined features of the subject (as a rule, in traditional teaching). In the system of developing education, the task is to develop the so-called content-theoretical thinking, which allows the student to understand the inner essence of the subject being studied, the laws of its functioning and transformation.

Intellectual reflection (the ability to comprehend the content of one's actions and their reasons) is a neoplasm that marks the beginning of the development of theoretical thinking in younger students. Theoretical thinking is found in a situation that requires not so much the application of a rule as its discovery, construction.

In the process of learning, other cognitive processes also change - attention, perception, memory. In the foreground is the formation of the arbitrariness of these mental functions, which can occur either spontaneously, in the form of a stereotyped adaptation to the conditions of the activity of learning, or purposefully, as the interiorization of special control actions.

From the first days of schooling, extremely high demands are placed on attention, especially from the point of view of its arbitrariness and controllability. The child, at the direction of the teacher, must direct and hold attention to such objects that do not have features of immediate attractiveness or unusualness. The direction of the development of attention in elementary school: from concentration of attention in the conditions created by the teacher, to self-organization of attention, distribution and switching of its dynamics within the task and the whole working day.

Perception, from a process of recognition, discrimination based on obvious signs, becomes an activity of observation. Observation is first carried out under the guidance of a teacher, who sets the task of examining objects or phenomena, introduces students to the rules of perception, draws attention to the main and secondary signs, and teaches how to record the results of observations (in the form of notes, drawings, diagrams). Perception becomes synthesizing and establishing connections, deliberate, purposeful observation of the object.

Memory acquires a meaningful character if it is based on the methods of logical processing of material. It is important to convey to the child the idea of ​​the need for active work with memorized material and its specific organization.

It is necessary to teach the child to single out a mnemonic task and equip him with memorization techniques. Among them:

Intentional learning;

Techniques for active mental processing of material (semantic grouping - highlighting semantic pieces, parts in the text, their designation, drawing up a plan; searching for semantic strongholds - key words for a given passage of text, narrowed names; drawing up a plan, classification, schematization, mnemonic techniques and others);

Repeated reading as a way of mental processing of the material (as opposed to cramming), which involves setting different tasks during subsequent reading. As the reading skill is mastered and developed, it is necessary to teach different types of reading as a learning activity: viewing reading, studying, memorizing, control reading.

Proponents of the concept of "developmental education" criticize the traditional system of education for the fact that it provokes the development of a peculiar type of specifically "school memory", based on memorization of the form of presentation of educational material and characterized by extremely limited possibilities for its arbitrary selective reproduction. On the basis of theoretical thinking, a new type of truly arbitrary memory is being formed, which provides meaningful assimilation of complex educational material.

Personal development in early childhood. At the age of 7-11 years, the motivational-need sphere and self-awareness of the child are actively developing. One of the most important is the desire for self-affirmation and the claim to recognition from teachers, parents and peers, primarily associated with educational activities, with its success. Educational activity requires responsibility from children and contributes to its formation as a personality trait.

In the conditions of developing education, educational cognitive interest becomes effective. A meaningful assessment of the methods and results of educational activities by the teacher, fellow students, and by the end of primary school age, self-esteem is becoming increasingly important.

At this age, self-knowledge and personal reflection develop as the ability to independently set the boundaries of one’s capabilities (“Can I or can’t solve this problem?”, “What am I missing to solve it?”), An internal plan of action (the ability to predict and plan achievement of a certain result), arbitrariness, self-control. The child masters his behavior. He more accurately and differentiatedly understands the norms of behavior at home and in public places, captures the nature of relationships with adults and peers, begins to more restrainedly express his emotions, especially negative ones. Norms of behavior turn into internal requirements for oneself, which gives rise to feelings of pangs of conscience. Higher feelings develop: moral, moral (a sense of camaraderie, sympathy, indignation from a sense of injustice). Nevertheless, the instability of the moral character, the inconstancy of experiences and relationships are quite typical for the younger schoolchild.

Depending on the organization and content of the leading educational activity, the level of neoplasms themselves in a younger student can vary significantly. We have already noted that thinking can be theoretical or empirical, just like reflection can be meaningful or formal, and planning can be based on essential features or on partial grounds.

The main psychological neoplasms of primary school age are:

1. The arbitrariness and awareness of all mental processes and their intellectualization, their internal mediation, which occurs due to the assimilation of a system of scientific concepts. Everyone but the intellect. The intellect does not yet know itself.

2. Awareness of one's own changes as a result of the development of educational activities.

If training is built in accordance with the principles of the activity theory of learning, then by the end of primary school age, the following are formed:

1. Educational activity and its subject.

2. Theoretical thinking, which, in accordance with the theory of V.V. Davydov, includes:

● meaningful reflection, i.e. search and consideration of significant grounds for one's own actions;

● meaningful analysis, i.e. highlighting an essential relationship from particular features;

● meaningful abstraction, i.e. singling out the particular from the universal basis;

● meaningful planning, i.e. building a system of possible actions and determining the optimality of the action corresponding to the conditions of the problem;

● meaningful generalization, i.e. the discovery of a pattern or relationship between the universal and the special and singular.

Active development in early childhood motivational sphere , appear learning needs. Leading at this age are cognitive needs. Central psychological neoplasm of primary school age - peer group orientation (I.V. Dubrovina). At this age, the relationship of age-related affection for a peer and the relationship of rivalry are intertwined: on the one hand, the child wants to "be like everyone else", on the other hand, "to be better than everyone else." Of great importance for the development of the personality of a younger student are motives for establishing and maintaining positive relationships with peers. In general, motivation develops in the direction awareness, acquires arbitrary character. Learning activities require children responsibility and contributes to its formation as a personality trait.

At the age of 6-7 - 10-11 years, intensively develops self-awareness : the child begins to understand that he is an individual who is subjected to social influences: he is obliged to learn and in the process of learning to change himself, appropriating collective signs (speech, numbers, etc.), collective concepts, knowledge, ideas that exist in society, a system of social expectations regarding behavior and value orientations; at the same time, the child experiences his uniqueness, his selfhood, seeks to assert himself among adults and peers. In educational activities, the student develops ideas about himself, self-esteem, skills of self-control and self-regulation are formed.

At primary school age, there is a transition from concrete situational to generalized self-esteem. At this age develops self-knowledge and personal reflection as the ability to independently set the boundaries of their capabilities ("Can I or can't solve this problem?", "What am I missing to solve it?") (I.V. Shapovalenko). Reflection is manifested in the ability to highlight the features of one's own actions and make them the subject of analysis. By the end of primary school age, such volitional character traits as independence, perseverance, endurance.

In any educational setting, children who graduate from elementary school differ significantly from those who enter first grade. The requirements of learning activities inevitably lead students to the formation arbitrariness as the characteristics of all mental processes. Arbitrariness is formed as a result of the fact that the child does daily what his position as a student requires: listening to explanations, solving problems, etc. Gradually, he learns to do what he needs, and not what he would like. Thus, students learn to control their behavior (to one degree or another), overcome difficulties, move towards the goal, look for the best ways to achieve it.

The second important change is reflection. The teacher requires the child not only to solve the problem, but also to substantiate its correctness. This gradually forms the child's ability to realize, to be aware of what he is doing, what he has done. More than that - to assess whether he did the right thing and why he thinks it's right. Thus, the student gradually learns to look at himself as if through the eyes of another person - from the outside - and evaluate his own activities.

The ability of a person to realize what he is doing, and to argue, justify his activities is called reflection.

In the initial period of learning, first-grade students need to rely on external objects, models, and drawings. Gradually, they learn to replace objects with words (oral counting, for example), to keep images of objects in their heads. By the end of elementary school, students can already perform actions to themselves - mentally. This means that their intellectual development has risen to a new level, they have formed internal action plan.

So, the mental activity of a student who has completed elementary school should be characterized by three neoplasms: arbitrariness, reflection, internal plan of action(See: Davydov V.V. Mental development in primary school age // Age and pedagogical psychology / Under the editorship of A.V. Petrovsky. - M., 1979. S. 69-101).

The neoplasms with which the child came to school developed in the course of his play activity and allowed him to start learning. Participation in educational activities, systematic learning formed new features of the mental activity of a younger student. These neoplasms, in turn, prepared students for the transition to the next level of education - to secondary school.

The development of these features of the psyche of schoolchildren goes inextricably linked with their mastery of various types of cognitive activity. So, when entering school, children are unable to analyze the various properties of perceived objects. They are usually limited to naming colors and shapes. In the process of learning, children learn to purposefully perceive objects. First, the teacher gives an external pattern of eye movement on the perceived object, using a pointer. Then the child learns to draw up a scheme, a verbal plan of observation, based on its goal. Thus, an arbitrary targeted surveillance is one of the important types of cognitive activity.

The activity associated with memorizing and reproducing what remains in memory also changes significantly. First-graders easily remember bright, emotionally impressive things. They tend to be literal. Learning constantly requires a new type of memorization, where at first the analysis of what is memorized, the selection of the main thing, the grouping of material, etc. takes place. Techniques of arbitrary, meaningful memorization are gradually formed. Involuntary memorization retains its value, but it also undergoes changes in the direction of comprehending the memorized material. Preliminary work with the material is decisive for memorization: the material is remembered as if by itself. The gradual formation of an internal plan of action leads to significant changes in all intellectual processes. At first, children tend to make generalizations based on external, usually unimportant, features. But in the learning process, the teacher fixes their attention on connections, relationships, on what is not directly perceived, so students move to a higher level of generalizations, they are able to assimilate scientific concepts without relying on visual material.

In elementary school, all cognitive processes develop, but D.B. Elkonin, following L.S. Vygotsky, believes that changes in perception, in memory are derived from thinking. It is thinking that becomes the center of development during this period of childhood. Because of this, the development of perception and memory follows the path intellectualization. Students use mental actions in solving problems of perception, memorization and reproduction. “Thanks to the transition of thinking to a new, higher level, a restructuring of all other mental processes takes place, memory becomes thinking, and perception becomes thinking. The transition of thinking processes to a new level and the associated restructuring of all other processes constitute the main content of mental development in primary school age ”(Elkonin D.B. Selected psychological works. - M., 1989. - P. 255).

At the same time, it should be noted that, according to modern psychological data, the mental development of younger schoolchildren has large reserves. In a mass school, these reserves are not actually used. Long-term studies conducted under the direction of D.B. Elkonin and V.V. Davydov, have shown that modern children, due to fundamentally new social conditions for their development, can form broader and richer mental abilities than have been done so far (See: Age-related opportunities for acquiring knowledge

The neoplasms of primary school age include memory, perception, will, and thinking.

Memory. At this age, great changes occur in the cognitive sphere of the child. Memory acquires a pronounced cognitive character. Mechanical memory develops well, indirect and logical memory lags behind in its development. This is due to the fact that these types of memory in educational, labor, play activities are not in demand and the child has enough mechanical memory. There is an intensive formation of memorization techniques: from the most primitive (repetition, careful long-term consideration of the material) to grouping and comprehending the connections of different parts of the material.

Perception. There is a transition from involuntary perception to purposeful arbitrary observation of an object or object. At the beginning of this period, perception is not yet differentiated, so the child sometimes confuses letters and numbers that are similar in spelling.

If at the initial stage of education, the child's analyzing perception prevails, then by the end of primary school age, a synthesizing perception develops. He can establish connections between the elements of the perceived. This is clearly seen in the following example. When children were asked to tell what was drawn in the picture, children from 2 to 5 years old listed the objects depicted in it, from 6 to 9 years old - described the picture, and a child over 9 years old gave his interpretation of what he saw.

Will. Educational activity contributes to the development of the will, since learning always requires internal discipline. The child begins to develop the ability to self-organize, he masters planning techniques, self-control and self-esteem increase. The ability to focus on uninteresting things is formed.

Significant changes at this age occur in the area thinking. The cognitive activity of a child of primary school age is very high. This is expressed in the fact that he asks many questions and is interested in everything: how deep is the ocean, how do animals breathe there, etc.

The child seeks knowledge. He learns to operate with them, imagine situations and, if necessary, tries to find a way out of a particular situation. The child can already imagine the situation and act in it in his imagination. This kind of thinking is called visual-figurative. This is the main type of thinking at this age. A child can also think logically, but since learning in the lower grades is successful only on the basis of the principle of visibility, this kind of thinking is still necessary.

At the beginning of primary school age, thinking is different egocentrism- a special mental position, due to the lack of knowledge necessary for the correct definition of some problematic points.

The learning process in the lower grades is aimed at active development verbal-logical thinking. The first two years in the learning process are dominated by visual samples of educational material, but gradually their use is reduced. Thus, visual-figurative thinking is replaced by verbal-logical thinking.

Already at the end of primary school age (and later), individual differences between children appear: some are “theorists” or “thinkers” who easily solve problems verbally; others are “practitioners”, they need reliance on visibility and practical actions; the "artists" have a well-developed figurative thinking. In many children, these types of thinking are developed in the same way.

Begins to develop in early childhood theoretical thinking leading to the restructuring of all mental processes, and, as D.B. Elkonin: “memory becomes thinking, and perception becomes thinking”. An important condition for the development of theoretical thinking is the formation of scientific concepts and their application in practice. This can be illustrated by the following example. Children of preschool and school age were asked the question: "What is a fetus?" Preschoolers said that this is what they eat and what grows, and schoolchildren answered that the fruit is the part of the plant that contains the seed.

Theoretical thinking allows solving problems based on internal features, essential properties and relationships. The development of theoretical thinking depends on the type of education, that is, on how and what the child is taught.

1. Development of arbitrariness of the processes of perception, attention, memory. Memory acquires a pronounced cognitive character, since mental operations now have a goal, and memorization processes are also purposeful. There is an intensive formation of memorization techniques. It occurs before from involuntary memorization of a preschooler to arbitrary memorization of a schoolchild, purposeful observation of an object. The ability to focus on uninteresting things is formed.

2. Development of mental operations of analysis, synthesis, generalization, comparison, classification, etc. This is the age of active intellectual development. The intellect mediates the development of all other functions, there is an intellectualization of all mental processes, their awareness.

3. Awareness of one's own development, one's own changes as a result of learning activities.

Consciousness of learning is characterized by an awareness of responsibility for learning achievements, activity and independence in the assimilation and application of knowledge, mastery of the methods of mental activity, which ensures self-management of educational activities. Leontiev divided actions into actually realized, “automated”, or consciously controlled, and actions that are only in the field of perception. For example, walking down the street with a friend and talking about something, the environment will be perceived, your movement relative to external objects will be consciously controlled, and the meaning of the interlocutor's words will be actually realized. It is very important to understand the difference between an action that is actually conscious and one that is only under conscious control. At first glance, these concepts are similar to each other or even coincide, but Leontiev gives the following example: “Let's assume that a child is studying and in the process of learning performs one of the well-known exercises on spelling a capital letter in proper names, which consists in the following: in the textbook of the text, you need to separately write out the names of cows and separately - the names of dogs. In this case, his actions should be aimed at deciding whether the next nickname that he reads is more suitable for cows or it is more suitable for dogs. This becomes the subject of his actual consciousness. Here again, the content actually recognized by the child does not coincide with what is subject to conscious assimilation: after all, it is not necessary to learn the difference between, so to speak, "typically cow" and "typically dog" nicknames, but the fact that proper names, in particular the nicknames of animals (and at the same time exactly the same, whether it is the name of dogs or cows), are written with a capital letter. Another thing is when a child must, for example, in an exercise write out words that are capitalized; in this case, his inner action will be directed towards distinguishing these words, guided by the rule communicated to him. Accordingly, the actual subject of his consciousness will be in this case precisely spelling of proper names»

In addition, there may be a discrepancy in learning between the requirement to comprehend the material, on the one hand, and its awareness by the child, on the other. Using the same spelling rules as an example, we will give the child an exercise to learn the spelling of words with unchecked vowels. To do this, he must read the riddle, draw an answer, and then sign the text of the riddle under his drawing. This exercise is designed to ensure the consciousness of cheating, and it really cannot be done "mechanically". To draw a riddle, the child must necessarily be aware of the text of the riddle. Consequently, the child, signing the riddle under his drawing, writes off the text, the content of which he is fully aware of in advance. Let us approach, however, the example under consideration from the other side and put the question as follows: for what given this exercise? Of course, it is not given in order to teach the child to understand riddles. His direct task is the conscious assimilation of orthograms. But what necessary does the child become aware of when doing this exercise, i.e. what does it guarantee awareness of? Obviously, consciousness thoughts expressed in the text of the riddle. Consciousness spelling sides of the text in this exercise is just not provided with anything. After all, the only word in relation to which a question about its spelling could arise in the mind of a child is a guess word, but it is precisely this word that the child should not write, but depict with the help of a drawing, and it is not in it that the studied spelling. The text of the riddle itself, which contains the spelling being studied, the child can rewrite completely "mechanically", that is, without being aware of its spelling side. It turns out, therefore, that the material of this exercise is indeed always recognized, but only the child recognizes in it something completely different from what is required for the conscious mastery of precisely spelling. In this case, as in many others, we are dealing with the discrepancy that the child must be aware of the educational material in accordance with a certain specific pedagogical task, and what is real object of his consciousness.

The problem of the consciousness of the teaching acts as a problem of the meaning that the knowledge he acquires has for the child. The way I am aware of something meaning has for me what I am conscious of - is determined by the motive of the activity in which a particular action is included. That is, how knowledge is assimilated and what it will become for the child is determined by the specific motives that prompted him to learn.

Motives can be divided into two large groups:

1. The motives inherent in the educational activity itself:

Motives related to the content of the teaching (the desire to learn new things, master certain skills, methods of action, etc.)

Motives related to the learning process (like the learning process itself, interaction with the teacher and peers, etc.)

2. Indirect motives:

Social motives associated with the concept of duty, honor, etc.

Motives for self-improvement, self-determination

Motives for Avoiding Trouble

True, it should be taken into account that there are so many people, so many motives, so many different goals, but in general the structure is as follows. It is clear that the success of mastering knowledge and the degree of their awareness will be different in each case: whether the child will learn a lesson so that his parents will soon let him go for a walk in order to get a good grade or because he likes the content of the subject itself.

The principle of conscientiousness of learning requires the child to understand the need for his teaching in the future life, but understanding alone is not enough. Thus, the cognitive content of consciousness depends on the attitude to the cognizable, on the motive that prompts cognition. In this regard, Leontiev spoke of the need education motives of students, the importance of forming the right attitude to learning, the need for such an organization of the educational process in which students would not only be interested in the content of the subject, but also motivated to master it. He brought an interesting experiment in the house of pioneers, in a circle of aircraft designers. More than half of the children enthusiastically collecting model airplanes were not at all interested in theory - why an airplane flies, and this is fundamental knowledge. No calls to start studying these things have had any effect. Then the experimenters came up with the idea of ​​giving the beginners a new task, it was necessary not only to construct a model, but also to make it fly a certain distance. From this point of view, it is no longer possible to do without theory, and what previously did not carry any specific meaning for a child is now of paramount importance - in order to make a model fly, one already has to rummage through the literature, communicate with an instructor, etc.

Leontiev said that only that which is the goal of activity is actually realized. Having thus changed the role of theoretical knowledge in the overall structure of activities, he attracted the interest of children in fundamental knowledge. All training should also be built.

In psychology and pedagogy, there is such a thing as the psychological readiness of the child for school. This readiness requires from the child a certain level of development, a certain ability to control himself, his behavior, a certain level of development of mental functions, the presence of certain skills to interact with adults and peers, and, of course, a certain level of self-awareness. At school, all these skills of self-control, self-awareness continue to develop and become more complex. At the age of one, the child begins to separate himself from the objects of the outside world, at three - his objective actions from the objective actions of an adult - at the level of primary school age - with the help of an adult, he evaluates his mental qualities - thinking, memory, imagination. Thus, conscious learning, which is based on the mastery of educational activities, contributes to the formation of consciousness, self-esteem of the student, the development of volitional qualities, self-control skills, the organization of mental work, the development of cognitive processes, etc.

156. Education during adolescence.

Studying at school or college occupies a large place in the life of a teenager. For a teenager, independent forms of employment become attractive. The teenager is impressed, and it is easier for him to master the methods of action when the teacher only helps him.

Of course, interest in a subject is largely related to the quality of teaching. Of great importance is the presentation of the material by the teacher, the ability to explain the material in a fascinating and intelligible way, which activates interest, enhances the motivation for learning. Gradually, based on the cognitive need, stable cognitive interests are formed, leading to a positive attitude towards academic subjects in general.

At this age there are new motives for teaching associated with the awareness of life prospects, one's place in the future, professional intentions, ideal. Knowledge is of particular importance for the development of the personality of a teenager. They are the value that provides the teenager with the expansion of his own consciousness and a significant place among his peers. It is in adolescence that special efforts are made to expand everyday, artistic and scientific knowledge. A teenager eagerly learns the worldly experience of significant people, which gives him the opportunity to navigate in everyday life.

Orientation to work and socially useful activity. In the orientation towards work, in the formation of interests, inclinations and abilities in adolescents, an active test of strength in various areas of labor activity plays an important role. At the same time, orientations are largely determined by the possibility of personal self-affirmation and self-improvement. In our time, a teenager has received a new motivation to participate in work activities - this is an opportunity to earn money. However, it is in adolescence that many adolescents feel the need for professional self-determination, which is associated with the general tendency of this age to find their place in life. A teenager begins to look at the variety of professions with growing interest. Making a preliminary choice, he evaluates different types of activity in terms of his interests and inclinations, as well as in terms of social value orientations.

Social pedagogy considers the process of education, the sociology of personality in theoretical and applied aspects. It considers deviations or conformities of human behavior under the influence of the environment, what is commonly referred to as the socialization of the individual. According to scientists, social pedagogy is “a branch of pedagogy that considers the social education of all age groups and social categories of people, in organizations specially created for this”

Social pedagogy is the basis for the branches of pedagogy, which represent the branches of social pedagogy.