Based on the teachings of A.S. Vygotsky (4), domestic psychologists A.N. Leontiev (6), D.B. Davydov (15), L.V. Zankov (12), N.A. Menchinskaya (21), P.Ya. Galperin (6), developed the theoretical foundations of educational activities , which especially favorably affect the development of the intellectual, volitional, emotional and motivational spheres of the individual, as well as ensure its equilateral education.

Proceeding from the provisions of Marxism on the role of labor in the formation of a person, Soviet psychology asserts that objective activity should change and change the type of his behavior. At the same time, for a person, simultaneously with objective and internal psychological activity, carried out with the help of verbal, digital and other signs, is characteristic. This activity leads to the psychological development of the individual.

A person especially actively masters various signs and material tools during special organized training. Social "relations of people, manifested, in particular, in learning, lead to the development of their higher mental functions. Now it is customary to briefly convey this thought of LSVygotsky in the form of the formula:" Learning goes ahead of development. "

The fundamental difference between Soviet educational psychology and many foreign concepts is that it focuses on the active formation of psychological functions, and not on their passive registration and adaptation to the existing level. Hence the very important methodological significance is the idea of ​​such a structure of teaching, which would take into account the zone of proximal development of the individual, i.e. it is necessary to focus not on the level of development available today, but on a somewhat higher one, which the student can achieve under the guidance and with the help of a teacher.

From the standpoint of the general theory of activity in Soviet psychology, the concepts of "educational activity" and "teaching" are distinguished. Educational activity is one of the main types of human activity, specifically aimed at mastering the methods of objective and cognitive actions, generalized theoretical knowledge. The concept of "learning activity" in relation to "learning" is considered as broader, since it includes both the activities of the teacher and the activities of the student.

Learning is the process of acquiring and consolidating ways of acting.

Teaching includes:

• A) the process of assimilating information about the significant properties of the world, which is necessary for the successful organization of certain types of ideal and practical activities (the product of this process is knowledge);
• B) The process of mastering the techniques and operations that make up all these activities (the product of this process is skills);
• C) The process of mastering the ways of using the specified information for the correct selection and control of techniques and operations in accordance with the conditions of the task and the goal (the product of this process is skills).

Thus, learning takes place where a person's actions are governed by the conscious goal of assimilating certain knowledge, skills, and abilities.

Educational activity equips a person with the knowledge, skills and abilities necessary for various types of socially useful activity, it also forms in a person the ability to manage his mental processes, the ability to choose, organize and direct his actions and operations, skills and experience in accordance with the task at hand. Thus, it prepares a person for work.

Modern educational psychology believes that for each age period there is its own, most characteristic leading type of activity: in preschool - play, in primary school - learning, in middle school age - expanded socially useful activity in all its variants (educational, labor, social - organizational, artistic, sports, etc.). During this period, students actively master various forms of communication. In senior school age, the leading becomes special form educational activity, which is already more vocational guidance and colored by independent moral judgments and assessments. The foregoing does not mean that at every age a student should engage in precisely the leading type of activity. It is important to constantly develop all the wealth of activities that ensure the all-round development of the individual. At the same time, the recognition of the leading types of activity allows teachers to more actively use and shape them in communication and education.

Emphasizing the leading role of activity in the development of personality, some psychologists also consider training to be a type of activity. For didactics, the point of view of the Soviet psychologist B. G. Ananyev, who saw the special role of communication in human development, along with cognition and labor, is more practical. In accordance with this concept, it is necessary to highlight in the description of the learning process not only the activity aspect, but also the aspect of communication.

In the course of cognition and labor, active assimilation of knowledge is ensured, while communication creates conditions for assimilation and activates this process. The correct organization of cognition, learning and work is the most important condition for the successful functioning of the educational process, for the purpose of all-round development.

Educational and cognitive activity is accompanied by an internal mental process of assimilation by students educational information.

In accordance with the activity approach, according to some psychologists, students should form not knowledge, but certain types of activity, in which knowledge is included as a certain element. For didactics, such an interpretation of the role of knowledge is incomplete, since it does not take into account the general logic of building goals and the content of education, where the formation of knowledge is singled out as a particularly important goal. In addition, it is known that knowledge exists objectively not only in the consciousness of the individual, but also in the form of information stored in books, "computer banks", etc., which becomes the property of the individual in the process of cognitive activity, at the same time, knowledge cannot be considered. outside of connection with activity, because knowledge is needed, first of all, in order to act.

All of the above does not mean belittling the importance of the formation of various types of activity in students. This is provided for by the didactic requirements for the formation of practical, special and general educational skills and abilities in students, which include knowledge about ways to improve these actions.

In psychology, several approaches have been developed to organize the processes of assimilating knowledge. For example, N.A. Menzhinskaya and D.N.Bogoyavlensky studied the role in this of analytic-synthetic activity, comparisons, associations, generalizations based on specific knowledge, as well as the importance of an independent search for signs of assimilated concepts and methods of solving new types of problems in the process of assimilation. At the same time, N.A. Menzhinskaya (4) pays great attention to the development of learning, in which it includes the generalization of mental activity, the economy of thinking, independence of thinking, flexibility of thinking, semantic memory, the nature of the connection between visual-figurative and abstract components of thinking. By developing these qualities of thinking in the learning process, it is possible to ensure the development of learning ability, and on this basis the ability to increase the efficiency of the learning process as a whole.

D. B. Elkonin (21) and V. V. Davydov (6) investigated such ways of assimilation in which generalizations did not appear traditionally: on the basis of the transition from the particular to the formally general, but on the basis of the initial acquaintance of schoolchildren with some more generalized theoretical propositions (meaningful abstractions), in order to then deductively deduce from them more particular properties, more specific knowledge about phenomena of an objective nature. For example, they first introduce younger schoolchildren with the concepts of quantities, teach the relationships between them (more, less, etc.), and then with the natural series of numbers. In the Russian language, first, they teach linguistic analysis, then grammar and syntax.

The structure of the assimilation cycle acquires new shades in the theory developed by P. Ya. Galperin (12) and developed by N.F. Talyzina (4). In accordance with this theory, there are five stages of assimilation of new actions: preliminary acquaintance with the action, with the conditions for its implementation; the formation of an action in a material (or materialized with the help of people) form with the deployment of all operations included in it; formation of action as externally speech; formation of action in external speech; the formation of action in inner speech, its transition into deep, curtailed processes of thinking. This whole chain of mental actions ensures the transition of actions from the external to the internal plane. This process is called interisation. This concept is more applicable to explanatory - illustrative, but not to problem learning, which does not always start with subject education, but presupposes the comprehension of logical tasks immediately in the verbal form of an external or internal plan. Despite a number of possible approaches to characterizing learning activities, it is still possible to characterize some typical options for students' actions under the guidance of a teacher and during completely independent learning activities, both in the lesson and at home.

Conventionally, we can distinguish two typical variants of the educational activity of schoolchildren. One of them takes place during a lesson or other form of teaching schoolchildren, where the teacher plays the leading, guiding role, the second - during the students' independent work in the lesson or when doing homework.

In the case when educational activity proceeds under the guidance of a teacher, the following educational actions of schoolchildren can be identified:

• - Acceptance of learning objectives and action plan proposed by the teacher;
• - implementation of training actions and operations to solve the assigned tasks;
• - regulation of educational activities under the influence of teacher control and self-control;
• - analysis of the results of educational activities carried out under the guidance of a teacher.

In the course of independent educational activities carried out without direct supervision in this moment, the following actions are usually highlighted:

• - planning or specifying the tasks of their educational activities, planning methods, means and forms of educational activities;
• - self-organization of educational activities;
• - self-regulation of teaching; introspection of the results of educational activities.

The structural elements of educational activity are modified depending on the nature of the educational tasks to be solved, on the leading methods that are used in this case. The structure of the educational activity of schoolchildren under the direct control of it by the teacher is fully consistent with the structure of the teacher's actions. If the teacher plans the tasks, the upcoming educational actions of the students, stimulates them, then the student accepts these tasks and carries out the planned actions, relying on the motives that arise under the influence of the teacher's stimulating influences. If the teacher controls the actions of the students and regulates their learning actions, then the students under the influence of the teacher also regulate their actions. Likewise, the analysis of learning outcomes proceeds in conjunction with their self-analysis by the student himself. In this correspondence, the structure of the actions of the teacher and students is the unity of the processes of teaching and learning, which is only called the learning process. The considered interaction of teaching and learning is also manifested in the case when a student is engaged in independent educational activities in the absence of a teacher or when performing independent work in the classroom. In this case, the teacher indirectly directs the actions of the students, since before that he set tasks for them, stimulated the performance of tasks.

Like any other human activity, educational activity is polymotivated.

Motives can be of two types - external and internal. External motives include stimuli such as punishment and reward, threat and demand, group pressure, expectation of future benefits, etc. They are all external to the immediate goal of the teaching. Knowledge and skills in these cases serve only as a means to achieve other basic goals (avoiding the unpleasant, achieving social or personal success, satisfying ambition).

The goal itself - teaching - in such situations can be indifferent or even repulsive. Teaching is to some extent forced and acts as an obstacle that must be overcome on the way to the main goal. This situation is characterized by the presence of opposing forces. It is, in principle, a conflict, therefore, it is associated with significant mental stress, requires internal efforts and sometimes the struggle of the individual with himself. With a great severity of the conflict, there may be tendencies to "get out of the situation" (refusal, avoidance of difficulties, neurosis). Then the student drops out of school or "breaks down" - begins to break the rules, falls into apathy. A similar structure of the educational situation is often found in school practice.

Intrinsic motives include those that induce a person to learn as their goal. An example is interest in the classes themselves, curiosity, the desire to raise the cultural level. Learning situations with such motives do not contain internal conflict of course, they are also associated with overcoming the difficulties encountered in the course of teaching, and require volitional efforts. But these efforts are aimed at overcoming external obstacles, not at fighting with oneself. Such situations are optimal from a pedagogical point of view, their creation is an important task of the teacher. They require educating students, shaping their goals, interests and ideals, and not just managing their behavior.

A certain thing, events, situation or action become motives of activity if they are associated with the sources of a certain human activity. These sources can be divided into three main categories.

1. Internal sources. They are determined by the needs of a person and can have both an innate character, expressing the organic needs of the body, and an acquired character, expressing the social needs formed by society. The need for activity and the need for information are of particular importance in stimulating learning.

So, from the first days of life, a child is in a state of continuous activity - smiling, moving, moving his arms and legs, running, playing, talking, asking endless questions. The actions themselves give him pleasure. A person's need for information is clearly manifested in experiments, when the subjects are isolated from any influences for a certain period. outside world for example, placed in a dark, soundproofed chamber. As a result, there are serious intellectual, emotional and volitional disorders, imbalance, melancholy, anger, apathy, loss of the ability to volitional actions, sometimes even the disintegration of systematic thinking, hallucinations. In living conditions, a deficit of activity and information (and sometimes their excess) gives rise to a negative state in a person, called fatigue and boredom.

Among socially formed needs, gnostic needs and positive social needs are of particular importance for stimulating learning activity. These include the need for knowledge, the desire to benefit society, the desire for socially valuable achievements, etc.

2. External sources. They are determined by the social conditions of human life. These sources include requirements, expectations and opportunities.

Requirements offer a person certain types and forms of activities and behavior. So, parents require the child to eat with a spoon, sit on a chair, say "thank you". The school requires the student to appear at a certain time, listen to what the teacher says, and complete his assignments. Society requires an individual to observe certain moral norms and forms of communication between people in behavior, to do certain work.

Expectations characterize the attitude of society to a person associated with a proposal about what features of behavior and forms of activity it considers normal for a given individual. So, others consider it normal for a one-year-old child to start walking, they expect this from the baby and treat him accordingly. In contrast to the demands, expectations create a general atmosphere for the performance of the activity, which is more stimulating than an order.

Opportunities are those objective conditions of a certain activity that are in the environment of a person. For example, a good home library encourages reading, as it provides such an opportunity. Psychological analysis shows that a person's behavior largely depends on objective capabilities (especially if his personality and leading life goals have not yet been formed). So, a book on geometry that accidentally fell into the hands of a child, can determine his propensity for mathematics.

3. Personal sources. They are determined by the interests, aspirations, attitudes, beliefs and worldview of a person, his idea of ​​himself, his attitude to society. These sources of activity are called values. Such values ​​can be self-improvement, satisfaction of certain needs, life ideals and patterns.

The listed sources of activity in different combinations and modifications are observed in each person. But the activity generated by them is not always cast into the form of teaching. For this it is necessary that the needs and drives of the individual, the requirements, expectations and opportunities presented to him by the environment, his personal values ​​and attitudes, i.e. internal, external and personal stimuli of his behavior, associated with one of the sides of the teaching (result, goal, process) or with all. Then these aspects of the teaching will turn into motives that induce the corresponding activity. This process is called motivation. How it is achieved depends on which side of the teaching is put forward as a motive and with what sources of activity it is associated. For example, if the results of learning are put forward as a motive, and for motivation they turn to internal sources of activity, then motivation is achieved by linking educational success with reward, public approval, usefulness for future work, etc. The use of external incentives is expressed in demand, trust, and the provision of suitable opportunities. An example of personal motivation for learning results is linking them with an individual's self-esteem (praise). The variety of possible techniques and combinations of motivation is as extensive as life itself, as those motives that determine human activity.

One of important directions in solving this problem, the creation of primary grades conditions that ensure the full-fledged mental development of children associated with the formation of stable cognitive interests of the skills and abilities of mental activity, the qualities of the mind, creative initiative and independence in search of ways to solve problems. As a result of such training, the quality of thinking is not sufficiently developed in children: the depth of criticality, flexibility, which determine its independence. If we compare the reading of the problem by the student and ...

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Lecture 2

Features of psychological cognitive processes

and educational activities of younger students

The problem of the development of the cognitive activity of children of primary school age is one of the most important problems of modern pedagogy. It acts as a primary condition for the formation of students' need for knowledge, mastering the skills of intellectual activity, independence, ensuring the depth and strength of knowledge.

The realities of today require the orientation of the education of primary schoolchildren on the development of the cognitive activity of the individual as the basis personal development, since in the process of initial education, the foundation of the ability to learn is laid, which later becomes the main condition for lifelong education.

The problem of cognitive interest is one of the most difficult in pedagogy, since, being an individual psychological characteristic of a person, it reflects very complex interactions of psychophysiological, biological and social conditions of development.

Numerous observations of teachers, research by psychologists have convincingly shown that a child who has not learned how to learn, who has not mastered the methods of mental activity in the elementary grades of school, in the middle usually goes into the category of unsuccessful ones. One of the important directions in solving this problem is the creation in the primary grades of conditions that ensure the full mental development of children, associated with the formation of stable cognitive interests, abilities and skills of mental activity, mental qualities, creative initiative and independence in search of ways to solve problems.

As a result of such training, the qualities of thinking are not sufficiently developed in children: depth, criticality, flexibility, which determine its independence. The development of independent, creative, search, research thinking is one of the main tasks schooling in general and in primary grades in particular. Independence of thinking is manifested in the child's peculiar vision of a problem situation, requires an individual approach that would take into account the peculiarities of the mental activity of each student.

Experience shows that the conditions necessary for organizing systematic work on the purposeful development of cognitive processes are very difficult to provide in lessons saturated with teaching material... This can be done by a special organization of regular extracurricular activities, classes in institutions of additional education in which children use the game to solve non-standard problems.

Development of perception. Children come to school with sufficiently developed perception processes - they distinguish the form, color, and sounds of speech. But they still cannot conduct a systematic analysis of the properties and qualities of an object; they must master the means of such analysis.

In school classes, a special perceptual activity - observation. The task is to notice the features of the perceived object. Methods of inspection are given (the procedure for revealing properties, comparison with a standard), a form of image of the revealed properties is proposed - a drawing, a diagram, a word. Special tasks are given for perception objects, for example, find differences in drawings, find two similar objects or differences between these four-digit numbers and determine in which digit these differences are; count the triangles in the proposed figure, and so on. As a result, the student learns to purposefully and element-wise examine the subject, masters observation, but he still depends on the attitudes and control on the part of the teacher.

Development of attention ... In school teaching, everyone is developing intensivelyproperties of attention... The development of arbitrariness is most noticeable, since at school it is required to trace and assimilate those properties of objects that are not at all of interest to the child at the moment. Have to hold Attention on the necessary, not just attractive items. The stability of the student's voluntary attention depends on how clearly the teacher sets the goals and objectives of educational actions: open the textbook on page such and such, find exercise number ... and now all attention is on the blackboard, check if he correctly identified the types of declensions, etc. .d.

It is difficult for a child to maintain voluntary attention during the lesson, therefore, elements of involuntary attention are constantly attracted, using visualization, highlighting the necessary details with bright colors, changing the intonation and tempo of the voice, changing the forms of work and methodological techniques, creating play and competitive moments. If we compare the reading of the problem by the student and the teacher, you can see how intonationally the teacher literally invests in consciousness children are mathematical addictions, relying on their involuntary attention. “Two boxes of sweets were brought to the buffet. One contained 8 kg of sweets, the other - 2 kg more. " Students will unwittingly notice what the teacher is emphasizing with their voice. The elements of involuntary attention help to voluntarily keep a task and ways of solving it in the field of attention. With the development of children's knowledge and interests, their involuntary attention is attracted by more and more essential aspects of objects.

Under the influence of the teacher, children develop internal means of self-regulation of educational activity. Arbitrary attention is an element of self-control. This is facilitated by a clear order of control actions, the requirement to follow this order at school and at home. For example, before you sit down for your lessons, fold textbooks and notebooks on the edge of the table in the order in which you will work with them; position the chair so that its edge coincides with the edge of the table; get everything ready for the first lesson; sit down, check your legs, back, elbows, fingers on the pen and then start writing. Once you've done your work, move your textbook and notebook to the other end of the table until the adults check the work. The books stacked to the left clearly show how many lessons are left to do, and this guides the child's attention and efforts. And the books, folded on the right, give satisfaction from the work done. The child needs visual means of self-control.

Reliance on external actions helps self-regulation. Therefore, the teaching uses the techniques of denoting sounds with chips, composing graphic diagrams, drawings, layouts and applications.

Great learning requirements are imposed on the distribution of attention. Writing is especially difficult in this regard. When performing writing exercises, the child must follow the stitching, and the tilt, and the letters, and the literacy, and the position of the pen. These control actions are practiced element by element while writing the same sticks and hooks. But when you go to the letter, you need to immediately distributed control. It is especially difficult for phlegmatic children. Having started to write, they no longer hear comments and corrections due to their high concentration. Mom told one student three times that she was holding the pen incorrectly. Finally, looking up from the letter, the girl replied: "Now I will finish writing and then I will listen to you." She cannot fix it "on the fly".

Self-control develops more successfully if, before starting work, the teacher suggests reminding himself of the rules. So, before starting the letter, the teacher says: “Let's remember our rule, check: legs, back, elbows, fingers. Let's start writing. "

Distribution of attention is also required in order to, while doing your work, monitor the behavior of your comrades, by their reaction to notice their mistakes. This is typical for reading lessons and oral responses.

With each year of study, schoolchildren become more and more accustomed to setting goals on their own, organizing their attention, and conducting self-control. But behind all this - the exactingness and systematic guidance of the teacher.

Memory development ... Preschool children have tenacious figurative memory, but it is easier for them to retell events not in order, but according to bright moments, including the circumstances under which memorization took place. School requires accurate reproduction, arbitrary recall. In addition, mnemonic tasks are different: either verbatim to remember and tell, then in meaning, then for a short time (digital data of the task). In accordance with these requirements, mnemonic capabilities schoolboy. However, up to grade 3-4, many children are dominated by literal memorization texts. The answers of children in natural history lessons sound funny: “How can mountains be destroyed, you ask. Yes, mountains can collapse. " And then follows the story of the weathering of rocks. Such memory will not be successful in high school.

The productivity of the memory of younger schoolchildren increases not only from constant training, but also from the assimilation of the appropriate techniques and methods of memorization and reproduction, which they themselves cannot invent. This includes, first of all, the techniques of meaningful memorization: highlighting key words, dividing the text into semantic units, semantic grouping, comparing large and detailed plans of the text, etc. It is important that these techniques are worked out on different materials and constantly. Plan plot story differs from a detailed plan for solving an arithmetic problem and from a plan for working on a grammatical text. It requires not only the allocation of semantic units, but also their grouping, subordination. From the 2nd grade, children already draw up a written plan.

A special psychological and pedagogical task is the development of methods of reproduction, its distribution in time, and self-control. KD Ushinsky noticed that the child forgets because he is too lazy to remember. Of course, it takes effort to recall the material over and over again. But skills are also needed in order to use the selected reference words, rely on the plan, on general ideas about a given phenomenon, reproduce individual semantic parts before the whole material is mastered, etc.

The teacher needs systematic work on the development of memorization and reproduction techniques, otherwise both the plan, and the reference words, and the grouping of the material will be performed as special tasks for the mark and will not become their own skills.

The above methods of memorization and reproduction are worked out as elements of voluntary memory, but when they are mastered, the productivity of involuntary memorization also increases.

Involuntary memory is more effective until the methods of semantic processing of the material are developed. But here, too, a pattern is characteristic: what is the object and purpose of the activity is better remembered. And if the semantic grouping and analysis of texts were the subject of mental work, they also improve involuntary memorization, provide full-fledged assimilation of the material. Even the memorization of images improves if they are examined, analyzed, grouped. The formation of techniques for working with educational material is an effective way of fostering a good memory.

Development of imagination. Most of the information reported in primary school teacher and textbooks, given in the form of verbal descriptions, pictures and diagrams. The assimilation of the material depends on the child's ability to imagine, to recreate the presented images of reality. Learning relies primarily on recreational imagination.

At first, the imagination of a younger student is very schematic, the images are poor in details, they lack flexibility. Children try to "squeeze" existing everyday ideas into the situations described in the textbook. For example, listening to the text "Sanitary dogs", a schoolchild says: "I saw a big dog yesterday," that is, he does not represent what is described. Concentrate imagination within the framework of the text, such techniques as a picture plan, reading by role, etc., help.

Under the influence of learning, children begin to recreate more accurate and detailed images, to represent events previous and subsequent in time, the implied states of the characters or the possible consequences of events. They develop the ability to build justifications for their options for the continuation of events such as: "This will definitely happen if you do this and that."

The desire of children to indicate the conditions, origin and consequences of some transformations of objects is the most important prerequisite for the development of creative (productive) imagination, the creation of their own ideas and designs. The modern school still does not create sufficient conditions for the development of creativity, although the potential opportunities for children are quite rich.

It should be noted that imagination not only ensures the assimilation of educational material, but also acts as a form of personal activity of a student, a way of identifying oneself with positive heroes, which are narrated in the lesson. It is impossible to develop children's curiosity and love of reading without relying on imagination. Such forms of work as matinees of fairy tales, “parade of literary characters”, dramatization games, drawings on the themes of the reading, etc., help to enhance this most valuable personal influence of learning.

From "gluing" existing ideas with new information, the student's imagination acquires the properties of flexible use of images, the deployment of ideas about the origins and consequences of events, personal identification with historical and literary heroes.

The development of speech in primary school age is a complex and multifaceted process. This is, first of all, the improvement of oral speech: improving the purity of sound-pronunciation, getting rid of dialectisms, mastering complex grammatical structures, using participial phrases, passive voice, etc. The circle of communication and the scope of oral speech are expanding. The teacher's literate and rich speech serves as an example.

New, written, complex ones appear types of speech : reading and writing. These are the most important achievements of the student, based on the mechanisms of sound coding and grapheme decoding. These are forms of symbolic communication. They suggest a new level of perception, attention, memory, associations with existing knowledge. Only under these conditions will reading be the perception of the meaning of the text, and writing - the transmission of meaning.

The mastery of symbolic communication begins with the child's understanding of speech, with listening to stories and “reading” from memory texts in a favorite book or inscriptions in a familiar situation. By reading familiar names and names, the child himself can learn to read, which is quite common these days. Such itself learning served as the basis for the theory of internal spontaneous linguistic maturation, which supposedly "suddenly" brings literacy to the surface.

Scientific explanation Such facts are provided by the theory of LS Vygotsky about the "zone of proximal development" of the child in the course of interaction with literate people, about the meaning of the enriched environment. The components of such an environment are reading adults, books at the child's disposal, stories from adults and hearing children's stories, explanations of words, communication with friends, word games, interesting experiences and experiences of telling about them, playing them, and then describing them, encouraging interest in the written form of the word.

The main condition for the development of literacy is informative reading and informative writing. In joint reading of interesting books (a line is an adult, a line is a child), first graders are more likely to master reading than when they “work out” small texts to complete memorization. For the development of written speech, they are offered to compose and write down fairy tales, write letters to the teacher about events during the holidays, write about their friends, etc. Even if a part of the text is represented by a picture, the student perceives as the main thing - the meaning of the letter, and not the image of letters and words.

It should be noted that children who have mastered reading on their own very often remain deaf to grammar. Their attention is concentrated on the content of the text, they recognize words by their general appearance and do not notice the peculiarities of their writing. D. B. Elkonin in How to Teach Children to Read (1978) emphasizes the role sound analysis words, when chips are used instead of letters, a symbolic representation of the characteristics of sound. A vowel, soft consonant or hard consonant - each has its own color. Depicting a word with chips, the child analyzes the properties of sounds, comes up with words with a given sound or according to a given scheme. Such actions prepare him for mastering the rules of grammar and at the same time facilitate the development of reading skills.

According to numerous studies, the ability to read is the basis of academic performance; without it, the student does not master the educational material and does not even grasp the meaning of the mathematical problem. Therefore, the reading speed is taken under the control of the school leaders.

Oral speech elementary school students are enriched with phrases and phrases of written speech. Sometimes in the lesson they repeat verbatim phrases of the textbook, this gives their speech a certain unnaturalness, bookishness, but in this way they also learn the logic of reasoning.

The inner speech of schoolchildren achieves significant development, sincelearning activitiesrequires constant self-control. In inner speech, they outline the order, the inner plan of action. Self-report is given in inner speech and self-esteem ... And here, too, the influence of the teacher's speech, which determines the order of self-examination, is noticeable.

In general, educational activities significantly accelerate speech development children, improves all types of speech.

The development of thinking in primary school goes through two stages. At the first stage, visual-active thinking prevails in children, the analysis of material on the basis of visible, perceived features of objects. Educational activities follow the pattern. Generalizations are made on the basis of visual signs. Even in grammar, the preposition "on" is easier to distinguish if it denotes a specific ratio of objects - a book on a table. It is much more difficult for them to single out the same preposition in an abstract meaning - for memory, the other day.

The educational material on the subjects is presented in the 1-2nd grade so that important signs are clearly expressed. The composition of the number is represented in pairs by numbers in two windows of a multi-storey building or by two numbers of specific objects: 5 circles and 2 triangles, etc. The educational process is full of visual aids. But on their basis, verbal generalizations are already underway. More often this is a generalization based on functional or utilitarian signs: this is to drive, it is put on, etc. The main criterion of knowledge is the student's ability to come up with his own example.

This level of intelligence J. Piaget called the stage of specific operations.

Systematic educational work leads to a change in the thinking of children. The second stage in its development is distinguished by the assimilation of scientific concepts with their generic relationships and classification. The program of classes is full of requirements and tasks for finding relationships between phenomena or defining concepts with an indication of generic characteristics and species differences: "a noun is such a part of speech that ..." and then the species characteristics are listed.

The judgments of a younger student are based on visual signs of objects. But they are already assimilated on the basis of rational activity... So, examining the image of a grain field, children express an abstract judgment: "Winter crops are grain plants sown in the fall, before winter."

By the 3-4th grade, more and more judgments of schoolchildren reflect significant connections between phenomena, and visual elements are minimized. The stage of formal operations is being prepared (J. Piaget).

The above-mentioned features of thinking do not fully express the capabilities of younger schoolchildren. Experimental teaching organized by D. B. El-konin and V. V. Davydov in Russian schools, shows that already at the beginning of learning, children can explore ways of solving mental problems, build and test hypotheses, in an abstract schematic form build mathematical reasoning like: “If the first is equal to A, and the second is twice as large, then we can find what the second is , and then find their sum. "

Modeling actions play a special role in the development of schoolchildren's thinking, when it is required to reproduce the text of the story in short, draw up a presentation plan, briefly write down the condition of the problem or the formula for solving it, express the ratio in letters, signs or graphs.

The development of abstract thinking is already embedded in the very structure of educational activity. It presupposes the ability of the student to find a general way of acting in similar educational tasks, that is, the ability to present concrete-practical tasks as educational-theoretical.

The main psychological neoplasms that develop in the educational activity of younger schoolchildren are as follows.

Upon entering school, the child finds himself in conditions of rather strict control over the course and result of each cognitive process. The teacher and parents, on the basis of social experience, make adjustments to how he views, how he listens, how he remembered, etc. Constantly remind what to do. As a result, arbitrariness develops as a special quality of mental processes.

Completing educational assignments requires actions in a given order. The teacher's control develops self-control and self-report in children, the ability to fully substantiate the correctness of their answers. As a result, such valuable new formations of the intellect as an internal plan of action and internal self-report appear - reflection.

Foreign psychologists combine these new formations with the term "metacognition", understanding it as the current control exercised by a person over his own processes, goals and actions (G. Craig). Metacognition allows the student to determine whether he memorized the material well, how he got this or that result, etc. This is a necessary condition for the ability to learn.

Thus, under the conditions of school education, there is a systematic improvement of cognitive processes based on historical human experience under the control of the teacher, and then the student himself.

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The article discusses the problem of enhancing the cognitive activity of students technical universities taking into account age and psychological and pedagogical characteristics.

Keywords: student, age characteristics, cognitive activity, activation.

Student age is a developmental phenomenon high school... K. D. Ushinsky called this age "the most decisive", because it is this period, determining the future of a person, is a very active time of intensive work on oneself.

L. D. Stolyarenko characterizes students as a special social category, a specific community of people, organizationally united by the institute higher education... According to I.A. In winter, the student body includes people who purposefully, systematically acquire knowledge and professional skills, are distinguished by the highest educational level, the most active consumption of culture and a high level of cognitive motivation. B.G. Ananyev believes that the period of life from 17 to 25 years is important as the final stage of personality formation and as the main stage of professionalization. According to B.G. Ananyev, by the age of 17, the individual has created optimal subjective conditions for the formation of skills for self-educational activity.

A modern university student is, first of all, a young person who has every opportunity for further development. Being the most important intellectual potential of society, a first-year student is a yesterday's schoolboy who does not have the necessary experience and feels an urgent need to acquire it.

In this regard, it is very important that the teacher directs the activities of the freshman student to adapt to independent work... This implies the development of cognitive activity. It is necessary to make it clear to the student that he conducts this activity in order to master knowledge, skills and abilities, and not only in order to successfully pass the exams.

Student years

General age characteristics are inherent in the student: biological (type of higher nervous activity, unconditioned reflexes, instincts, physical strength, etc.); psychological (the unity of psychological processes, states and properties); social (social relations, qualities, belonging to a particular social group, etc.). At the same time, when studying a specific student, it is necessary to take into account the individual characteristics of each, the peculiarities of his mental processes and states.

It is important for us to know the peculiarities of the transition, development from adolescence to adolescence. At this age, people try to find their place in society, strive to understand themselves, to be more critical not only of themselves, but also of others. These features are distinguished by both domestic and foreign researchers - A.G. Asmolov, L.S. Vygotsky, A.N. Leontiev, D.I. Feldstein and others.

Student years - a kind of stage life path... The basis is quite understandable - training in accordance with the goal, objectives, and most importantly - motivation due to obtaining a specialty in a given university.

It is especially difficult for first-year students. The time interval between graduation from school and the beginning of study at a university is very short, and it is during this period that it is necessary to significantly adjust the previously set goals, deeply rethink their habits and behavior, as a result of which new qualities appear that contribute to the implementation of new social roles, the manifestation of such personal qualities as independence, curiosity, initiative. The student faces difficulties associated with the fact that he has to get used to everything new - fellow students, teachers of specialized subjects, various forms of accountability and significance in the eyes of others.

There is a complex dynamic relationship between learning and development that changes with age. L.S. Vygotsky proved that developmental processes do not coincide with learning processes, but follow them. He identified a "zone" of proximal development, outlined by a circle of tasks that at a certain stage of development a student is able to solve under the guidance of a teacher, and not independently. But over time, as the development of cognitive abilities, these tasks will be performed by him completely independently.

Researchers identify the so-called sensitive periods human ontogenesis. During these periods, a particularly intensive development of abilities can occur, outstripping general development personality. This is an important condition for the development of abilities.

B.G. Ananyeva and a group of scientists prove that the nature of the psychophysical development of human maturity is heterogeneous and contradictory, is complex structure various processes. The most profound social and psychophysiological shifts occur on the lines between the termination of maturation and the stabilization of mature, formed structures of human behavior and intelligence.

Moments of social adaptation

The components of this structure are: an increase in the functional level of various mechanisms of activity, the stabilization of these levels and their lowering. B.G. As a result of the experiment, Ananiev compared the moments that form the structure of the development of psychophysiological functions of a person, identified the years of life in which there are moments of increase, stabilization and decrease in the functional level (Table 1).

Table 1

Moments of development and their relationship in different microperiods of maturity

Microperiods, Years	Enhancement functional level,%	Stabilization,%	Downgrade functional level,%

Analysis of the data in the table shows that the age from 18 to 22 years (the age that interests us the most) accounts for the largest percentage of the functional level (46.8%), i.e. the biggest spike in cognition.

For student age, indicators are characteristic: sustained attention, developed imagination, greater memory integration. During this period, the formation of personality, style of behavior is intensively going on. It is no secret that most students set themselves “big” tasks. In this regard, the problem of self-education and self-education comes to the fore. Therefore, when organizing any student's activity, it is necessary to take into account his psychology, which changes with each new course.

In student age, important transformations of interpersonal relations take place. They are characterized by a tendency towards more personal and meaningful interactions, high reflectivity, become a source of emotional experiences. At this age, the need for understanding and empathy, sympathy, and the establishment of trusting relationships increases. Communication with peers is of particular importance and becomes one of the leading factors in personal development.

V.S. Ilyin and V.A. Nikitin define that the effectiveness of educational processes and the restoration of moral and mental health depend on how quickly the student adapts to the new conditions of existence. In educational activities, adaptation is associated with mastering the methods of cognition, orientation in cognitive values. A change in the usual environment can be aggravated by dissatisfaction with the results of studies, interpersonal relationships, the loss of the usual status in the group, anxiety in choosing a future profession. This leads to stress and nervous exhaustion, fatigue and the so-called maladjustment... Disadaptation can manifest itself in a change in the system of internal regulation, serious deviations in the psyche, self-destructive behavior, aggression.

For some students, the development of a new behavioral stereotype is abrupt, while for others it is more or less even. Undoubtedly, the features of this restructuring are associated with the characteristics of the type of higher nervous activity. However, social factors are critical here. Knowledge of the individual characteristics of the student, on the basis of which the system of his inclusion in new types of activity and in new circle communication, makes it possible to avoid maladjustment syndrome, to make the adaptation process smooth and psychologically comfortable.

Social adaptation at the university is divided into:

professional adaptation, which means adaptation to the nature, content, conditions and organization of the educational process, the development of skills of independence in educational work;

socio-psychological adaptation - adaptation of the individual to the group, building relationships with it, developing their own style of behavior.

Many freshmen at the beginning of their studies experience great difficulties associated with the lack of skills in independent study. They do not know how to take notes of lectures, work with textbooks, gain knowledge from primary sources, analyze large amounts of information, clearly and clearly express their thoughts.

The adaptation of students to the educational process usually ends somewhere at the end of the 2nd - beginning of the 3rd semesters.

Types and groups of students

Many researchers in the field of psychology and pedagogy have revealed the fact that some students work hard and willingly to master new knowledge. The difficulties that arise in this case only add energy and desire to achieve their goal. Others, however, do everything "out of hand", and obstacles sharply reduce their activity.

Educators and psychologists explain this individual psychological characteristics of students. These features include intelligence (the ability to assimilate new knowledge), creativity (the ability to independently develop new knowledge), high self-esteem, etc.

By the nature of educational activity and the corresponding models of behavior, three types of students are distinguished.

Have first type cognitive interests go beyond the knowledge outlined by the curriculum and discipline programs. Students are active in all spheres of university life and are focused on broad specialization and diversified professional training.

For students classified in the second type, is characterized by a clear focus on narrow specialization. Here, too, cognitive activity goes beyond the curriculum, but rather not in breadth, but in depth. The entire system of activity is limited by the framework of “near-professional interests”.

Finally, students third type cognitive activity is strictly aimed at mastering knowledge and skills only within the framework curriculum... This type demonstrates the minimum level of activity and creativity.

They come to the university different people with different settings and different "starting conditions". In this respect, interesting analysis of student youth in connection with their chosen profession... The totality of students is rather clearly divided into three groups.

First group are students focused on education as a profession. In this group, the largest number of students, for whom the interest in future work, the desire to realize themselves in it is the most important thing. Only they have a tendency to continue their education. All other factors are less significant for them. Second group are business-oriented students. Their attitude to education is completely different: education acts as a tool (or a possible starting stage) in order to further try to create their own business, engage in trade, etc. professions are less interested than representatives of the first group. Third group- students, who, on the one hand, can be called "undecided", and on the other hand, crushed by various personal, everyday problems. Domestic, personal, housing, family problems come to the fore. One could say that this is a group of those who "go with the flow." They cannot choose their own path, for them education and profession do not represent the interest that characterizes other groups. Perhaps the self-determination of the students of this group will occur later, but so far it can be assumed that this group includes people for whom the process of self-determination, choice of a path, and purposefulness is not typical.

Choosing a path

The process of choosing a profession, studying at a university has become today for many a pragmatic, purposeful, and relevant change in the modern world. The value of education as a social phenomenon has receded into the background. With the advent of "commercial" recruitment, wealthy students came to the university, who were not accustomed to deny themselves anything, confident in the correctness of their choice, well aware of the specifics of the future. professional activity... These students, inspired by the example of parents (usually entrepreneurs), look into the future without fear: for them it is a clearly traced perspective. At the same time, in general, the behavior of students is characterized by a high degree of conformism.

In the course of studying at the university, different courses solve different problems. On first year there are tasks of familiarizing the former applicant with student forms of collective life: the freshman does not have a differentiated approach to his roles. Second course- this is the period of the most intense educational activity of students. All forms of education are intensively included in the life of sophomores. Students receive general training, their wide cultural needs and needs are formed. The process of adapting to this environment is largely complete. Third course- the beginning of specialization, strengthening of interest in scientific work as a reflection of the further development and deepening of the professional interests of students. The urgent need for specialization (the forms of formation of a personality in a higher educational institution are mainly determined by the factor of specialization) often leads to a narrowing of the sphere of versatile interests of the individual. Fourth year in college- the prospect of an early graduation from the university - forms clear practical guidelines for the future type of activity. New, increasingly relevant values ​​associated with material and marital status, place of work, etc. Students are gradually moving away from the collective forms of life of the university.

For the student's cognitive activity, the aesthetic aspect is of great importance, which gives this activity a certain focus, contributes to the development of interests. Cognitive activity, curiosity and aesthetic education are inextricably linked with each other. The aesthetic content of cognitive activity weakens somewhat under the pressure of various social structures and interests.

The effectiveness of cognitive activity can be ensured through certain pedagogical conditions, by which we mean an interconnected set of measures in educational process providing students with readiness for creative interaction with information.

Specificity of technical colleges

Due to the originality of goals, objectives, content, forms and methods of the learning process, as well as due to the age and psychological characteristics of students, a technical university has its own specifics.

Socio-economic conditions require from graduates of technical universities such qualities as enterprise, sociability, readiness to adapt to new working conditions. A production specialist has to deal with an abundant flow of information, which he needs to correctly accept, process and convey, which is impossible without the presence of personal communicative reserves.

A number of researchers note that technical university students the development of non-verbal intelligence is inherent, the structure of which includes the ability for constructive activity, more developed spatial representations, formal logical thinking, a combination of synthetic and analytical thinking (L.A. Baranova, L.N.Borisova, V.N.Druzhinin, L. N. Sobchik). Revealed a high level of concentration, switching attention, visual memory, high speed and accuracy of the course of mental operations. Among students of technical universities, researchers note an increase in personality introversion in the learning process, the dominance of cognition motivation, a desire for independence, a lack of desire for dominance, consciousness, responsibility, a low level of emotionality when communicating with fellow students, a critical attitude towards the environment.

For a student of a technical college, an important stage in professional development is the development of mental abilities: theoretical thinking, the ability to abstract, make generalizations are significantly developed. There are qualitative changes in cognitive capabilities, the following become characteristic:

non-standard approach to already known problems;

the ability to include particular problems in more general problems;

the ability to pose fruitful general questions even on the basis of poorly formulated tasks.

However, as evidenced by the works of Z.I. Kalmykova, N.S. Leites, B.M. Teplova, etc., without special complex influences, cognitive activity does not develop into adequate activity, learning ability, thinking productivity, and the level of students' aspirations decrease. Underdevelopment of cognitive activity is, of course, compensated to some extent. Based on the results of numerous studies, such compensation, first of all, inhibits the development of the student's personality, which, in turn, entails a decrease in cognitive activity or its one-sided development.

Conclusion

It seems to us that cognitive activity includes a wide range of tasks. It can be an integral part of various types of both educational and extracurricular activities of students, contributing to the deepening and expansion of the sphere of knowledge of students in their chosen specialty. We proceed mainly from the need to form the student's creative personality traits, needs and opportunities to go beyond the studied material, the ability for self-development and continuous self-education.

In general, cognitive activity, acting as the most important factor in the development of students, is characterized by the need to expand the general horizons, increase the intellectual level.

Thus, only taking into account the age characteristics of students, we can effectively develop their cognitive activity. The latter is one of the leading mechanisms ensuring a high level of student independence and responsibility in the future.

7. Pavlova L.N. The content and organization of self-educational activities on the formation of the subjective activity of students: Author's abstract. dis .... Candidate of Pedagogical Sciences. - Krasnoyarsk, 2000 .-- S. 19.

8. Kalmykova Z.I. Psychological principles of developing education - M .: Knowledge, 1979. - P. 48.

9. Leites N.S. Age endowments of schoolchildren: a textbook for pedagogical students educational institutions... - M .: Academy, 2000 .-- S. 318.

10. Teplov BM Practical thinking: a reader on the general psychology of thinking. - M .: Pedagogy, 1981 .-- S. 177.

Learning as an activity takes place where a person's actions are governed by the conscious goal of assimilating certain knowledge, skills, and abilities. Teaching is a specifically human activity, and it is possible only at that stage of development of the human psyche when he is able to regulate his actions with a conscious goal. The teaching makes requirements for cognitive processes (memory, intelligence, imagination, flexibility of the mind) and volitional qualities (control of attention, regulation of feelings, etc.).

The founder of the activity theory of learning is L. S. Vygotsky, who introduced fundamental changes in the theoretical concepts of the learning process. He considered teaching as a specific activity in which the formation of mental new formations takes place through the appropriation of cultural and historical experience. The sources of development, therefore, are not in the child himself, but in his learning activity, aimed at mastering the methods of acquiring knowledge.

The initial concepts of this theory are:

• - training as a system of organizing teaching methods, i.e. transferring socio-historical experience to an individual, the purpose of this activity is the planned purposeful mental development of the individual;
• - teaching, or educational activity, - social activity, in terms of content and functions, representing a special type of cognitive activity of the subject, performed with the aim of mastering a certain composition of knowledge, skills, intellectual skills;
• - assimilation is the main link in the learning process, the process of reproduction by an individual of historically formed generic abilities.

The starting point in teaching is the need-motivational aspect. Cognitive need is a prerequisite for the activity of learning, on the other hand - its result (formed motive). In this case, learning activity is considered from the point of view of the formation of cognitive motivation. The learning process in the context of its correct organization can become a condition for changing the structure of the motivational-need sphere of the individual.

The second aspect that characterizes educational activity is related to the consideration of its constituent structural components.

Each type of activity determines it item. It seems that the subject of educational activity is a generalized experience of knowledge, differentiated into separate sciences. The paradox of educational activity is that, while assimilating the knowledge itself, a person does not change anything in it. The subject of changes in educational activity is the subject itself, carrying out this activity. Samos is the main thing in educational process- this is a turn on oneself, an assessment of one's own changes.

In educational activity, its subject, means, methods, product, result, actions, structure are distinguished (generalized characteristics are presented in Table 7.1).

table 7.1

Study subject activities	Assimilation of knowledge, mastery of generalized methods of action, development of techniques and methods of action, their programs, algorithms, in the process of which the student himself develops
Means of educational activities	1 - intellectual mental actions (analysis, synthesis, generalization, classification, etc.); 2 - linguistic sign means, in the form of which knowledge is acquired; 3 - background background knowledge
Methods of learning activities	1 - reproductive; 2 - problem-creative; 3 - research and cognitive actions; 4 - the transition from external, objective actions to internal, mental actions
Learning product	1 - structured knowledge; 2 - the ability to solve scientific and professional problems; 3 - internal neoplasms: the formation of theoretical thinking; 4 - the accumulation of individual experience through the assimilation of the socio-historical experience of mankind
The result of educational activities	1 - the need to continue learning, interest, satisfaction with studies, or 2 - unwillingness to learn, negative attitude towards school
External structure of educational activities	1 - educational motivation; 2 - educational situation; 3 - educational task; 4 - solving the problem through educational activities; 5 - teacher control; 6 - teacher rating
Learning tasks	1 - goal, task requirements; 2 - the initial conditions of the object of the problem: relations between objects; 3 - model of the required state of the object of the task; 4 - task operator (a set of actions that must be performed on the condition of the task in order to complete its solution)

The main characteristics of educational activities:

• 1) specially aimed at mastering educational material and solving educational problems ;
• 2) it masters general modes of action and scientific concepts ;
• Y) general methods of action precede the solution of problems, there is an ascent from the general to the particular ;
• 4) learning activity leads to changes in the person himself - the student ;
• 5) there are changes in the mental properties and behavior of the student "depending on the results of their own actions."

The original concept of educational activity was proposed by V.V.Davydov. In the process of mastering educational activity, a person reproduces not only knowledge and skills, but also the very ability to learn, which arose at a certain stage in the development of society. With regard to exercise activities, its product is a change in the person himself. He changes himself, acquiring new knowledge. These are the products of his activity: new cognitive opportunities, new practical actions.

The activity of teaching is self-change, self-development of man. The psychological content, the subject of educational activity is the assimilation of knowledge, the mastery of generalized methods of action, in the process of which the student himself develops.

According to D. B. Elkonin, learning activity is not the same as assimilation. It is its main element.

Learning activities arepublic character : by content, since it is aimed at assimilating all the riches of culture and spiders, accumulated by mankind] in the sense of because it is socially significant and appreciated; in shape, since it corresponds to socially developed norms of communication and takes place in special public institutions, for example, in schools, gymnasiums, colleges, institutes.

Teaching is aimed at satisfying cognitive needs. It is only actually an activity when it satisfies a cognitive need. Knowledge, to master which the teaching is directed, in this case are as a motive, in which the cognitive need of the student has found its substantive embodiment, and at the same time act as the goal of teaching.

If the student does not have a cognitive need, then he will either not learn, or will learn for the sake of satisfying some other need. In the latter case, learning is no longer an activity, since the mastery of knowledge in itself does not lead to the satisfaction of the subject's needs, but serves only as an intermediate goal. Teaching becomes an action that realizes another activity.

So, the teaching can be different psychological meaning for a student: a) respond to a cognitive need, which acts as a motive for learning, i.e. as an "engine" of his educational activity;

b) serve as a means to achieve other goals. In this case, this other goal is the motive for performing the learning activity.

Outwardly, the activities of all students are similar; internally, psychologically, it is very different. This difference is primarily determined by the motives of the activity. It is they who determine for a person the meaning of the activity he performs. The nature of educational motives is a decisive link when it comes to ways to improve the effectiveness of educational activities. There are the following types of motives.

• 1. The motives inherent in the educational activity itself, associated with its direct product:
  • a) motives associated with the content of teaching (learning is encouraged by the desire to learn new facts, to master knowledge, methods of action, to penetrate the essence of phenomena);
  • b) motives associated with the learning process (learning is prompted by the desire to manifest intellectual activity, the need to think, reason in the lesson, to overcome obstacles in the process of solving difficult problems).
• 2. Motives associated with the indirect product of learning, with what lies outside the learning activity itself:
  • a) broad social motives:
    • - motives of duty and responsibility to society, class, teacher, etc.,
    • - motives of self-determination (understanding the meaning of knowledge for the future, the desire to prepare for future work, etc.) and self-improvement (to be developed as a result of learning);
  • b) narrow-minded motives:
    • - motives of well-being (the desire to get approval from teachers, parents, classmates, the desire to get good grades),
    • - prestigious motives (desire to be among the first students, to be the best, to take a worthy place among comrades);
  • c) negative motives (avoiding troubles that may arise from teachers, parents, classmates if the student does not study well).

The nature of educational motivation may differ at different ages: for example, the main motive for educational activity in the conditions of traditional education is the mark for younger schoolchildren (65.8%). The development of teaching motives goes in two ways:

• 1) through the assimilation of the social meaning of the teaching by students;
• 2) through the very educational activity of the student, which should interest him in something.

Studies have shown that the cognitive interests of schoolchildren significantly depend on the methods of disclosing the subject. As VF Morgun's research has shown, both its content and the method of working with it can motivate a positive attitude towards the study of a given subject. So, if the educational activity acquires a creative character for the student, then it arouses his interest in the study of this subject. Great importance to increase interest in the subject under study, the group cohesion of students working in small groups has. In groups where there was no cohesion, the attitude towards the subject deteriorated sharply. On the contrary, in close-knit groups, interest in the subject under study has increased significantly.

In the study of M.V. Matyukhina, it was found that educational and cognitive motivation can also be successfully formed using the relationship between the motive and the goal of the activity.

The goal set by the teacher should be the goal of the student. The best way to move is from motive to goal, i.e. when the student already has a motive that prompts him to strive for the goal set by the teacher. Unfortunately, such situations are rare in teaching practice. As a rule, the movement goes from the goal set by the teacher to the motive. In this case, the teacher's efforts are aimed at ensuring that the goal set by him is accepted by the students, i.e. motivationally provided. Here it is important, first of all, to use the goal itself as a source of motivation, to turn it into a motive-goal.

One of the most effective means of promoting cognitive motivation is and the problem of learning. At each stage, it is necessary to use problem situations, tasks. If the teacher does this, then usually the motivation of the students is at a fairly high level.

The psychological form of successful learning can be characterized by the conditional formula:

where M is motivation; 1 P - reception (or search) of information; 2 P - understand the information; 3 P - remember; 4 P - apply information; С - systematicness of classes.

In educational activity, not only cognitive functions (perception, attention, memory, thinking, imagination) are combined, but also needs, motives, emotions, and will.

Motivation is the motivating forces that move the student towards the goal of learning. Objects of the external world, representations, ideas, feelings and experiences, in a word, everything in which the need has found embodiment (L.I.Bozhovich) can act as motives.

The concept of motivation includes all types of motives: motives, needs, interests, aspirations, goals, drives, ideals, etc., which directly determine human activity(E. V. Shorokhova). In the structure of motivation, four components can be distinguished: pleasure from the activity itself; the significance for the individual of the direct result of the activity; the motivating power of reward for activities; coercive pressure on the person (B.I.Dodonov).

Motives can be external and internal. External motives include punishment and reward, threat and demand, material gain, group pressure, expectation of future benefits, etc. They are all external to the immediate goal of the teaching. Knowledge and skills in these cases serve only as a means to achieve other basic goals (avoiding the unpleasant, achieving social or personal success, profit, career, satisfaction of ambition). The goal itself - learning - in such situations can be indifferent or even repulsive, and learning is often forced.

Internal motives include those that encourage a person to learn as their goal (interest in knowledge itself, curiosity, the desire to improve the cultural and professional level, the need for active and new information).

The development of cognitive interest goes through three main stages: situational cognitive interest arising in conditions of novelty, uncertainty, etc .; persistent interest in a certain subject content of the activity; the inclusion of cognitive interests in the general orientation of the individual, in the system of her life goals and plans. As a very effective means of enhancing the cognitive activity of students, one should especially note the novelty of teaching methods, the involvement of students in its experimental form.

The emergence and development of cognitive motivation is largely due to the type of interaction and communication between the teacher and students, as well as students among themselves.

The development of cognitive motivation of students depends on teaching excellence teacher, his ability to properly organize the activities of students, to encourage them to develop cognitive motivation.

Regardless of whether the teaching is aimed at satisfying what need (specific to it or not), it is always realized by an action or a chain of actions.

The means of educational activity, with the help of which it is carried out, are: intellectual actions, mental operations (analysis, synthesis, generalization, classification, etc.); sign language means, in the form of which knowledge is acquired.

The methods of educational activity can be varied: reproductive, problem-creative, research-cognitive actions (V.V.Davydov).

In educational activity, in contrast to research activity, a person begins not with a consideration of the sensually concrete diversity of reality, but with the universal inner basis of this diversity already identified by others (researchers). Thus, in educational activity there is an ascent from the abstract to the concrete, from the general to the particular.

The main product of educational activity in the proper sense of the word is the formation of a student's theoretical consciousness and thinking. The nature of all knowledge acquired in the course of further education depends on the formed theoretical thinking, which replaces empirical thinking.

The learning activity has an external structure, consisting of the following elements:

• 1) motivation;
• 2) educational tasks in certain situations in various forms of assignments;
• 3) educational activities;
• 4) control turning into self-control;
• 5) assessment, turning into self-assessment.

Educational task acts as a specific educational task with a clear goal, but in order to achieve this goal, it is necessary to take into account the conditions in which the action must be carried out. According to A. N. Leont'ev, a task is a goal given under certain conditions. As the learning tasks are completed, the student himself changes. Learning activity can be presented as a system of learning tasks that are given in certain learning situations and involve certain learning actions.

An educational task acts as a complex system of information about an object, a process in which only part of the information is clearly defined, and the rest is unknown, which must be found using the existing knowledge and solution algorithms in combination with independent guesses and the search for optimal solutions.

E. I. Mashbits formulated the basic requirements for the design of educational tasks:

• - educational tasks should ensure the assimilation of the system of means necessary and sufficient for the successful implementation of educational activities;
• - the educational task should be designed so that the corresponding means of activity, the assimilation of which is assumed in the process of solving problems, act as a direct product of students' actions, a direct product of training.

The learning task is given in a specific learning situation. The educational situation can be conflicting (interpersonal conflict situation interferes with learning) and collaborative, and in terms of content - problematic or neutral. The problem situation is asked to the student in the form of questions: "Why?", "How?", "What is the reason, the connection of these phenomena?"

The problem arises here as a consequence of a problem situation as a result of its analysis, but if the student does not accept, does not understand, is not interested in the problem situation, it cannot develop into a task. Its solution, the implementation of educational activities is possible only on the basis of the implementation of educational actions and operations.

Learning activity as a whole includes a number of specific actions and operations at different levels. I.I.Ilyasov refers to the executive educational actions of the first level:

• a) the actions of understanding the content of the educational material;
• b) actions of processing educational material.

In addition to executive actions to clarify and process the material, in parallel with them, control actions take place, the nature and composition of which depend on the same conditions as the composition of the executive actions (source and form of obtaining educational information). Along with the thinkers in training activities perceptual and mnemonic actions and operations, reproductive (performing, template) and productive (aimed at creating a new) actions are realized.

Thus, the set of actions and operations that a student performs in the course of educational activities includes:

• 1) general actions (logical techniques and psychological skills) and specific (objective) actions;
• 2) actions of goal setting;
• 3) programming actions;
• 4) planning actions;
• 5) executive actions: verbal; material, practical; "Mental and logical"; "Perceptual"; "Mnemonic"; "Reproductive"; "Productive"; "Transforming"; "Research"; research and reproduction;
• 6) control actions (self-control);
• 7) actions of assessment (self-assessment).

Static and dynamic models of educational activity are presented in Fig. 7.2.

Rice. 7.2.

The effectiveness and efficiency of educational activities also depends on the individual psychological characteristics, abilities, and the level of learning of the student.

A person's learnability is one of the main indicators of his readiness to learn, to assimilate knowledge, spontaneously or purposefully, in the context of any particular educational system.

Learning is psychophysiologically related to this property nervous system as dynamism, i.e. the rate of formation of a temporary connection (V.D. Nebylitsyn). Learning in the broad sense of this word can be interpreted as a potential opportunity for mastering new knowledge in a friendly “work with adults” (B.V. Zeigarnik), as a “zone of proximal development” (L. S. Vygotsky). The concept of "special" learning is highlighted as the preparedness of the psyche for its rapid development in a certain direction, to a specific area of ​​knowledge, skills.

One of the leading Russian researchers of the problem of learning, Z. I. Kalmykova, understands learning as“The totality (ensemble) of the intellectual properties of a person, on which, in the presence and relative equality of other necessary conditions (the initial minimum of knowledge, a positive attitude to learning, etc.), the productivity of educational activity depends”. V this definition learning is related to productivity.

Productivity is primarily about quality, rate of work its volume per unit of time, lack of tension and fatigue for a long period, satisfaction with the result of work. The productivity of educational activity can be characterized by these parameters in relation to the knowledge being mastered and the formed generalized methods of action.

According to A.K. Markova, learnability is"The student's susceptibility to the assimilation of new knowledge, his readiness to move to new levels of mental development."

The main indicators of learning are: pace advancement in the development of knowledge and the formation of skills, ease this development (lack of tension, fatigue, experience of satisfaction from mastering knowledge), flexibility in switching to new ways and techniques of work, strength preservation of the mastered material. Individual differences of trainees in educational activities according to G. Klaus (Table 7.2).

Table 7.2

The end of the table. 7.2

Parameter comparisons	Positive type	Negative type
Motivation	Willingly, voluntarily, on their own motivation, actively, inclusively, enthusiastically, diligently, diligently, with all their might	Reluctantly, out of duty, under pressure, passive, sluggish, indifferent, careless, lazy
Regulation action	Performs independently, autonomously, independently, systematically, purposefully, persistently, constantly	Performs spontaneously, imitating, aimlessly, haphazardly, without a plan, periodically, unstable
Cognitive organization	Consciously, with understanding, directed, anticipating the consequences, rationally, economically	Mechanically, without understanding, by trial and error, accidentally, unintentionally, irrational, ineffective
Overall score

The total indicator of learning ability, according to 3. I. Kalmykova, is the economy and the pace of thinking; the amount of specific material on the basis of which the solution of a new problem is achieved, the number of "steps" for its independent solution and a portion of dosed help, on the basis of which the result was achieved, as well as the time spent on the solution; ability to self-study; performance and endurance. Significant indicators of learning, proposed by A.K. Markova, which are:

• - orientation activity in new conditions;
• - initiative in choosing optional decisions, independent recourse to more difficult tasks can be correlated with the concept of intellectual initiative as a unit of creative activity (according to D. B. Bogoyavlenskaya);
• - persistence in achieving the set goal and "noise immunity" as the ability to work in situations of interference, distraction, obstacles;
• - receptivity, willingness to help another person, lack of resistance.

The learning ability of the subject of educational activity is manifested in its characteristics and character, influencing the style of this activity. Developed individual styles can be schematically represented by two poles: "positive" - ​​"negative". The table below illustrates the content of learning activities that reflect these styles, which are largely based on their underlying learnability.

Learning ability is a dynamic characteristic, in different age periods the learning ability of one and the same person can change: increase or decrease. Nevertheless, groups of students with varying degrees of learning are clearly distinguished: from high to medium, to underestimated and low.

Cognitive processes (perception, memory, thinking, imagination) are included as an integral part of any human activity and provide one or another of its effectiveness. Cognitive processes allow a person to outline goals, plans and content of upcoming activities in advance, to replay in his mind the course of this activity, his actions and behavior, to anticipate the results of his actions and manage them as they are performed.

When talking about general abilities person, they also mean the level of development and characteristics his cognitive processes, because the better these processes are developed in a person, the more capable he is, the more opportunities he possesses. The ease and efficiency of his teaching depends on the level of development of the student's cognitive processes.

A person is born with sufficiently developed inclinations for cognitive activity, however, the newborn carries out cognitive processes at first unconsciously, instinctively. He has yet to develop his cognitive abilities, learn how to manage them. Therefore, the level of development of a person's cognitive abilities depends not only on the inclinations received at birth (although they play a significant role in the development of cognitive processes), but to a greater extent on the nature of the child's upbringing in the family, at school, on his own activity on the self-development of his intellectual abilities.

Cognitive processes are carried out in the form of separate cognitive actions, each of which is an integral mental act, consisting inseparably of all types of mental processes. But one of them is usually the main, leading, determining the nature of this cognitive action. Only in this sense can we consider separately such mental processes as perception, memory, thinking, imagination.

Carried out in various types of activity, mental processes in it are also formed.

Improving the child's sensory perception is associated, Firstly, with the ability to better use their sensory apparatuses as a result of their exercise; secondly, the ability to interpret sensory data more and more meaningfully, which is associated with the general mental development of the child, plays an essential role.

In a preschooler, the process of assimilation is involuntary, he remembers, since the material itself settles in him. Imprinting is not a goal, but an involuntary product of the child's activity: he repeats an action that attracts him or requires repeating a story that interests him, not in order to remember it, but because it is interesting to him, and as a result he remembers. Memorization is built mainly on the basis of play as the main type of activity.

The main transformation in the functional development of memory that characterizes the first school age is the transformation of imprinting into a consciously directed learning process. At school age, memorization is rebuilt on the basis of learning. Learning begins to proceed from certain tasks and goals, it becomes a volitional process. Its organization also becomes different, planned: the dismemberment of the material and its repetition are deliberately applied. The next essential point is the further restructuring of memory on the basis of abstract thinking developing in the child. The essence of the restructuring of memory in a schoolchild lies not so much in the restructuring of the semantic memory itself, which acquires a more mediated and logical character.

Children's imagination is also first manifested and formed in play, as well as sculpting, drawing, singing, etc., the actually creative and even combinatory moments in the imagination are not so significant at first, they develop in the process of the child's general mental development. The first line in the development of imagination is increasing freedom in relation to perception. The second, even more significant, comes in later years. It consists in the fact that imagination moves from subjective forms of fantasizing to objectifying forms of creative imagination, embodied in the objective products of creativity.

Thought processes are primarily performed as subordinate components of any "practical" external activity, and only then thinking is singled out as a special, relatively independent "theoretical" in later years, and the growing cops in the imagination are not so significant at first, they develop more through the means of activity.

In the first period of systematic schooling, mastering the first foundations of the knowledge system, the child enters the field of abstraction. He penetrates into it and overcomes the difficulties of generalization, moving simultaneously from two sides - from the general to the particular, and from the particular to the general. In the process of teaching the system of theoretical knowledge, the child at this highest stage of development learns to “explore the nature of the concepts themselves”, revealing their more and more abstract properties through their interrelationships; empirical in its content, rational in form, thinking passes into theoretical thinking in abstract concepts.

For any education, children who graduate from primary school differ significantly from those who entered the first grade. The requirements of educational activity inevitably lead students to the formation of arbitrariness as a characteristic of all mental processes. Arbitrariness is formed as a result of the fact that the child daily does what his position as a student requires: he listens to explanations, solves problems, etc. Gradually, he learns to do what he needs, and not what he would like. Thus, students learn to manage their behavior (to one degree or another), overcome difficulties, move towards a set goal, and look for the best ways to achieve it.

The second important neoplasm is reflection. The teacher requires the child not only to solve the problem, but also to justify its correctness. This gradually forms the child's ability to be aware, to be aware of what he is doing, what he has done. Moreover, to assess whether he did the right thing and why he believes that it is 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. A person's ability to be aware of what he is doing and to argue, to justify his activities is called reflection.

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

So, the mental activity of a student who graduated from primary school should be characterized by three new formations: arbitrariness, reflection, and an internal plan of action.

The neoplasms with which the child came to school developed in the process 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 new formations, in turn, prepared students for the transition to the next stage of education, to secondary school.

The development of these features of the psyche of schoolchildren is inextricably linked with their mastery different kinds cognitive activity. For example, upon entering school, children are unable to analyze various properties 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 sample of the movement of the gaze on the perceived object using a pointer. Then the child learns to draw up a diagram, a verbal plan of observation, based on his goal. Thus, an arbitrary, purposeful observation is formed - one of the important types of cognitive activity.

The activity associated with memorizing and reproducing what is left in memory also changes significantly. First-graders easily remember the bright, emotionally impressive. They tend to memorize literally. But learning constantly requires a new type of memorization, where at the beginning there is an analysis of the memorized, highlighting the main thing, grouping the material, etc. The techniques of voluntary, 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 turns out to be decisive for memorization: the material is memorized as if by itself. The gradual formation of an internal action plan leads to significant changes in all intellectual processes. At first, children tend to make generalizations based on external, as a rule, insignificant signs. But in the learning process, the teacher fixes their attention on connections, relationships, on what is not directly perceived, therefore, students move to a higher level of generalization, 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 of intellectualization. Students use mental actions to solve 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 processes to a new stage and the associated restructuring of all other processes is the main content of mental development in primary school age. "

Educational activity becomes the leading activity in primary school age. It determines the most important changes in the development of the psyche of children at a given age stage. Within the framework of educational activity, psychological neoplasms are formed that characterize the most significant achievements in the development of primary schoolchildren and are the foundation that ensures development at the next age stage. Gradually, the motivation for learning activity, so strong in the first grade, begins to decline. This is due to a drop in interest in learning and the fact that the child already has a conquered social position, he has nothing to achieve. In order to prevent this from happening, learning activity must be given a new, personally meaningful motivation. The leading role of educational activity in the development of a child does not exclude the fact that the younger student is actively involved in other types of activity, in the course of which his new achievements are improved and consolidated.

According to L.S. Vygotsky, with the beginning of school education, thinking moves to the center of the child's conscious activity. The development of verbal - logical, reasoning thinking, which occurs in the course of assimilating scientific knowledge, also rearranges all other cognitive processes: "memory at this age becomes thinking, and perception becomes thinking."

According to O.Yu. Ermolaev, during primary school age, significant changes take place in the development of attention, there is an intensive development of all its properties: the volume of attention increases especially sharply (2.1 times), its stability increases, skills of switching and distribution develop. By the age of 9-10, children become able to maintain attention for a long time and carry out an arbitrarily set program of actions.

At primary school age, memory, like all other mental processes, undergoes significant changes. Their essence lies in the fact that the child's memory gradually acquires the features of arbitrariness, becoming consciously regulated and mediated.

Younger school age is sensitive for becoming higher forms voluntary memorization, therefore, purposeful developmental work on mastering mnemonic activity is the most effective during this period. V.D. Shadrikov and L.V. Cheremoshkin identified 13 mnemonic techniques, or methods of organizing the memorization of material: grouping, highlighting support points, drawing up a plan, classification, structuring, schematization, establishing analogies, mnemonic techniques, recoding, completing the memorized material, serial organization, associations, repetition.

Thus, primary school age is the age of intensive intellectual development. Intellect mediates the development of all other functions, there is an intellectualization of all mental processes, their awareness and arbitrariness. According to L.S. Vygotsky, we are dealing with the development of an intellect that does not know itself.

So, the main psychological neoplasms of primary school age are:

1. Arbitrariness and awareness of all mental processes and their intellectualization, their internal mediation, which occurs due to the development of a system of concepts (all except the intellect; the intellect does not yet know itself);

2. Awareness of their own changes as a result of the development of educational activities.

All these achievements indicate the child's transition to the next age period that ends childhood.

Thus, the period of initial education is one of the most important periods of personality formation.