2011, 4
The grounds for tolerance towards the disabled must be formed at the very early stages of personality development – in preschool childhood, when a child is being acquainted to the outside world and learns primary social skills.
Kindergarten plays the major role in acquiring tolerance because it is the teaching process that creates situations of cultural, interpersonal, formal and informal communication. The problem in the view is of urgent importance in small towns, where integrated education is absent. That is why the solution could be enactment of communication with the disabled that involves live-through experience and comprehension of cultural value of non-violence, empathy and mutual respect. The article describes the original program “The World is one for everyone” that was designed around the aforementioned principles, including plans and examples of classes.
The author through observation and analysis discerned general differences in cognition and productive activity of boys and girls:
1. Girls prevail in verbal skills, boys – in spatial and mathematical.
2. Cognition is more flexible at girls, and at boys are quicker at it.
3. Girls prefer bright colours and drawings of objects, whereas boys prefer darker colours and tend to draw stories.
4. Girls inquiry in the sake of conversation, boys inquiry to obtain information.
Backed with these results, the author suggests arrangement of teaching process with the gender factor in mind. Consequently, drawing at art classes is not just about development of drawing skills of 2–3 year-old children, but also about formation of their gender identity. The classes are conducted in a play manner and aim at getting children familiar with culture. Such classes help to develop respect for the opposite gender, to understand that boys and girls are different. Classes, where boys and girls perform different tasks for the common purpose, help to overcome disconnection for the sake of more productive activity.
It is assumed that violence must be consistently excluded from human existence and replaced by a sufficiently vaguely understood tolerance. Nevertheless, violence can not be understood only as a deviation from normal functioning, but as absolutely necessary manifestation of vitality and condition of socialization.
Even a simple child’s education of food handling does not occur smoothly, and the phenomenon of punishment in the broad sense of the term, fundamentally is not removable from the culture. It makes questionable the idea of the perfect harmony in dyads “adult – the child” or “subject – society”. After all, eating with your hands is a lot easier than with a fork. Assimilation of social and cultural norms is not much different from learning law of gravitation through falling practice. Effort and tension are of fundamental importance for generation of higher forms of mentality. It is through the inhibition, delay, denial and stress some of the functions and phenomena of the psyche can be objectified.
Main task of psychologist is formation of psychological culture in educational process. Psychological culture is based on two projections: the theoretical one and a projection of psychological activity. Psychological activity has two major areas: activities directed on me and toward another person. Thus psychological culture embraces the existence of identity in two worlds: the inner world of the self and the world of interpersonal space. With respect to psychological structure of the culture, it includes own mental processes, personality, indirect knowledge of the everyday experience, as well as ways of self-analysis, self-knowledge, self-education and self-regulation.
So in description of work of psychologist we turn from the characteristics of theoretical layer of psychological culture to the layer of the activity. Psychological activity is activity that is directed on the subject himself. Psychological activity is a special work aimed at establishing meaningful correspondence between mind and being.
Mankind has got modern tools for development and they should be used. The present level of development of preschool level of education involves the active use of ICT in all areas of work: management, care and education, collaboration with parents.
In preschool establishment #2156 (Moscow) teachers and speech therapists have developed on the base of “Pervo-LOGO” special program for individual work with children. The program is aimed at correcting the speech of preschool children and one of the components of this program is the use of ICT. Using animation, sound, graphics provides entertaining educational content and strengthens motivation of children during individual meetings with speech therapist.