Developmental conversation as a method of working with schoolchildren in modern educational organisations

Abstract

The modern education system is characterised by a constant search for new forms and methods of motivating, educating, teaching, and developing schoolchildren. Federal state educational standards require educational organisations to focus on the spiritual and moral education of the students, the preservation of their health, and the development of personal qualities of high-school graduates. In this context, we find that the experience of European countries, and, in particular, Estonia where developmental conversation is used in working with schoolchildren, deserves our attention.

The paper discusses the methodology of preparing for and conducting developmental conversations. The authors formulate the main goal of the developmental conversation, which is to increase and maintain the joint efforts made by the schoolchildren, their parents and the school to help the children to achieve the educational goals set before them by the curriculum. The researchers also define the objectives of the developmental conversation, which include joint assessment of a child’s achievements, conducted by the teacher and the child’s parents, planning future goals and activities necessary to achieve them, focusing the parents’ and the school’s efforts on maintaining the child’s development, informing parents on the school’s expectations, and providing feedback on the child’s development. It should be noted that, while in Estonia activities associated with developmental conversations are regulated by the Basic Schools and Upper Secondary Schools Act, in Russia they will have to be conducted in the framework of initiative projects.

The article provides an example of the questionnaire to be filled out by the schoolchildren before a developmental conversation. The authors describe the training program for Russian teachers, its goals, and its main modules. The program content includes basic training (development of the teacher’s congruence), content preparation (provisions for developing interviews and questionnaires for schoolchildren), organisational and psychological training, ways to overcome communication barriers, key rules of conducting educational talks, establishing and maintaining rapport with the schoolchildren during the conversation, common mistakes when asking questions to schoolchildren, active listening techniques, effective discussion skills, motivating schoolchildren during and after the conversation, control of the teacher’s emotional tension.

The authors present the results of testing the program in a number of educational organisations in Moscow.