TEACHER PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT LABORATORY AS A FORM OF PEDAGOGICAL MENTORING
Authors: Galitskikh E. O. ,   Institute for the Development of Education of the Kirov region
Published: July 2024

In the introduction to the article, the author presents professional development laboratory as a form of pedagogical mentoring, reveals its purpose and objectives. The author considers mentoring as a process of professional and personal formation of a teacher who travels through the path of searching for an individual creative style of their activity, an original way of teaching and raising children under the guidance of a teacher – a master of his craft, relying on the pedagogical traditions of the Russian school of K. D. Ushinsky, L. N. Tolstoy, S. T. Shatsky, and V. A. Sukhomlinsky. On this path, the teacher is provided with pedagogical support by an experienced mentor, an older friend, and a teacher-consultant. In the laboratory, mentors, teachers with productive methodological and diverse experience discover the specifics of their master classes, enrich the intellectual, methodological and organizational experience of all laboratory participants, and create an innovative experience of their professional and personal formation in the process of work. The purpose of the article is to summarize the activities of the laboratory in the form of the experiment conducted in 2022–2023 under the guidance of Professor, Doctor of Pedagogical Sciences, Honored Teacher of the Russian Federation Elena Olegovna Galitsky, and the head of the center, Candidate of Pedagogical Sciences Natalia Nikolaevna Fileva at the Kirov Institute for the Development of Education under the patronage of the Center for Education and Psychology. The literature review revealed the methodological foundations of the laboratory’s activities, the scientific school of the teacher-mentor by E. O. Galitsky. There are three components in the literature review: the results of scientific pedagogical research, the experience of mastering and creating pedagogical technologies, and a list of fiction books that were used and studied by laboratory participants as sources of discussions and creative tasks. This review is necessary because one of the directions of the laboratory is the self-education of a teacher, the ability to extract what is necessary from what is read, and to comprehend reading experience as a source of pedagogical knowledge. Materials and methods. This section of the article reflects the stages of work, the principles of the organization of activities, the laboratory program, the methodology of immersion days. Each day had its own cross-cutting theme, which was developed and mastered with the obligatory inclusion of intellectual, methodological, technological and emotional components. Every day’s activities evolved into events and “educational meetings” the fruits of which emerged in the unique and imaginative work produced by each laboratory participant. The immersion in various communication formats including exhibitions, excursions, galas, festivals, mastering modern pedagogical technologies, meeting with a professional mentor guest, and final reflection freed its participants from fatigue and routine. The day ended with a creative “surprise gift”, receiving didactic material for building an individual portfolio of professional development and a photo of participants. Results. In this part of the article, the author emphasizes that in the activities of the professional development laboratory, it was not only the final result of each person that mattered, but also the process itself, the organization of which was aimed at developing creative, intellectual, and emotional potential in the teacher. The laboratory became a resource of pedagogical mentoring from “heart to heart”, through live communication with colleagues, scientists, and professional teachers. The supertask of the laboratory was to develop the personal potential of mentoring, which reveals joy, optimism, resilience, teamwork experience, the developing power of art, and a thirst for novelty in one’s work. The individual result was presented in the form that allowed conveying the teacher’s reflection on their experience, each laboratory participant had the opportunity to introduce the results of work in different forms and genres (personal presentation, project, creative workshop, story about the individual result of their development in the profession, final reflection, pedagogical diary, essay, moral choice lesson, reading diary, professional development portfolio). All works were collected and arranged into a description of the laboratory experience and stored in electronic format. The public result of the laboratory’s work was the “Success and Mastery” festival, where everyone shared their individual reflection and presented their professional development re¬sults. In conclusion, the author summed up the results of the experiment according to three com-ponents. The Professional Development Laboratory in the Year of the Teacher and Mentor opened three sources and “three doors” for each of its participants (M. Tarkovsky) to: – the free space of self-education of a modern teacher as a source of pedagogical knowledge; – Russian culture and art as a source of emotional resources for the teacher; –the experience of pedagogical mentoring which provides an opportunity for technological open communication and trust in each other as a source of methodological mastery.