TEACHING AND LEARNING

Nenad Suzić, Ph.D.:
Seeking help – students' cognitive strategies
Bernar Ducret, Ph.D.::
History and geography teaching for living together
Slavica Ševkušić, М.A., Jasmina Šefer, Ph.D:
Action research of the new approach in teaching social studies in primary school
A. V. Hutorskoj, Ph.D:
The position of the textbook in the didactic system
Blanka Bogunović, Ph.D.:
Students' dynamic personality traits and attainment in music

CHILDREN WITH SPECIAL NEEDS

Andreja Rinc Urošević:
Speech-linguistic impairments – a case study

TEACHING PERSONNEL

Gordana Miščević, M.A.:
Pre-service teachers' knowledge of basic astronomical phenomena
Nedeljko Trnavac, Ph.D.:
Work conditions of school pedagogues in Serbia

MANAGEMENT IN EDUCATION

Miroslava Đurišić-Bojanović, Ph.D., Slavica Maksić, Ph.D.:
School principal – leader or manager?

PRE-SCHOOL EDUCATION

Ana Gavrilović, Ph.D.:
The role and importance of preschool institutions for population policy

Nenad Suzić, Ph.D.:
Filozofski fakultet
Banja Luka

SEEKING HELP – STUDENTS’ COGNITIVE STRATEGIES

The author starts with two hypotheses. Firstly, it is possible to construct an instrument which distances orthogonally the orientations of students seeking help. Secondly, different orientations of students seeking help can be crossed with motivational orientations regarding school attainment, leading to pedagogically useful conclusions. Both hypotheses have been confirmed. The author made a cross tabulation and applied the test instrument which distinguishes orthogonally three orientations of students: dependence, acceptance, and help avoidance. These orientations were crossed with motivational behaviour of students, and the author came to some important conclusions. He found that the students oriented to help avoidance were negatively motivated for school attainment (amotivation), while the students who depend on help from others have a weaker motivation than those who accept help normally when they need it. The author holds that it would be necessary to construct productive pedagogical models which will be able to develop such cognitive orientations among help-avoiding students to enable them to seek help when they need it. Beside the instruments for measuring motivation which are the best known and most widely used in the world, the author’s Big Inventory of Attainment Motivation (BIAM) was also used in the research. The results of this research are methodologically illustrated very precisely, and a number of problems for further investigation were registered, too.
Keywords: seeking help, cognitive strategies, attainment motivation, amotivation, selfefficiency, goals
CONTENTS

Bernar Ducret, Ph.D.:
Anesi, Francuska

HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY TEACHING FOR LIVING TOGETHER

History and geography are two subjects that carry crucial values relevant for teaching students ‘how to live together’. Different countries deal with the matter in different ways. Some curricula consider history and geography only of a limited space (closed model); others study the past and the space of the states or regions connected with other states or regions by trade balance, migrations, invasions... (juxtaposed model). Yet another model does not deal with an inside closed space but with politicians, merchants, corporations, students... (bound model). There is no ‘best education’ since each type is derived from the past and the society of each country. Imposing ‘a best’ but foreign model on a democratic society is worthless. A better way seems to be to permit each student to express their feelings and discuss them in the classroom. Necessary knowledge is supplied beforehand in the form of case studies with the examples of solutions. The curriculum should be developed based on an open-minded concept, and the challenge for the teacher is to introduce investigating and problem solving techniques. The Ulster and South Africa curricula are based on these principles and have proved effective in these conflicting societies.
Keywords: teaching, history, geography, living together, teaching model.
CONTENTS

Slavica Ševkušić, М.A.,
Jasmina Šefer, Ph.D:
Institut za pedagoška istraživanja
Beograd

ACTION RESEARCH OF THE NEW APPROACH IN TEACHING SOCIAL
STUDIES IN PRIMARY SCHOOL

The paper discusses some possibilities of the application of the thematic and group research work in the teaching of the subject Society in junior primary school classes. The action research of the teaching process was conducted in one fourth grade class in the form of a case study. The research included planning, realization and evaluation of the teaching process related to the teaching of the Medievalm Serbia thematic field, and the whole process was conducted in cooperation of the researchers and the teacher. Formative evaluation included observations of both the researchers and
the teacher regarding the process, problems, and effects of the group research, aimed at the advancement of studying. The research experience, apart from speaking for thematic planning and group-research teaching model, indicate to the need of introducing new themes and contents into the teaching of the subject Society. It was noted that students of this age are able to: form a greater number of concepts in a shorter period, develop their understanding of history, epoch and time, and consequently achieve a better understanding of historical sequence.
Keywords: thematic planning, teaching, team-research study, creativity.
CONTENTS

A. V. Hutorskoj, Ph.D:
Ruska akademija obrazovanja

THE POSITION OF THE TEXTBOOK IN THE DIDACTIC SYSTEM

Besides describing three theoretical and practical approaches to developing school textbooks, the paper analyses the characteristics and possibilities of an approach which is oriented, to the greatest extent, towards individually oriented modernization of education, i.e. the orientation that starts from the notion that there are as many textbook theories as there are educational systems. Therefore, in developing a methodological concept of a textbook it is necessary to consider two basic facts: firstly, that there are various textbook typologies depending upon the type of education and the didactic system for which the teaching process is planned, and secondly, that it is necessary to define standards for different educational levels. In accordance with this, the textbook might be defined as a complex informational-work model of the educational process, originating within a particular didactic system, which provides necessary conditions for its realization. Additionally, it is a model which reflects not only the goals, principles, contents and technology of a particular educational process, but also the reality,
regarding the conditions for the realization of the process. Individually oriented teaching is possible only in the conditions of personal integration both with the teaching process and its model incarnated in the textbook. For the textbook the condition sine qua non is the integration of the textbook-model with the textbook-reality, which happens during educational activities of the participants in the teaching process. Namely, the individualised humanistic educational paradigm provides the opportunity for the learner to include his own components of the teaching contents into the textbook, filling its variable part, as opposed to the invariable part which contains fundamental educational objects and basic
technologies that the students should master. This may be regarded as one possible way to develop a textbook of a creative type, in difference to the textbook that is only the means of reproductively-informatively oriented teaching.
Keywords: textbook, textbook theory, educational system, textbook structure.
CONTENTS

Blanka Bogunović, Ph.D.:
Institut za pedagoška istraživanja
Beograd

STUDENTS’ DYNAMIC PERSONALALITY TRAITS AND ATTAINMENT IN MUSIC

The research is based on the idea of integrative functioning of some aspects of motivational processes and dynamic personality traits during studying music. We applied Wiener’s extended attribution model of attainment assessment which we regard appropriate for understanding the dynamics of the process of progressing towards attainment and acquisition of musical competencies. The aim of the research was to describe the mode and level of interrelatedness of the categories such as success and failure and the dynamic properties of the personality (intrinsic motivation and
personality features). The sample comprised 137 students (aged 12-20) of I-IV grades of a Musical school. The results indicate to some specificities in the interpretation of the causes of successfulness by the respondents and its fundamental reliance on the dynamic personality traits. The respondents cited the reasons for their success in the following order: pleasure, effort, ambition, then: mayor subject teacher, and, as the least important, their talent for music. The data show that those students who consider effort as an important factor of their successfulness possess personality features which are regarded necessary for reaching high goals – persistence in progressing, strong inner control locus, and a positive self image. Additionally, they are extrovert, active, and assertive. They are more capable of setting higher goals and standards of achievement. The fact that some factors (effort, ambition, pleasure, circumstances) are significantly related to dynamic personality traits means that cognitive interpretation of success causes is actually derived from dynamic personality traits. We find that there is enough ground to conclude that the structure and emotional-motivational quality of personality play a prime role in the process of cognitive interpretation of the results in progressing. Practical application of the results relates to the important role of the teacher in providing favourable conditions for the development of intrinsic motivation.
Keywords: causal attribution of attainment, students of high school for music, intrinsic motivation, personality traits.
CONTENTS

Andreja Rinc Urošević
Osnovna škola Miklavž na Dravskem polju
Slovenija

SPEECH-LINGUISTIC IMPAIRMENTS – A CASE STUDY

The article presents a theoretical background of speech-linguistic impairments among students, and describes in detail all the stages of work with one such student during the first trimester in the third grade of a primary school. An overall estimation was made of the student’s functional and learning activities, the structure of the applied individual educational programme, the work plan and its realization and evaluation. The evaluation of the results, in respect to the goals set at the beginning, revealed that a trimester is too short a period to achieve noticeable changes in the areas of speech and writing, predominant learning style, and attention span. Yet, some progress was achieved in all these areas and the student was highly motivated to learn, which encouraged me to go on and continue my work with her.
Keywords: case study, speech-linguistic deficiencies, speech, additional professional help, students with special needs.
CONTENTS

Gordana Miščević, M.A.:
Učiteljski fakultet
Beograd

PRE-SERVICE TEACHERS’ KNOWLEDGE OF BASIC ASTRONOMICAL PHENOMENA

In order to assess the quality of knowledge the researchers conducted a twodirectional research. One part was directed towards the assessment of the levels of knowledge (remembering, recognition, reproduction, comprehension, application), while the other involved a consideration of both what the respondents know – declarative knowledge, and what they can do – procedural knowledge. Much research, so far, has focused on the analysis of the student’s knowledge of the Earth and basic astronomical phenomena, while less attention has been paid to the quality of knowledge of those who, within school as institution, are responsible for the students’ knowledge advancement – i.e. teachers themselves. That is why we decided to examine the quality of the fourth-year students, future teachers’ knowledge of the causes of day and night shifts on our planet, four seasons, and the phases of the Moon. Their quality of knowledge was analyzed within the frame of contents of the subject Nature, since teachers are one of the essential factors able to contribute to the advancement of the quality of knowledge of future generations of students. Presented are appropriate practical recommendations derived from the analysis.
Keywords: pre-service teacher, quality of knowledge, day and night shift, seasons, Moon phases
CONTENTS

Nedeljko Trnavac, Ph.D
Filozofski fakultet
Beograd

WORK CONDITIONS OF SCHOOL PEDAGOGUES IN SERBIA

The paper presents the second part of the material collected during an extensive research on the position of school pedagogues in Serbia. The first part comprised the data about school pedagogues and who they are (gender and age structure, education and attainments, social background, work abilities, professional motivation, etc.). In the second part we present basic indicators of the conditions (ambience) in which school pedagogues work: work space, equipment, school, colleagues and work hours, while the third sequel will offer research results and comments on what (contents) and how (methodological problems) school pedagogues in Serbia perform.
Keywords: school pedagogue, work conditions, technical equipment, work hours..
CONTENTS

Mirosava Đurišić-Bojanović, Ph.D
Slavica Maksić, Ph.D
Institut za pedagoška istraživanja
Beograd

SCHOOL PRINCIPAL – LEADER OR MANAGER?

Democratization and decentralization of the education system presupposes a number of structural, systemic and functional changes regarding school management and the role of the principal. The paper discusses the duties and competencies of the principal as required by various regulations and school practices: whether a principal is a manager or a leader, and how professional human resources for school management can be provided. Basic competencies for school management and
organization include planning, decision making, managing, and communication. The research results suggest that for a successful school management not only managerial but also leader functions are necessary, with high social skills being regarded as a key competence. In accordance with the Bases of the Educational System Law, a person to be elected a principal should possess adequate education, licence, and experience in educational work. It is possible to provide efficient training to satisfy the regulative requirements, but there remains the fact that personal predispositions can be both an advantage and hindrance in the acquisition of necessary knowledge and skills of potential principals, implying that selection should be included in the standard procedure for the election of principals.
Keywords: school principal, manager, leader, social competencies, training
CONTENTS

Ana Gavrilović, Ph.D
Filozofski fakultet
Banja Luka

THE ROLE AND IMPORTANCE OF PRESCHOOL INSTITUTIONS FOR POPULATION POLICY

The paper contains three parts: current demographic problems in Serbia, population policy – the response of the State and preschool institutions - an unavoidable factor of the population policy. The first part deals with insufficient childbirth as the hugest demographic problem in Serbia, its causes and
consequences that follow. The population policy, as a response of the State is discussed in the second part, regarding the definition of the concept, principles, the UN recommendations, and the implementation of measures. The third part analyses the role of the preschool institutions in the population policy, in the context of the reasons for their foundation, basic characteristics of their activities, changes in the sphere of work, changes in family life, parenthood phenomenon, emancipation of women, and the needs of young children..
Keywords: population, population policy, preschool institutions.
CONTENTS