Modern schoolchildren are lucky. For them, briefcases and backpacks of various sizes and shapes, bright felt-tip pens, funny pens, sharpeners in the form of animals and cars are sold, and the school uniform itself can be chosen convenient and fashionable. In our childhood, everything was different. But childhood is childhood, and we were happy with what we had: notebooks, book covers, counting sticks, stencils ... And, comparing them with modern school attributes, we now remember them with a smile.
Diary and blotter.
The notebooks were simple, without drawings and inscriptions. On the reverse side the rules of behavior for schoolchildren, the multiplication table, or, at worst, the words of the songs were printed: “Fly up the bonfires, blue nights”, “Victory Day”, “Eaglet”, “That birch, then mountain ash”, “Where does the Motherland begin”, the Anthem of the USSR . For some reason, the notebooks were dirty and sad colors: blue, pink, green, yellow. It is still a mystery to me why there were no fields in the notebooks in the box? They had to be drawn by ourselves, and always with a red pencil, and not with a pen.
For a while we wrote in ink: first, with fountain pens, which were dipped into non-spill inkwells (they stood on every desk, and dead midges always swam in them). No matter how neat and balanced you are, you still could not avoid blots on a desk or in a notebook. Later, nib sticks replaced the ever-leaking automatic ink pens (with pipettes and threaded ones). By the way, fountain pens could be found at the post office and in savings banks back in the late eighties, they filled out receipts and wrote texts of telegrams.
The Ministry of Education of the USSR allowed the use of ballpoint pens only in the late 70s. Of course, it was a breakthrough, all the children of the vast Motherland breathed a sigh of relief. And only now you understand that an ink pen is expensive and stylish, and calligraphy is an art on which the Japanese, for example, still earn good money.
In order not to wait for the ink to dry, the page was blotted with a special leaf that lay in each notebook - a blotting paper. This is an absolutely wonderful item that has gone into oblivion along with ink pens. And what a good word - a blotter.
A pink, blue or lilac leaf was always scribbled and painted, and indeed it had a lot of applications: cool airplanes were made from blotting paper, because the paper was lighter, cheat sheets, and New Year's snowflakes also turned out great. And notes for girls or boys! They silently fell into the "object of sighs", in contrast to heavy paper leaves.
In boys, as a rule, this leaf was quickly used, and not quite for its intended purpose: they chewed it in order to launch a ball through a tube into a neighbor (neighbor). Unhappy modern children, why do they spit at each other?
School uniform
If you ask 40-year-old women what color they dislike the most in clothes, 90% of them will answer: “Brown”. This is due to the Soviet school uniform: the dress of the creepy Brown and a black apron. I still shudder at the memory of the touch of this prickly clothing (the dress was sewn from coarse wool) to the body. And mind you, it was worn all year round: in autumn, winter and spring. These clothes were cold in winter and hot in spring. What kind of hygiene can we talk about? I remember that at one time special inserts with cellophane were sold, which were sewn into the armpits of dresses so that white salt stains from sweat would not show through.
A black apron and brown (black) bows were supposed to be worn with a brown dress - another color combination! The festive school outfit included a white apron, tights and bows.
In order to somehow diversify the boring form, mothers and grandmothers “came off” on collars and aprons: they were sewn from the finest lace, imported guipure, crocheted, invented styles of aprons with “wings”, with frills, etc. Sometimes there were simply masterpieces of handmade sewing. The girls tried to decorate school clothes as best they could: they pinned brooches, made leather appliqués, sewed in beads (however, strict teachers forced all this splendor to be removed, they also measured the length of the dress from the knee to the hem with a ruler - God forbid, a millimeter higher than it should be according to the instructions of the Ministry of Education).
Some parents managed to get a “Baltic” uniform through pull, it was a pleasant chocolate color and was not sewn from wool, but from some kind of soft material. In fairness, I note that the Soviet uniform was sewn in different styles: a pleated skirt, tucks, folds, etc. were used. And all the same, we hated the uniform, since it was canceled in the mid-80s ... Although now I sometimes look at old photos and, comparing with the current school uniform, I think: maybe there was something in those dresses with aprons? Stylish and noble.
Collars had to be washed and sewn on every week. This, of course, was terribly annoying, but from the height of the present mind I understand that it was a good lesson in cleanliness for girls. How many 10-12-year-old girls can sew on a button and wash their clothes after themselves?
But what was truly wonderful in those years was the milk biscuits in the canteen! Amber color, fragrant, crumbly! And very democratic in price - only 8 kopecks.
Yes, there were buns with marmalade, poppy seeds, cinnamon, muffins, sour cream and cheesecakes, but for some reason these shortbreads come to mind.
High school students flaunted with briefcases - black or red, and for students lower grades satchels were indispensable. They were made of smelly leatherette, and the fasteners in them immediately broke. But the knapsacks themselves were incredibly durable: they rode them down the ice slides, sitting or on their stomachs, they fought with them, they were thrown into a pile after lessons, when it was necessary to urgently assemble a team to play the Cossack robbers. And they are nothing, they lived and served for a whole year.
It is now simple pencils(soft and hard) can be bought in any stationery department, and then the Czechoslovakian Koh-i-noor were considered the best pencils. They were brought from abroad or got through the pull in a department store. They were made, by the way, from California cedar (at least before). How much did we grind off during our studies of these yellow sticks with golden letters and with golden pimps on the tip!
Definitely a handy thing, but very heavy. Especially for a student sitting in front - if he spun and interfered in the lesson, he got hit on the head with a stand along with a book.
I personally didn’t know how to use this gadget, but for many nerds in those years it was indispensable. In Soviet times, when there were no computers yet, and the first electronic calculators were a curiosity, mathematical calculations were performed on it. The rulers were different lengths(from 15 to 50-75 cm), the accuracy of the calculations depended on it.
With the help of a ruler, it was possible to perform addition, subtraction, multiplication and division, raising to a power and extracting a root, calculating logarithms and working with trigonometric functions. They say that the accuracy of operations could reach 4-5 decimal places!
For me, all these manipulations with the ruler were a very difficult thing, but it is impossible to overestimate its role in the life of mathematics students of those years. I recently heard from a woman that her husband taught her how to use a slide rule so that she would calculate the number of loops while knitting. “For me, even today, this thing is indispensable in drawing up various proportions,” the woman is sure.
I don't like sharpeners, as a child my dad taught me how to sharpen pencils brilliantly with a blade or a sharp knife. There were few sharpeners in those days, and they sharpened, as a rule, cruelly. Until you get the “correct” lead, the pencil will run out, the only exception was a desktop mechanical device for sharpening pencils.
What you will not find in a schoolbag-package of a schoolboy of all times and peoples! But today you definitely won’t see such a funny toad toy, which was worn at breaks and in after-school.
Each of us has our own memories of that time - bright and not very bright. What do you remember from your school childhood?
In 1949, the transition to universal compulsory seven-year education was legally formalized. On the basis of the decision of the 19th Congress of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks (1952) on a gradual transition to universal secondary education and an increase in the construction of schools in cities and in the countryside by 70% compared with the previous five-year plan in the Union and autonomous republics plans were made to further expand the network of secondary schools. big development received in postwar period schools for working and rural youth established in 1943 (evening and shift).
AT post-war years A new type of school was created - a boarding school for children who have lost one or both parents. Children of single mothers, invalids of war and labor, orphans, as well as children for the upbringing of whom were absent the necessary conditions in family.
On December 24, 1958, the Supreme Soviet of the USSR adopted the law “On strengthening the connection between school and life and on the further development of the system public education in the USSR”, which marked the beginning of the reform of the school, which lasted until the mid-60s.
The main goal of the reform was declared to be the training of technically literate personnel for industry and Agriculture. Instead of 7 years, universal compulsory 8 years of education were introduced, the transition to which was completely completed in 1963. Complete secondary education, the term of which was increased from 10 to 11 years, was envisaged to be carried out on the basis of combining education with work in a day or evening school, or in the technical school. Two days a week, senior day school students had to work in factories or in agriculture.
High school graduates along with the matriculation certificate received a certificate of specialty.
The network of evening and correspondence education was expanded, benefits were provided for admission to a university for those who had already worked in production for at least three years, and the possibility of out-of-competition enrollment of persons sent to universities by enterprises, collective farms and state farms was provided.
In practice, the slogan of linking the school with life was poorly realized. The mass transition of schools to industrial training did not take place due to the lack of jobs for schoolchildren. Only a small part of the graduates went to work in the specialty received at school. At the same time, the level of general educational preparation of students turned out to be significantly reduced.
Therefore, in 1964-1966. the school returned to 10 years of education while maintaining 8 years of education as compulsory. Vocational training remained only in those educational institutions that had the necessary material base.
Unjustifiably increased admission to universities and technical schools. Later, compulsory secondary education was introduced. At the same time, the number of medium technical personnel has noticeably decreased throughout the country. An overabundance of specialists with higher technical education led to them being used instead of technicians. The prestige of higher education has fallen markedly. In turn, this led to a redistribution of wages.
On the wave of democratization public life, increasing the socio-political activity of people in the second half of the 1950s. The pedagogical experience of A. S. Makarenko became the pivotal basis for the creative searches of innovative teachers. Created by an outstanding teacher, the technology for organizing and rallying a children's educational team was successfully applied by dozens of directors of schools and orphanages in Moscow and other cities. The problems of the development of the children's educational team were studied by prominent scientists and teachers of the 1960-80s: M.D. Vinogradova, L. Yu. Gordin, N. S. Dezhnikova, S. E. Karklina, I. A. Kairov, V. M. Korotov, B. T. Likhachev, I. S. Marenko, L. I. Novikova, I. B. Pervin, B. E. Shirvindt and others. scientists and researchers of the Scientific Research Institute of General Problems of Education established in 1970 as part of the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences of the USSR.
At the same time, A. S. Makarenko’s pedagogical teaching about the educational team was distorted to please the ideological canons of that time. In particular, the role of the children's collective in the upbringing of the personality has been hypertrophied. The state doctrine affirmed the priority of the collective-public over the personal-individual.
The multifaceted critique of collectivism in education, which became especially active in the early 1990s, nevertheless, did not play its transformative role. The awareness by many scientists and teachers of such negative consequences of collectivist education as the dependent position of the individual on the collective, which creates a threat to his individuality, the impossibility of forming true moral freedom in the conditions of the collective, the removal from the child of the tension of personal responsibility, personal choice, transferring them to collective decision-making, collective irresponsibility and much more, has not yet become the basis for the final rejection of the idea of collectivist education. The collective today continues to be the “goal and means” of education, attempts to “harmonize” the collective and the individual do not stop, the search for the relationship between religious influence and harmony of the collective with the individual is actively conducted.
Such stability in assessments of the positive role of the collective and the vitality of ideas about it as the only form of cohesion and development of children have been preserved because criticism, analyzing the shortcomings of collectivist education, suggests such forms of organization of children that generally deny the idea of the collective or lead back to it in a roundabout way. , with the inevitable repetition of all its negative consequences.
An indicator of extremely negative assessments of the idea of educating a personality in a team was a lot of publications in the late 1980s and early 90s, the authors of which denied the entire system of Soviet collective education and accused it of complete failure. The leading place in this flow of publications was occupied by the “subverters” of A. S. Makarenko as the creator of the system of collective education in the USSR (Yu. P. Azarov and others). However, a balanced, constructive analysis of the history of the development of the theory and practice of collective education showed that a disdainful attitude to the pedagogical experience of the past, to history pedagogical ideas and views are simply unacceptable. It is no coincidence that the experience and legacy of A. S. Makarenko became the subject of close study by researchers of the Makarenko-Referat laboratory established in 1968 at the University of Marburg.
The updated program of school education is presented in the official documents of the Russian Ministry of Education in the 1990s. 20th century The goal of the school is to contribute to the spiritual renewal of society. Abandoning authoritarian parenting, the school must provide personal attention to students.
Law Russian Federation"On Education" (1992) created the foundations of a new regulatory framework for the reform and development of education, was the fundamental document that basically determined the policy in the field of education for a decade to come. In 1996, the law was adopted in a new edition. It was established that one of the state guarantees of the priority of the education sector is the allocation of at least 10% of the national income for the purpose of its development.
In the context of the socio-economic crisis, the steady decline in the share of budgetary financing of higher education has led to a tendency for higher education institutions to increase funds from non-budgetary sources. The wide educational market, which is not controlled by the state, leads to a disproportion in the contingent of students, where the proportion of children of parents of high status and wealth increases.
To live no worse than in America, or at least like in Europe, you must have a high level of education, comparable to European. America in terms of education falls out of a number of highly educated countries, tk. school education there has long been in decline, and higher education and science are based on the import of brains from all over the world.
The local culture is also in an appropriate state, which is glorified and copied by our creative elite. Western Europe and America maintain a relatively high standard of living through centuries of plunder of other countries and peoples and through the merciless exploitation of their own and other people's workers and peasants.
For three hundred years, capitalist England plundered the whole world, and yet the poverty and hunger of some Britons were constant companions of the wealth and luxury of others. An example that struck me English life late XIX century. The sick mother of little Charlie Chaplin, Hannah, could no longer perform in the music hall, lost her job and livelihood. There was nothing to pay for a rented apartment. Her children Sid and Charlie fed their ailing mother whatever they could get by begging. One day, Charlie played on the street and did not bring his mother the bread he asked for from passers-by. From hunger, the mother went mad and was placed in mental asylum. The children were sent to a school for orphans. They visited their mother in the hospital. When consciousness returned to her, Hannah said to Charlie: “Why didn’t you bring me bread? I wouldn't go crazy then." How many of these Charlies, Seeds and Hannas were and are there in the rich democratic Great Britain?
Russia has a different story. It did not plunder other countries and peoples, but, on the contrary, protected and preserved "every language that exists in it" and repeatedly all of Europe and the world as a whole. She could achieve this only by relying on her own strengths and resources. As the writer and historian Yu. Mukhin notes: “the mind of the people is transformed into its culture - into the ability to use the knowledge accumulated by all mankind and obtained by a specific people. And a high culture leads to the fact that a given people acquires a very high labor productivity, which gives it the opportunity to live materially better than less cultured peoples. Here, the culture of the people is a generalized concept that includes all aspects of the life of a given people and country. Those. achievements of science, education, arts, technology, production, crafts, traditions, beliefs, history, politics, economy, land development, interaction with other countries and peoples, etc.
It is quite obvious that the transmission of culture and its development by generations is impossible in modern world without high level education. Moreover, the existence of the people itself is impossible. The Bolsheviks, who came to power in 1917, clearly understood this. Right after October revolution the implementation of a grandiose program for the cultural and general educational development of the people, systematic work to create a truly popular education system begins. Already in November 1917, the Council of People's Commissars created the "State Commission for Education". Education and upbringing is transferred to the People's Commissariat for Education. In the first year of Soviet power alone, about 200 decrees and government resolutions on questions of education were issued. In March 1919, the VIII Congress of the RCP(b) adopted the second program of the party, which set the task of "transforming the school from an instrument of the class rule of the bourgeoisie into an instrument for the complete destruction of the division of society into classes, into an instrument for the communist transformation of society."
The program provided for: free and compulsory general and polytechnic (introducing in theory and practice to all major branches of production) education for all children of both sexes up to 17 years of age; full implementation of the principle of a unified labor school, with teaching at mother tongue, with co-education of children of both sexes; unconditionally secular, conducting a close connection between education and socially useful work, preparing comprehensively developed members of communist society.
All the available cultural forces of the country were thrown into the fight against illiteracy, which we inherited from tsarism. Public education becomes the "third front" of the struggle for socialism. On December 26, 1919, the Council of People's Commissars adopts a decree "On the elimination of illiteracy among the population of the RSFSR." According to this decree, the entire population of the republic aged 8 to 50 years old, who could not read and write, was obliged to learn to read and write in their native or Russian language, if desired.
The working day for students was reduced by two hours, various benefits were provided. Persons preventing the illiterate from attending school were held criminally liable. A wide network of schools and points for the elimination of illiteracy was created in the country. So the Soviet state, without delay and ostentatious charity, immediately set about solving a problem that neither the monarchy nor the bourgeoisie could solve. To eliminate illiteracy, not only teachers are involved, but all more or less educated citizens. To coordinate joint work, a voluntary society “Down with illiteracy” is being created under the leadership of M.I. Kalinin. Nevertheless, the measures taken are recognized as insufficient, and in July 1920 the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission for the Elimination of Illiteracy was established.
Soon the efforts made gave the first results. Already in 1926, 56% of the adult population of the country were literate. By the end of the 1930s, the illiteracy of the population had been largely eliminated. From 1921 to 1940, about 60 million people were trained in educational programs and schools for the semi-literate. The eradication of illiteracy is only the first, extremely necessary step in building a socialist society. To build socialism, to develop the country, a significant increase in the general educational, professional, technical and cultural level of people was necessary. Only on this basis it was possible to overcome the economic lag behind the developed capitalist countries and reliably protect oneself from external and internal threats. At the same time, a higher task was set in education than in bourgeois countries, where it is limited only to general education and vocational training. Culture, traditions and spiritual and moral education remain outside the framework of the bourgeois education system, since the capitalists need qualified performers in production, and not comprehensively developed individuals. Why should the bourgeois state spend extra money on the cultural needs of the people? Let them cultivate themselves as they want at their own expense. Therefore, simultaneously with the elimination of illiteracy in those most difficult conditions for the country, persistent and difficult work was carried out to create an extensive network of general education schools, workers' faculties, technical schools and universities. In the first decade of Soviet power alone, 7,780 general education schools were built for more than a million student places.
The industrialization and collectivization that had begun demanded an increase in the level of general educational and technical training, especially for young people. On July 25, 1930, the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks adopted a resolution “On the universal mandatory primary education", which is immediately introduced from the 1930/31 academic year, and on August 14, 1930, it is accepted by the Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR. Thanks to these decisions, an additional 10 million children sat at their desks. About 60,000 new teachers were sent to schools. Buildings for schools, funds for repairs were sought, funds were organized to help students, hot meals were organized, children were transported, explanatory work was carried out among parents.
In 1934, the transition to a universal seven-year education begins, with special attention being paid to the village, since by that time this problem had been solved in the city.
Relying on the already created base of the socialist economy, Soviet state was able from 1933 to 1937 to increase spending on schools by 3.5 times. During this period, 18,778 schools for 5.5 million student places were built, including 15,107 rural schools for 3.4 million places. This made it possible to close the gap in the enrollment of children in seven-year education in countryside. At the same time, much attention is paid to improving the teaching and upbringing process at school. Decrees of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks are adopted: August 25, 1931 “On Primary and Secondary Schools”; August 25, 1932 "On curricula and regime in primary and secondary school”; February 13, 1933 “On textbooks for elementary and secondary schools”, etc. Successes in the cultural and educational level of the population are enshrined in the Constitution of the USSR of 1936 as the basis for building socialism in the country, as the most important factor in economic growth and a condition for its security and defense capability. These achievements were especially evident during the Great Patriotic War and post-war reconstruction. National economy.
By 1939, 81% of all women under the age of 49 became literate, which allowed them to actively participate in the social and political life of the country. The literacy rate in the RSFSR was 89.7%, in Ukraine - 88.2%, in Belarus - 80.8%, in Uzbekistan - 78.7%, in Kazakhstan - 83.6%, in Kyrgyzstan - 79.8%, in Tajikistan - 82.8%, in Turkmenistan - 77.7%.
The well-known popularizer of science and teacher Ya.I. spoke about the unprecedented desire of Soviet youth at that time for knowledge. Perelman the following: “Not only among students, but even more among working youth, there is an intensive self-educational work, invariably growing and bearing appreciable fruits. I am convinced of this by numerous letters from readers and, in particular, conversations with the readership of a number of large factories, Leningrad and Moscow. We are willing to read such books that in the eyes of the average foreign reader are too difficult.
At the XVIII Party Congress in 1939, the task was set of transition in the third five-year plan to universal secondary education in the city and completion by 1938-1942. organization of seven-year education in the countryside. These measures allowed already on the eve of the war in 1940/41 academic year more than double the number of students in grades VIII-X compared with 1938, and three times in the countryside. The national economy and the army got the opportunity to quickly train highly qualified specialists, which was extremely important at that time. On the eve of the war in the Red Army, even battalion commanders were 94% average or higher education. From the end of 1939 until the beginning of the war, 77 additional military schools were opened.
The war caused great damage to education. The Nazi invaders destroyed 84 thousand schools, technical schools and universities. The number of students in the middle classes has halved, and in the senior classes by 2.5 times. Despite the enormous difficulties and hardships, only in 1941-1945. 687 school buildings were built in the country, about half of them in the liberated territories. At the same time, universal compulsory education of children from the age of seven was introduced. On April 30, 1944, a resolution was adopted in the USSR on the establishment of schools for working youth.
After the war in 1946-1950, 18.5 thousand new schools were built for 2.4 million student places. By 1952, the transition to compulsory seven-year education was completed. On December 24, 1958, the law "On strengthening the connection between school and life and on the further development of the system of public education in the USSR" was adopted. This law provided for the transition to universal compulsory eight-year education.
In the sixties in the Soviet Union, thanks to the achievements high level people's education is going deep qualitative changes in engineering and technology of social production. The scientific and technological revolution is rapidly developing. Complex-mechanized and automated workshops and enterprises equipped with CNC machines and high-performance technological equipment are being created. In 1971, there were already 5,000 such enterprises and 18,000 workshops. The new production, in turn, requires an increase in the training of skilled workers and specialists with secondary specialized and higher education. Completely new professions appear, the nature of work changes. At that time, 700,000 specialists with a degree in engineering and technicians were already working in the industry. According to forecasts, their share in the next 15 years was to increase to several million!
On June 20, 1972, the resolution of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR "On the completion of the transition to universal secondary education for young people and the further development of a comprehensive school" was issued. On July 17, 1973, at the sixth session of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, the Fundamentals of the Legislation of the USSR and union republics about public education. This large multifaceted document consolidated the basic principles of building a system of public education, codified the most important decisions in the field of education, reflected the richest pedagogical experience in our country, formulated the tasks facing public education, created a solid legal framework for all types of educational institutions in the Soviet Union.
As noted in Article 1, the Fundamentals of Legislation ... regulate social relations in the field of public education in order to most fully meet the needs of Soviet citizens and the needs of a developed socialist society in the education and communist education of the younger generation, providing the national economy with workers and specialists of appropriate qualifications.
In accordance with the Constitution of the USSR, Soviet citizens have the right to education. This right is ensured by compulsory eight-year education, the implementation of universal secondary education for young people, the broad development of vocational, secondary specialized and higher education based on the connection of learning with life, with the practice of communist construction, teaching in schools in the native language, expanding the network of preschool and extracurricular institutions, free of charge all types of education, a system of state scholarships and other types of material assistance to pupils and students, the organization various forms industrial training and advanced training of workers. Appropriate benefits are established for pupils and students.
Ten years later, the education reform of 1984 provided for the following: to carry out a reform of general education and vocational school- means to solve the following main tasks:
- improve the quality of education and upbringing; to ensure a higher scientific level of teaching each subject, a solid mastery of the fundamentals of science, an improvement in ideological and political, labor and moral education, aesthetic and physical development; improve curricula and programs, textbooks and study guides, methods of training and education; eliminate overload of students, excessive complexity of educational material;
- radically improve the organization of labor education, training and vocational guidance in general education school; to strengthen the polytechnical, practical orientation of teaching; significantly expand the training of qualified workers in the system of vocational training; to carry out the transition to universal vocational education of young people;
- to strengthen the responsibility of students for the quality of education, the observance of educational and labor discipline, to increase their social activity on the basis of the development of self-government in student groups;
- raise the social prestige of teachers and masters of industrial training, their theoretical and practical training, fully meet the needs of the public education system in teaching staff; raise wages and improve the material and living conditions of teaching staff;
- strengthen the material and technical base educational institutions, preschool and out-of-school institutions;
- to improve the structure of general and vocational schools and the management of public education.
However, the “production” part of the reform faces great difficulties from the very beginning. Enterprises are extremely reluctant to interact with schools and vocational schools. They have their own tasks and plans that need to be fulfilled. There are no special personnel and funds for the organization industrial practice students. The issue of child labor protection at the enterprise becomes acute. Fearing accidents, instead of practice, business leaders limit themselves, at best, to excursions. There are not enough production specialists in schools. The practice is organized and conducted by teachers and class teachers, already overloaded with educational work. The introduction of a full day of work disrupted the normal rhythm educational process in schools, leading to poor performance. At the same time, education is being introduced from the age of six, and in schools that already suffer from a shortage of classrooms, part of the classroom is withdrawn as classrooms and bedrooms for six-year-olds. Schools are moving to two or three shifts.
Assignment to the school of functions unusual for it - professional education was wrong. The very vagueness of the wording “bring students close to choosing a profession” gave wide scope for its understanding and implementation. It was not clear: to what level it is necessary to "let down"? Where is this limit of "summing up"? Whether to give a profession and what kind? Where to get for this cadres of qualified masters of industrial training, appropriate premises, machines, equipment? School budgets could not handle all this.
A way out of this situation was proposed by the Minister for Vocational Education A.P. Dumachev. He tried to expand the network of vocational schools, equip their training base with the latest modern production equipment, assign vocational schools to enterprises, making them subdivisions of plants and factories. To attract the best engineering and teaching staff to the vocational school. Ensure their training in universities. But the main thing is to radically change the established principle of recruiting a contingent of students, when poor students, poor performers and hooligans entered vocational schools. Now the best school students and graduates were supposed to enter vocational schools through competition. It was the modernized vocational schools that could provide the country with the necessary workforce. In order to increase the prestige and authority of vocational school teachers, Dumachev even suggested introducing a uniform for them!
The reform was not carried out. Gorbachev's "perestroika" began, and the country's leadership was not up to schools and vocational schools. A course was set for the destruction of the Great Power. The Soviet Union became the "Evil Empire". All the achievements of the Soviet people were declared an endless series of troubles and misfortunes, and the Soviet school was declared a hotbed of criminal ideology, an enemy of universal human values.
But no matter how the anti-Soviet democrats grumble, it was the Soviet system of education and collectivist upbringing that made the USSR the second power in the world in a very short historical period - less than 70 years (given the years of the revolution, the Civil and Great Patriotic War, when the growth of the welfare of citizens was simply impossible). This was recognized by the Americans. “However, the launch of a Russian satellite was needed to raise the issue of improving the school as a whole to the top of national priorities,” writes the American educational scientist Ernest L. Boyer. For more than a decade, Americans have been unsuccessfully trying to reform their education, going their own way. And still it remains of poor quality, defective. Therefore, the United States is forced to attract a large number of specialists from other countries, including from Russia.
In record time, illiteracy of the population was eliminated, education became publicly available.
There were many Nobel laureates and winners of international Olympiads. Soviet schoolchildren won international olympiads, including the natural sciences.
The well-known innovative teacher Viktor Shatalov said: “In the post-war years, the space industry arose in the USSR, the defense industry rose. All this could not grow out of nothing. Everything was based on education. Therefore, it can be argued that our education was not bad.”
There were indeed many positives. Let's not talk about the mass character and accessibility of the school level of education: today this principle is preserved. Let's talk about the quality of education: people like to compare this property of the Soviet past with the quality of education in modern society.
Despite the fact that a powerful number of leading subjects stood out in the Soviet school, among which were the Russian language, biology, physics, mathematics, the study of disciplines that give a systematic view of the world was mandatory. As a result, the student left the school bench, having almost encyclopedic knowledge. This knowledge became that solid foundation on which it was possible to “build” anything and subsequently educate a specialist in any profile.
The key to quality education was the synchronization of acquired knowledge in different subjects. The facts learned by students in physics lessons echoed the information obtained in the study of chemistry and mathematics. Thus, new concepts and terms were introduced in parallel, which helped to structure knowledge and form a complete picture of the world in children.
Today, teachers are sounding the alarm: schoolchildren lack motivation to study, many high school students do not feel responsible for their own future. In Soviet times, it was possible to create motivation due to the interaction of several factors:
1. The grades in the subjects corresponded to the acquired knowledge. In the USSR, they were not afraid to put deuces and triples even in a year. Class statistics certainly played a role, but were not of paramount importance. A loser could be left for the second year: it was not only a shame in front of other children, but also a powerful incentive to take up studies. It was impossible to buy an assessment: you had to study, because it was impossible to earn an excellent result in another way.
2. The system of patronage and guardianship in the USSR was an indisputable advantage. A weak student was not left alone with his problems and failures. The excellent student took him under his care and studied until the poor student achieved success. It was also for strong children good school: in order to explain the subject to another student, they had to work out the material in detail, independently learn to apply the best pedagogical methods. The system of paternalism brought up many Soviet scientists and teachers, who later became laureates of prestigious international awards.
3. Equal conditions for all. social status and financial situation the student's parents had no effect on school performance. All children were in equal conditions, studied according to the same program, so the road was open to everyone. School knowledge was enough to enter the university without hiring tutors. Compulsory distribution after graduation, although perceived as an undesirable phenomenon, guaranteed work and the demand for acquired knowledge and skills.
4. The emphasis is not only on training, but also on education. The Soviet school covered the student's free time, was interested in his hobbies. Sections, extracurricular activities, which were mandatory, left almost no time for aimless pastime and generated interest in further education.
5. Availability of free extracurricular activities. In the Soviet school, apart from compulsory program, electives were regularly held for those who wished. Classes in additional disciplines were free of charge and available to anyone who had the time and interest to study them.
6. Material support for students - scholarships accounted for almost a third of the country's average salary.
The combination of these factors gave rise to a huge incentive to study, without which Soviet education would not have been so effective.
A teacher in a Soviet school is an image with a high social status. Teachers were respected and treated as a valuable and socially significant work. Films were made about the school, songs were composed, presenting teachers in them as intelligent, honest and highly moral people who need to be equaled. Being a teacher was considered an honor.
There were reasons for this. High demands were placed on the personality of a teacher in the Soviet school. The teachers were people who graduated from universities and had an inner calling to teach children.
This situation continued until the 1970s. Teachers had relatively high salaries even compared to skilled workers. But closer to the "perestroika" the situation began to change. The development of capitalist relations contributed to the decline in the authority of the teacher's personality. Installation on material values, which have now become achievable, have made the teaching profession unprofitable and unprestigious, which led to the leveling of the true value of school grades.
So, Soviet education was based on three main "pillars":
1. Encyclopedic knowledge, achieved through versatile learning and synchronization of information obtained as a result of studying various subjects.
2. The presence of a powerful incentive for children to study, thanks to paternalism and free extracurricular activities.
3. Respect for teaching work and the institution of the school as a whole.
Looking at the Soviet education system from the "bell tower" of modernity, some shortcomings can be noted. We can say that they are something like a brick that we, many years later, could add to the temple of science built by a great country.
We will not touch on the problem of the abundance of ideology and the subordination of the humanities to it. Criticizing the ideological system of that time today is like criticizing the history of your country. Let's look at some of the shortcomings that can serve as an invaluable experience for us.
1. Emphasis on theory, not practice. A. Raikin's famous phrase: "Forget everything you were taught at school, and listen ..." was not born from scratch. Behind it lies an intensified study of theory and a lack of connection between the acquired knowledge and life. Nevertheless, the lack of practical experience did not prevent the education of great designers and engineers.
2. Low level of training foreign languages. The lack of experience in communicating with native speakers gave rise to the study of languages based on stamps that did not change in textbooks from year to year. Soviet schoolchildren, after 6 years of studying a foreign language, could not speak it even within the limits of everyday topics, although they knew grammar very well. The inaccessibility of educational foreign literature, audio and video recordings, the lack of the need to communicate with foreigners relegated the study of foreign languages to the background.
3. Lack of access to foreign literature. The Iron Curtain created a situation in which it became not only shameful, but also dangerous to refer to foreign scientists in student and academic papers. The lack of a fresh stream of information has given rise to some conservation of teaching methods. In this regard, in 1992, when Western influences became available, school system seemed outdated and in need of reformation.
4. Absence home education and external. It is difficult to judge whether this is good or bad, but the lack of opportunity for strong students to take subjects externally and move to the next class hindered the development of future advanced personnel, equalized them with the bulk of schoolchildren.
But no matter how hard we try today to find a "fly in the ointment" in the Soviet education system, its merits remain obvious. Perhaps the time will come, and we will return to the experience of the USSR, having mastered it positive sides taking into account the modern requirements of society.
- Tags: ,
Our country is changing rapidly and this process has been going on for almost thirty years. Everything is changing: society, the economy, people, and, naturally, the changes have also affected such an important part of society as education.
It is not worth talking much about how these or those changes affected the life of an individual.
Let's compare the education system Soviet Union and modern Russia.
Preschool education
Pre-school education in the USSR was the first, and perhaps one of the most important stages in the development of a Soviet citizen. And there is nothing surprising in the fact that kindergartens were built by the whole country. As a result, the system existing at that time before school education covered all children from birth to seven years of age. Already at the age of two, young mothers could carry their babies to the nursery. From the age of three, the baby moved into Kindergarten, where they went until they were seven years old, but there were often nurseries - kindergartens that combined both organizations. 
Despite many social problems of that time, the preschool education system of the USSR not only ensured the competent upbringing of children, but also helped the young mother to lead an active life. 
During perestroika, due to the decline in the birth rate and the emergence of such a thing as “natural population decline”, many buildings of preschool education passed into private hands. As a result of this process, many have lost such an institution within walking distance, and taking a child to a preschool every day is an overhead measure. As a result, many grandparents retired and nursed their grandchildren. 
Fortunately, over the past few years, this situation begins to improve and new, modern kindergartens are opened, equipped with last word technology, and old kindergartens are being reconstructed. But the problem of lack of places is still quite acute, besides rampant corruption has led to the fact that even if there are empty places in the kindergarten next to your house, it is very difficult to get there without expensive gifts or financial support. In addition, monthly fees for various needs have appeared, although kindergartens, like schools, which we will discuss later, receive their funding in full. 
General education (school)
How many braids were twitched and glasses were broken. However, for many people, it is the school that evokes the fondest memories of childhood. First love, first kiss and other things from adult life were discovered at school. In the USSR, due to the large area of \u200b\u200bthe country, there were several types of schools, which were divided into primary schools providing education from grades 1 to 3, eight-year-olds - grades 1-8 and ten-year schools providing full cycle education. Naturally, such a system had to ensure the uniformity of education, so that the child could easily move from one school to another. 
Same way important role boarding schools and “extension” schools played in the school system, which allowed parents not to worry about their children and work for the good of the country.
Important points in the system schooling was the medal system. Graduates of the senior level, who received semi-annual, annual and examination marks "excellent" in all subjects, were awarded a gold medal, and those who had one mark "good" - a silver one. In addition to moral satisfaction, the medal gave benefits when entering a university in the traditional form. 
Currently, schooling takes 11 years and the main goal of education is admission to a university. At the end of school, students take the Unified State exam(USE), which is required in mathematics and the Russian language. The remaining subjects are chosen by graduates themselves based on their needs. With the introduction of the Unified State Examination, all benefits, such as medals, lost their meaning and were canceled. The issuance of medals is made only as a moral encouragement. 
The USE system causes a lot of criticism from both teachers and parents. Recently, it is not uncommon for children to commit suicide by failing this exam. In addition, according to many experts, this exam does not reflect real knowledge, because the last two years of schooling, students are trained to solve specific test problems, and are not allowed to develop comprehensively.
Unfortunately, the quality of secondary education in Russia leaves much to be desired. In 2009, Russia ranked only 41 out of 65 possible places in terms of the quality of education, falling below such countries as Turkey and the United Arab Emirates. 
Naturally, we should not forget about corruption. Endless school fees, financial aid to schools for medals, and other extortion have become commonplace in the education system of modern Russia. 
Out-of-school education
The basis of out-of-school education in the USSR was a pioneer organization, and at the beginning of 1971, more than 4,000 palaces and houses of pioneers, more than 1,000 stations young technicians, almost 600 stations of young naturalists and other circles, covering a variety of areas of activity. Any student could choose a circle of interests, because the classes were free. In addition, classes in such organizations could not only pass the time, but also teach the child real professions and gain knowledge that would be useful in the future. 
There is no need to talk about free circles and sections in modern Russia. You will have to pay for everything, and even electives in some schools also exist exclusively on a commercial basis.
The average professional education
To replenish the workforce in the USSR, vocational schools were created, which allowed not only to gain knowledge, but also to master a working specialty, which usually did not need highly qualified specialists. 
In modern Russia, most of the technical schools have been transformed into colleges. The name has changed, but the essence remains the same. Technical schools and colleges teach in specialties in which secondary vocational education can be obtained in 3 years, and in certain specialties - 2 years.
Higher education
Perhaps one of the achievements of the Soviet education system is higher education, which could rightfully be considered the best in the world at that time. The system of higher education was represented by institutes and universities, and if the former mainly specialized in the training of technical specialists, then the second category of universities was focused on the training of humanitarians and teachers.
In addition to the direct training of specialists, universities in the USSR had an extensive scientific and research base, which made it possible to engage in scientific and innovative activities. 
We think that it is not worth saying that higher education in the USSR was free, and students were paid scholarships based on their grades. The average scholarship in the USSR was 40 rubles. Is it a lot? Considering that the salary of an engineer was 130-150 rubles, students could afford to live quite well.
In addition, it was in the USSR that the system of correspondence education was born. The first in the world! Despite the fact that tensions between the USSR and political opponents were not uncommon, the education system of the USSR, especially in engineering and technical specialties, occupied a leading position in the world. 
Unfortunately, perestroika, whose fruits we are still reaping, actually completely destroyed higher education, as it was in the USSR, and in 2003 the Bologna system of education was introduced throughout Russia, which basically had interesting theses, but in reality - completely destroyed the system of higher education, which was created in the USSR. Main difference new system from the past - the introduction of two levels in the system of higher education. The first level lasts 4 years and as a result graduates receive a bachelor's degree, the second level - a master's degree lasts 2 years. But most students complete their studies at the first stage, because there are no state-funded places in the master's program in individual specialties, and the cost of education is extremely high 
Speaking of tuition fees. Over the past few years, there has been a trend towards a significant reduction in budget places, and not many families in Russia can pay a round sum for the education of a child.
Currently, scholarships are paid to students who pass the next session without triples. There are several types of scholarships:
- state social scholarship is 730 rubles per month;
- state academic scholarship- 1340 rubles per month;
- state scholarship for postgraduate students is 6,000 rubles per month;
- The state scholarship for doctoral students is 10,000 rubles per month.
As you understand, the announced amounts are clearly insufficient for the student's living, so one way or another, parents have to help their children who entered the university on a budgetary basis. 
Specialties that do not provide budgetary places are prohibitively expensive for the average Russian family. So, a year of study in the humanities starts from 70 thousand rubles, technical from 100 thousand rubles. Of course, the cost of education depends on the university and its prestige, and we have given the announced figures for a provincial university. So, unlike the times of the USSR, higher education has become for many a luxury that cannot be afforded. 
In the last 10 years, a huge number of universities have appeared that do not even have their own premises and teachers working on a permanent basis. The "study" of subjects, as well as obtaining a diploma, consists in timely payment. However, such "specialists" work in a wide variety of fields, including medicine. Fortunately, recently a struggle has begun with such organizations, and licenses are promptly canceled. 
Despite all the current problems, the hope is that higher education, and indeed the entire education system in modern Russia, will not only reach the level of education in the USSR, but also surpass it. There is hope, but there is no action to achieve it. 
How do you feel about modern education? Can it at least in some way compete with the Soviet one?