Exploring the Development of Psychological and Pedagogical Competence in Young Teachers

Abstract

Young teacher professional development and retention is a major concern for any region of Russia. Professional adaptation of young teachers is complicated nowadays by changes in the teaching profession as such. In particular, those changes result in higher levels of psychological and pedagogical competence required from teachers, which implies embracing new activity-based methods of teacher induction. Young Professional Teacher Games have been held in Krasnoyarsk Krai since 2011 as an innovative way of promoting professional skills in young teachers that provides conditions for the development of their psychological and pedagogical competence. The article presents data from a comparative study of psychological and pedagogical competence development in young teachers as a function of whether they participated in the Young Professional Teacher Games or not. Findings show that competence indicators increased significantly in the experimental group as compared to the control group. Inferences are made on the possible ways of fostering psychological and pedagogical competence in young teachers.