Varenichenko A. “Training future elementary school teacher for the formation of ecological culture of elementary school pupils

The dissertation presents the results of theoretical generalization and solution of the issue of training future elementary school teacher for the formation of ecological culture of elementary school pupils. The essence of the concepts “culture”, “ecological culture”, “ecological culture of personality”, “ecological culture of elementary school pupils”, “professional training”, “training future elementary school teacher for the formation of ecological culture of elementary school pupils”, “readiness of the future elementary school teacher for the formation of ecological culture of elementary school pupils” was specified. We qualify training future elementary school teacher for the formation of ecological culture of elementary school pupils as a system of target, meaningful, technological characteristics of ecological education aimed at forming a professional and personal position of future elementary school teacher based on ecological and humanistic values, knowledge and skills; his ability to perceive the educational process in coordination between pedagogical and ecological education. The readiness of the future elementary school teacher for the formation of ecological culture of elementary school pupils is defined as an integral, holistic creation of the future teacher’s personality, which contains a system of environmental knowledge and knowledge about elementary school pupils as subjects of environmental and pedagogical activities, skills and professionally significant personal qualities, which allow teacher to organize effectively the ecological and pedagogical activities of elementary school pupils. Diagnosis of readiness of the future elementary school teacher for the formation of ecological culture of elementary school pupils that contained the analysis of the status of training future elementary school teacher for the formation of ecological culture of elementary school pupils and research of attitude of various categories of respondents (school children, students, teachers and lecturers) to ecological issues and problem of ecological culture formation, attitude to the experience of solving problems of ecological education, to different mechanisms of formation of ecological culture. The ascertaining experiment was organized, the results of which showed a low level of readiness of elementary school pupils. The reasons for the low level of their readiness for the formation of ecological culture are the following: insufficient attention to environmental education and formation of concepts about environmental and pedagogical activities in school; improper organization of the content of education, in particular the lack of optional courses, special seminars aimed at preparing students for the formation of environmental culture in elementary school pupils; lack of scientifically grounded methodical recommendations on training future elementary school teacher for the formation of ecological culture of elementary school pupils.