=Paper=
{{Paper
|id=Vol-2643/paper03
|storemode=property
|title=Technology of forming future journalists' social information competence in Iraq based on the use of a dynamic pedagogical site
|pdfUrl=https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2643/paper03.pdf
|volume=Vol-2643
|authors=Alla A. Kharkivska,Liudmyla V. Shtefan,Muntasir Alsadoon,Aleksandr D. Uchitel
|dblpUrl=https://dblp.org/rec/conf/cte/KharkivskaSAU19
}}
==Technology of forming future journalists' social information competence in Iraq based on the use of a dynamic pedagogical site==
https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2643/paper03.pdf
82
Technology of forming future journalists’ social
information competence in Iraq based on the use of a
dynamic pedagogical site
Alla A. Kharkivska1[0000-0003-4782-1079], Liudmyla V. Shtefan2[0000-0002-9910-5499],
Muntasir Alsadoon2[0000-0002-2921-2352] and Aleksandr D. Uchitel3[0000-0002-9969-0149]
1 Kharkiv Humanitarian-Pedagogical Academy, 7 Rustaveli Ln., Kharkiv, 61001, Ukraine
kharkivska_hgpa@ukr.net
2 Ukrainian Engineering Pedagogics Academy,
16 Universytetska Str., Kharkiv, 61003, Ukraine
lvlshtefan@gmail.com, alsadoonmunaser7@gmail.com
3 State University of Economics and Technology,
5 Stepana Tilhy Str., Kryvyi Rih, 50006, Ukraine
o.d.uchitel@i.ua
Abstract. The article reveals scientific approaches to substantiating and
developing technology to form social information competence of future Iraqi
journalists based on using a dynamic pedagogical site. After pre-interviewing
students of the Journalism Faculty at Al-Imam Al-Kadhim University College
for Islamic Sciences in Baghdad, the authors came to the conclusion there are
issues on defining the essence of social information competences. It is established
that the majority of respondents do not feel satisfied with the conditions for
forming these competences in the education institutions. At the same time, there
were also positive trends as most future journalists recognized the importance of
these professional competences for their professional development and had a
desire to attend additional courses, including distance learning ones.
Subsequently, the authors focused on social information competence of future
journalists, which is a key issue according to European requirements. The authors
describe the essence of this competence as an integrative quality of personality,
which characterizes an ability to select, transform information and allows to
organize effective professional communication on the basis of the use of modern
communicative technologies in the process of individual or team work. Based on
the analysis of literary sources, its components are determined: motivational,
cognitive, operational and personal. The researchers came to the conclusion that
it is necessary to develop a technology for forming social information
competence of future journalists based on the use of modern information
technologies. The necessity of technology implementation through the
preparatory, motivational, operational and diagnostic correction stages was
substantiated and its model was developed. The authors found that the main
means of technology implementation should be a dynamic pedagogical site,
which, unlike static, allows to expand technical possibilities by using such
applications as photo galleries, RSS modules, forums, etc. Technically, it can be
___________________
Copyright © 2020 for this paper by its authors. Use permitted under Creative Commons License
Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0).
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created using Site builder. Further research will be aimed at improving the
structure of the dynamic pedagogical site of the developed technology.
Keywords: Social information competence, Future journalist, Dynamic
pedagogical site, Technology.
1 Introduction
1.1 Research problem
Globalization of modern society, economic changes cause the intensification of the
competent approach to training modern specialists. It is the level of its formation that
determines their competitiveness in the labor market. As a result, there is a need to
implement a competent paradigm in vocational education that involves radical changes
in methods, forms and means of learning [11]. This trend is also common for training
future journalists around the world [10]. It acquires particular importance in countries
which are in conflict zones. It is Iraq today. Development of the modern information
society and special conditions of personality in the society stimulate the need for
particular attention of scientists to forming social and informational competence of
future journalists in general and Iraqi ones in particular. There is a search of
technological ways to meet the public demand based on information technologies that
have recently tended to be dynamic pedagogical sites.
They introduce fundamental changes in the professional training of future journalists
as they allow to implement a person-centered approach on a high level of requirements
in following the competence paradigm. However, at the present stage, there is a clear
discrepancy between the growing demands of society for forming social and
information competence of future journalists and the lack of development of the
necessary technologies, based on effective information resources, in relevant higher
education institutions in Iraq.
The purpose of the paper is to substantiate and develop the technology of shaping
the social information competence of future Iraqi journalists based on the use of a
dynamic pedagogical site.
1.2 Problem statement
Today, there is no doubt that the competency-based approach should become the basis
for fundamental changes in vocational education [9]. Indeed, according to John Raven,
competence is a specific ability to effectively perform certain actions in a particular
professional field [10]. And Iryna V. Demura agrees with the definition. She believes
that competence is an appraisal category that characterizes a person as a subject in terms
of the ability to make qualified judgments, to take adequate responsible decisions in
problem situations, to plan and act to rationally and successfully achieve set goals [2,
p. 66]. Taking into account the aim of the study, the most appropriate definition of
professional competence is a special set of knowledge and skills that allows a specialist
to successfully operate in the professional field in any, including extreme, conditions
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[5, p. 46]. The very conditions take place in Iraq, which is in an unstable position due
to the aggravation of conflict situations there. In addition, the country has a significant
level of illiteral population, lack of qualified specialists, strict control of political forces
[6; 8]. This complicates the working conditions of journalists and their achieving a high
professional level. Undoubtedly, these peculiarities of professional activity must be
taken into account in their professional training and in higher education institutions in
Iraq, actively involving modern information technologies.
2 Results
To obtain objective information on the state of implementing the competency-based
approach in the training of future journalists at higher education institutions of Iraq, we
carried out a questionnaire survey among the students of the Journalism Faculty at Al-
Imam Al-Kadhim University College for Islamic Sciences in the city of Baghdad.
The reliability coefficient for the questionnaire had a value from 0.85 to 0.91 (for
p < 0.01), which proves its high reliability.
The survey was carried out during the 2018–2019 school year. There were
58 students in the second year of study. According to the respondents data, the age
ranged from 20 to 25; there were 35 male and 23 female students.
The questionnaire had sixteen questions, mostly closed-ended questions and some
open-ended, which were meant for open answers of respondents. At this stage of the
research we focused on guaranteeing students’ understanding of concepts “social” and
“information” competencies. Next, there will be the results of the survey which students
offered when answering open-ended questions (with the maximum of the original
language).
The question “Do You know the concept of social competence?” got 85% positive
answers. For the question “Are you aware of the concept of information competence?”,
97% of respondents chose “Yes”. From this, we concluded that most students are
familiar with the concepts of “social competence” and “information competence”. But
further, there was a certain contradiction. Providing an answer to the question “How
would you define the concept of “social competence?”, 85% of respondents gave
mostly chaotic answers, e.g. that it relates to the protection of people, especially those
that have special needs. 5% of students understand this competence as “the ability to
put the right person in the right place” and 10% did chose the option “I don’t know”.
More accurate responses were received from half of the respondents when answering
the question about the essence of the concept “information competence”: 28% of
respondents stated that “it is when a journalist has sufficient knowledge in collecting
information”; and 22% said “it is when a journalist has a full understanding of scientific,
social, or political information”. The other half of respondents chose the option “I don’t
know”.
So, although most students have certain knowledge of “social” and “information”
competence, as the answers to the first two questions proved, but they haven’t got
necessary profound knowledge. As the additional survey showed, the reason for this
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was the lack of attention to these competencies when teaching professionally oriented
disciplines.
The questionnaire had a task of ranking qualities according to their importance for a
journalist:
a. ability to study new ways of activity;
b. the ability to make a decision;
c. the ability to build communication;
d. the ability to study situations in society;
e. the ability to organize an individual and group work.
Unfortunately, only 46% of the respondents did the ranking task. Ranking the responses
as the most important was as follows. “The ability to build communication” was
number one in almost 58% of those who answered the question; “The ability to study
situations in society” was number one for 23% of respondents; “The ability to study
new ways of activity” was chosen by 11%; “The ability to make a decision” was the
most important for only 4%; “The ability to organize individual and group work” was
also chosen by 4% of the respondents. It’s crucial to emphasize that 54% of respondents
did not answer this question. The results of the survey are in Figure 1.
Answers of respondents %
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
the ability the ability the ability the ability to make the ability to
to build to study situations to study new a decision; organize an
communication in society ways of activity individual and
Answer options group work
Fig. 1. The survey results of the respondents when ranking importance of certain qualities
When answering the question, “What, in your opinion, contributes to the formation of
social competence?”, the answers were as follows: 10% chose the disciplines of Civil
freedom and Sociology; 4% – Culture of freedom; 86% chose the option “I don’t
know”. When answering the question, “What, in your opinion, contributes to the
formation of information competence?”, 5% of the students chose Sociology, 5% –
Information culture; and the vast majority (90%) chose the option “I don’t know”.
Therefore, the answers to these questions can be traced to insufficient knowledge and
understanding of the deep connections between academic disciplines and their
influence on the formation of the concepts of social and information competence in
general.
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Students were asked to answer the question of whether they find the conditions of
forming social competence satisfactory at the education institution. The results showed
that only 14% of the respondents were satisfied with the conditions, while the majority
(86%) believed that they were insufficient. When answering the question whether they
find the conditions of forming information competence satisfactory, 100% of the
respondents chose the answer “No”. The results indicate dissatisfaction of students with
the conditions for forming social, and especially information competences created at
Al-Imam Al-Kadhim University College for Islamic Sciences.
The students were also asked the following question: “What contributes to the
formation of a single information space?” with the following options to choose:
a. computer technology;
b. information resources;
c. international communication.
Only 48% answered it. Ranking on the most important position was as follows:
“International communication” by 54% of the students who answered; “Information
resources” by 29% of respondents and 17% of the respondents chose “Computer
technology”. The results of the survey are in Figure 2.
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Answers of respondents %
50
40
30
20
10
0
international communication information resources computer technology
Answer options
Fig. 2. The results of the respondents when answering the question What contributes to the
formation of a single information space?
The students were asked to determine what classes stimulate the creativity of future
journalists. Only 55% of the respondents offered answers. The ranking of the responses
showed the following results: practical classes were chosen by 57% of the students,
group classes – by 31% and 6% of the respondents chose individual tasks and lectures
respectively (Fig. 3).
There was also the question: “Are you interested in the problems of forming future
journalists competence?” 66% of the respondents answered affirmatively and 17%
chose the option “Sometimes”. The question was of no interest for 17% of the survey
participants.
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Answers of respondents %
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
practical classes group classes chose individual tasks lectures
Answer options
Fig. 3. The results of the respondents when answering the question What classes stimulate the
creativity of future journalists?
The students were asked the following open-ended question: “What qualities, in your
opinion, determine the level of competence of the future journalist?”. The results
showed that the overwhelming majority of them (90%) identified such qualities as
honesty and determination; 5% pointed out that “they are the ability to collect
information and to form a level of social relations”; and 5% of the respondents did not
answer this question.
It was of interest to us whether students believe social and information competences
have a significant impact on the level of journalist professionalism. The answer was
unanimous: 100% of them chose the answer “yes”. We got the same answer to the
question of whether they would like to attend additional courses in order to form social
and information competences. The students’ answers prove importance of the
competencies for professionalism and show they are ready for additional training. To
clarify the last question, we asked whether the students would like the extra courses to
be organized remotely? 96% of them chose the answer “yes”. The answer demonstrates
their readiness to implement new information technology of education in the process
of vocational training.
Thus, the analysis of the survey results of the students at the Faculty of Journalism
at Al-Imam Al-Kadhim University College for Islamic Sciences, Baghdad, shows that
students were not always active, especially when it was necessary to show their
knowledge and define the notion. The conditions for forming information and social
competences created at the education institution were not satisfactory for most of the
students. However, there are also positive trends – most of them recognize the
importance of these professional competencies and are ready to attend additional
courses for their formation, including those in the remote mode.
It is worth noting that for the Arab educational system, the competency-based
approach is fundamentally new today. Its implementation doesn’t get much attention
and it remains at the periphery of vocational training. Therefore, managing the quality
of education and training of journalists in Iraq requires urgent adjustments. Moreover,
at the present stage, the training of future journalists should be directed towards the
formation of their ability to use modern information technologies in their professional
activities and the ability to manage information coming from different sources. The
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practical implementation of the competency-based approach will certainly increase the
level of competence of Iraqi journalists.
The revision of curricula for journalists, changes in the content of curricula, the use
of innovative forms and methods of organizing the learning process, the creation of a
modern set of methodological support will help solve the task. It is extremely important
to organize independent work of students, since it contributes to the development of
motivation for further development of information technologies, self-organization of
the student’s activity, and allows them to be independent in decision-making.
Further, social information competence of the journalist was of prior interest to the
study as it belongs to be the key competences and is viewed by the European
community through such indicators as knowledge of information technology, critical
attitude to social information, etc. [3, pp. 428–429]. It systematically covers the
peculiarities of both the social and informational competences of future journalists.
The preliminary work allowed for the authors to define the concept of social
information competence (SIC) of journalists as an integrative quality of personality,
characterizing an ability to select, process, transform information and organize effective
professional communication based on the use of modern communicative technologies
in the process of individual or team work [1, p. 13].
When conducting the study, we determined the components of social information
competence of journalists and their content:
1. Motivational component: implies an interest to the formation of social information
competence, the development of motives for self-improvement.
2. Cognitive component: includes knowledge about information technologies used in
journalism; knowledge of the social technologies of the journalist’s activity;
knowledge of norms (ethical and legal), regulating professional activity.
3. Activity component: ensures the formation of skills that allow collective and
individual activity in the information environment for future journalists; abilities to
search, collect, represent, and transmit information; abilities to analyze information
from different sources and synthesize new knowledge; abilities to creatively
comprehend information and create as well as share in the information space own
tools based on information technology
4. Personal component: involves the formation of personal qualities necessary for
future journalists, namely, responsibility, independence, diligence, organization,
perseverance.
To address the problem of implementing these components in the process of
professional training of future journalists is Iraq, technologies for forming social
information competence of journalists were substantiated and developed.
Technological approach to education is traditional. In the study, there is the position
that the structure of pedagogical technology includes the conceptual framework;
content (learning objectives, contents, training material) and procedural (organization
of educational process, methods and forms of educational activities, diagnosis of the
educational process) parts [7, p. 907].
Based on these conclusions and taking into account the structure of social
information competence of future journalists, the stages of study technology were
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identified, which included preparatory, motivational, operational, and diagnostic
corrective.
The preparatory stage of technology has the objective of carrying out
organizational and methodological work. One of the basic tools of technology will be
a dynamic pedagogical site of the teacher and the textbook that will meet the
requirements of forming social information competence of future journalists. They will
be developed at this phase. Simultaneously, it is necessary to take organizational steps
in introducing them in educational process of education institutions. Previuosly, it is
necessary to deal with teachers to increase their attention to this competence in the
educational process. Therefore, the enhancement of classroom training to form social
information competence of future journalists is the first pedagogical condition of
implementing the technology of study.
Next, it is about detailing the work on the development of a dynamic pedagogical
website which is the main tool of the presented technology. Dynamic websites differ
from static ones as they allow to expand opportunities through applications such as
photo galleries, RSS modules, forums, etc. Today websites of this type are actively used
by teachers, therefore, it’s called “pedagogical”. In our study, this dynamic pedagogical
site should be the tool of the teachers, which will allow them to systematically and
promptly provide information on the formation of social information competence of
future journalists.
Thus, a dynamic pedagogical site for formation a journalist’s social information
competence is an information-pedagogical construct that allows the teacher to
positively influence the formation of the communicative and information components
of the professional activity through the complex use of measures to form theoretical
and practical training, also professional qualities through the mobile use of information
technology.
Site builder was used. This is an online service that allows to create a website and
publish it in the Internet without programming skills. Only an Internet-enabled
computer and a web browser are required to use it.
The advantage of Site builder is that it allows you to customize virtually every
element of the template without programming. In particular, it allows you to make the
following changes to the template:
1. Adjust the position of the header.
2. Change the font layout of the entire site.
3. Specify the font, height and spacing of the logo font.
4. Change the background image, types and kinds of links, etc.
Based on this constructor, during the study, the website was developed to organize the
independent work of future journalists. It includes the following structural components,
which are located in the menu bar:
1. Home.
2. The program of organizing independent work of students.
3. Tutorials, textbooks and teaching materials for self-education.
4. Dictionary.
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5. Video appendices (including video lectures by the teacher on the “Student
Independent Work Program”, interesting video information on journalistic topics,
etc.).
6. Audio Add-ons.
7. News in Journalism.
8. Conferences, forums symposia on journalism.
9. Grants, training for journalists.
10. Knowledge tests.
11. Tests to determine the personal qualities of future journalists.
12. Forum.
13. Help.
The last component is not obligatory. It consists of information about the basic elements
of using a pedagogical site and includes instructions that are necessary to navigate there.
The site has a photo of the teacher, contains the national symbols, allows learning in
two languages: Arabic and English (Fig. 4).
Fig. 4. The page of the dynamic pedagogical site
Creating a learning social informational environment based on a dynamic pedagogical
site that promotes self-education of future journalists is the second pedagogical
condition for implementing the mentioned technology.
The motivational stage of the technology is aimed at encouraging students to form
their social information competence as an important component of their
professionalism. This will be done through a dynamic pedagogical site, the materials
of which will collectively give an idea of importance of the competence and the process
of managing its formation. A significant role is assigned to the teaching staff of the
education institution, which should pay much attention to the competence in the process
of teaching academic disciplines in order to provide relevant professional interest in it.
Forms of stage implementation: lectures, seminars, individual work.
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Methods of stage implementation: persuasion, interactive conversations in the
Internet, case-technology.
Means of stage implementation: dynamic pedagogical site, computer.
The operational stage of the technology is the basis of the formative stage of the
pedagogical experiment. It is aimed at forming necessary knowledge, skills, experience
and professional qualities of students that will correspond to the essence of the future
journalists’ social information competence. To implement these tasks, all the webpages
of the dynamic pedagogical site and a set of cases will be used. It is necessary to
strengthen the work of the teaching staff by intensifying attention to the formation of
this competence.
Forms of stage implementation: problem lectures; seminars, individual, group and
pair work; individual work.
Methods of stage implementation: persuasion, interactive conversations and online
case decisions, case-technology, personal example.
Means of stage implementation: dynamic pedagogical site, computer, cases.
The diagnostic corrective stage of technology is aimed at clarifying qualitative
changes in the formation of social-information competence of future journalists and to
carry out corrective technological measures (if necessary) on this basis. This work was
carried out at the control stage of the pedagogical experiment.
The model of technology of forming social information competence (SIC) of future
journalists on the basis of a dynamic pedagogical site, which in addition to educational
functions, included also managerial (organization, planning, decision-making, control
over the qualitative formation of SIC). This model was implemented in the educational
process of Anbar University (Er Ramadi) and Tikrit University (Tikrit). The study
involved 52 individuals. The implementation of the developed technology led to
positive changes in the quality of students education. A complex of diagnostic methods
was created, which included three blocks: a cognitive block of test tasks for testing
students’ knowledge, an activity block of tests for testing their practical skills and a
personal block of psychological tests for determining the formation of professional
qualities. The results showed that almost 42% of the respondents improved theoretical
knowledge and 38% – practical skills. Among personal changes, abilities to self-
development, to work with information, and attentiveness were reported improved.
More detailed results will be presented in the following article.
The model of the technology developed during the study is shown in Figure 5.
Thus, the use of the technology of forming social information competence of future
journalists on the basis of a dynamic pedagogical site led to positive changes in the
quality of professional training.
3 Conclusions
1. The analysis of scientific literature provided grounds for determining the essence of
the concept of “social informational competence” of future journalists as an
integrative quality of personality, which characterizes an ability to select, process,
transform information and allows to organize effective professional communication
92
based on the use of modern communicative technologies in the process of individual
or team work and identify its components (motivational, cognitive, activity and
personal).
The aim of the technology: to form SIC of future journalists
The content of the structural components of SIC for future journalists
formation of social information competence, the development
and create as well as share in the information space own tools
environment for future journalists; abilities to search, collect,
information technologies used in journalism; knowledge of
knowledge; abilities to creatively comprehend information
allow collective and individual activity in the information
Personal component: involves the formation of personal
Activity component: ensures the formation of skills that
represent, and transmit information; abilities to analyze
information from different sources and synthesize new
responsibility, independence, diligence, organization,
Motivational component: implies an interest to the
the social technologies of the journalist’ s activity;
knowledge of norms (ethical and legal), regulating
Cognitive component: includes knowledge about
qualities necessary for future journalists, namely,
based on information technology
of motives for self-improvement
professional activity
perseverance
DYNAMIC PEDAGOGICAL SITE
Stages of technology
Preparatory Motivational Operational Diagnostic
corrective
Technology Toolkit:
Forms: lectures, seminars, independent work of students, individual and group forms.
Methods: persuasion, interactive conversation and online case management.
Tools: dynamic pedagogical site, computer, set of cases.
Pedagogical conditions: intensification of students’ classroom education in the direction
of forming SIC; creating an educational social information environment on the basis of the
dynamic pedagogical site.
Expected result: SIC of future journalists
Fig. 5. The model of technology for forming social information competence of future
journalists on the basis of a dynamic pedagogical site
2. In the course of the study, based on the survey of the students the Journalism Faculty
at Al-Imam Al-Kadhim University College for Islamic Sciences, Baghdad, there was
an issue of implementing competency-based approach. Next the focus of the study
93
was on social information competence of future journalists, which is one of the key
issues according to European requirements. The technology of forming this
competence for future journalists based on the use of modern information
technologies through the implementation of preparatory, motivational, inductive,
activity and diagnostic, correctional stages has been substantiated and developed,
and its model has been developed.
3. The main means of implementing this technology has become a dynamic
pedagogical site, the technical basis of which is Site Builder. The contents of the
website pages create all the necessary conditions for organizing qualitative self-
education in order to form social information competence of future journalists.
4. Further trends will be aimed at improving the dynamic pedagogical site of the
developed technology.
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