Analysis of advice appeals of modern parents raising children of primary school age

Statement of the problem. In order to provide parents with high-quality psychological and pedagogical assistance in upbringing, education and development of children in the Russian Federation, the Support for Families with Children project, adopted within the framework of the national Education project, is being implemented. Within the framework of the project, specialists provide psychological, pedagogical, methodological and consulting assistance to parents, using various formats of individual and group work for this purpose. Practice shows that parents’ interest in the proposed activities is much higher when their current needs are taken into account. On the other hand, on their own initiative, parents seek help when a problem has already arisen in some area of their child’s life. Therefore, it is important to study the requests of parents for psychological and pedagogical assistance, including organization of an effective process of psychological and pedagogical education of parents, which will help to increase their parental competence and prevent the occurrence of difficulties in raising children. The purpose of the article is to identify the features of the requests of modern parents for psychological and pedagogical assistance in upbringing, education and development of primary school children. Materials and methods. The methodology of the study consists of scientific concepts reflecting the general and specific patterns of mental development of children, presented in the works by L.S. Vygotsky, D.B. Elkonin, studies of parental competence by E.A. Kabanchenko, T.V. Kovalenko, N.N. Mizina, O.V. Suvorova, O.I. Petz, the works of Russian (F.A. Akramov, O.O. Andronnikov, M.A. Evdokimova, N.V. Ivanova, E.K. Pogodina, T.M. Sorokina, etc.) and foreign (Bodenmann G., Cina A., Ledermann T., Sanders M. R., Glгveanu S.M., Graf F. A., Grumm M., Hein S., Fingerle M.) authors substantiating the conditions for effective psychological and pedagogical support of parents and improving their parental competence. The main method of the study was the quantitative and qualitative content analysis of parents’ appeals to the psychological service of the KSPU named after V.P. Astafyev to receive advice on upbringing, education and development of primary school children. A total of 7,683 requests were analyzed. Research results. The study of parents’ requests revealed typical requests in groups allocated by the age of children (from 7 to 11 years), their proportion and dynamics of requests due to changes in the age of children. The most typical requests are related to the admission of children to school: readiness for school, motivation to study, learning difficulties, and inclusive education. It is also possible to identify requests related to communication of a child with adults and peers, child-parent relationships, age crises, development of abilities and addictions. To a lesser extent, parents are interested in issues of moral development and sexual education. Conclusion. It should be noted that the need for psychological and pedagogical assistance from parents is increasing. Educational activities and psychological and pedagogical support are relevant for parents in the process of development and formation of their children’s personality at different age stages, taking into account not only their sensitive development, but also their immediate development. Such educational activities will help to solve the problems and difficulties that arise in the process of interaction with a child, and prevent erroneous actions in the process of raising children.