Openness as a personal predictor of effective resolution of pedagogical difficulties

Statement of the problem. The article discusses situations of pedagogical difficulty as a personality construct, in which the factor of “openness” acts as a personal prerequisite for resolving situations of difficulty in a developing way. It is shown that situations of difficulty in the educational space differ from life situations of difficulty mainly because they carry the requirement for the development of participants in the educational process, and therefore coping behavior is a possible but insufficient condition for their effective resolution. The purpose of the article is to consider the meaning of the “openness” parameter in the literature, to justify the expediency of highlighting adaptive and personal openness, and to show personal openness as a condition for maintaining the developing context of a situation of difficulty. Materials and methods. The research methodology was composed of research works of international and Russian scientists on the problem of personality in a situation of difficulty. The study involved 90 teachers from seven educational institutions of Krasnoyarsk working with children of preschool and primary school age. The personal component was diagnosed using the methods of 16pf Cattell, PIO, “Tolerance to Uncertainty” by S. Badner, test by M. Kuhn, T. McPartland, the results were correlated with the respondents' resolution of five situations of difficulty. The second diagnostic section took place a year later, after teachers passed the developed training program. Research results. Comparison of samples using the Mann-Whitney U-test in an experimental group that took part in special events aimed at developing the personal abilities of the participants in the experiment to transform difficulty into a developing format showed an increase in the efficiency of resolving difficulty situations (p: >0,00069; >0,0023; >0,00034; >0,00036; >0,00005), increasing tolerance to uncertainty (p>0,009) and changing the personality profile in parameter A “openness” (p>0,0029). The following interpretation of the results is possible: a mere shift in the personality profile towards greater openness is enough to significantly increase the success of resolving situations of difficulty. Conclusions. Openness is an important personal predictor of effective resolution of situations of pedagogical difficulty, since the productive resolution of situations of difficulty in an educational format is associated with a situation reaching a new level of understanding and the discovery of its qualities and capabilities that lead to a change in the participants of the educational process. The value of openness in a situation of difficulty is associated with the dialogical nature of self-awareness (the core of the personality). The underdevelopment of such a feature as “openness” can become an obstacle to the effective resolution of difficult situations, since it will increase the likelihood of stereotypical and other protective forms of behavior, closing the situation and lowering its developing potential for participants. The study showed the flexibility of this personality parameter, which allows us to set the increase in personal openness as a task in compiling educational programs for teachers.