Organisation of Independent Work of Students of a Technical University in Field-Specific Disciplines: Instructional Commitment of a Lecturer

Abstract

The competency-based approach is regarded as the basic approach in higher educational institutions nowadays. The approach suggests certain requirements for both university lecturers and students as active participants of the teaching and learning process. In terms of the competency-based approach the development of students’ autonomy and the pedagogical conditions which stimulate and maintain the autonomy are supposed to be crucial. The paper analyses the results of the survey focused on the instructional commitment of graduate department lecturers to organise independent work of students. Students’ independent work is viewed as the most essential cognitive activity which involves certain content and organisational challenges for both students and lecturers. The survey resulted in identification of the principle directions of development of pedagogical conditions of students’ independent work organisation in the process of learning in the framework of field-specific disciplines which are delivered by the Department of Physical Methods of Non-Destructive Testing of National Research Tomsk Polytechnic University, Russia.

DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n6s1p142