The electronic resources of the Presidential Library may effectively “work” in educational institutions

A meeting with representatives of educational institutions in St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Oblast was held in the Presidential Library, within the framework of Knowledge Forum. The event was attended by the staff of the Institute for the Development of Education (St. Petersburg), the St. Petersburg Academy of Postgraduate Schoolteacher Education, the Leningrad Regional Institute for Educational Development, the representatives of the Education Committee of St. Petersburg, the General and Professional Education Committee of the Leningrad Region, the heads and methodologists of outreach and methodological centers, the teachers and librarians. The colleagues from Moscow, Voronezh, Arkhangelsk, Novosibirsk, Tyumen, Ulan-Ude and other regions participated in the event in the video-conferencing mode.

The question about which resources of the Presidential Library can enhance the process of education in schools was discussed.

As the meeting moderator, the chief research officer of the Presidential Library, PhD in Historical Sciences Pavel Fyodorov: “One of the main objectives is to promote resources on the history and theory and practice of Russian statehood, as well as on Russian as a state language in different scopes of activity, including education. This mission belongs to the Association of School Libraries and the educational authorities. All that we offer is not limited with improving the information literacy of schoolchildren, but also aimed higher on improving the methodology of teaching subjects of the liberal arts area and as a result — deepening the civil and patriotic education of the younger generation.”

In July this year, a new version of the Presidential Library website was opened for public, providing new opportunities for users of the resource to work with rare books, documents, newsreels of the beginning of the last century and contemporary movies filmed by the professional filmmaking team of the Presidential Library.

For realization of the most various educational purposes the library suggests addressing following base collections — “State authorities,” “People,” “Russian language,” “Territory,” and some special selections — such, for example, as “History of formation in Russia,” “The fact and image of Russian history in the works of Russian writers.” The Presidential Library is also known for its collections, telling about the life and work of Russian writers, composers, scientists, statesmen. With the help of these materials could be prepared not a single but entire cycles of lessons. The educational activities include viewing documentaries, video lectures, and video lessons videotaped or online on the Presidential Library website. The user can open and see such unique videos as The Most Holy Governing Synod, The Russian fleet off the coast of America, Diary of a traveler: the stay of Peter Simon Pallas in the Altai, Chairmen of the space (about the Avant-garde artists) and many others. Public video lecturing, which are performed by the best scientists of Moscow, St. Petersburg and other regions of Russia, are organized using current cutting edge information technologies, available on the Presidential Library — this content is offered to the students in an unconventional, detailed, illustrative manner.

A video lesson is a class on one of the subjects of the social and humanitarian sphere, organized by a school or college remotely on the basis of the Presidential Library stock with the objective of popularization the latest pedagogical practices. The teachers — winners of various competitions — conduct video lessons presenting the resources of the Presidential Library. A palette of the typical lesson can be enriched with little-known materials about the works of Alexander Pushkin, K. E. Tsiolkovsky, the subject of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, and so on.

Another educational project — a multimedia lesson — is organized in cooperation with educational organizations in a remote mode using current media-educational technologies on the base of the information technology of the Presidential Library for students to earn practical skills in working with electronic resources. Annually the Presidential Library prepares several cycles of multimedia lessons devoted to issues of national history and law. The topics of these lessons, as a rule, are of an interdisciplinary nature and can be included in the school curriculum in different subjects. Among the lessons are classes on the “Russian Truth: the law of ancient Rus” theme, “The young voter’s alphabet,” “The 1825: thoughts on the destiny of Russia” themes and many others. Currently, the Presidential Library is offering multimedia lessons focused on the Year of Ecology in Russia and to the Year of Especially Protected Natural Territories. A new cycle of classes is conducted for students of the upper grades of the High schools, the university preparatory schools and the lyceums.

The project “Multimedia Lessons of the Presidential Library” was launched in December 2013. In 2013-2017, more than 16,500 students from institutions of secondary general and secondary vocational education attended the classes.

As the specialists of the Presidential Library noted at the meeting, such lessons allow integrating the resources of the contemporary electronic library and its capabilities into the educational process. The use of multimedia technologies also makes the learning process more interesting and more productive.

And finally — the large-scale Olympiad of school students named “Russia in the electronic world” organized by the Russian State Pedagogical University named after A. I. Herzen on the base of the information technologies of the Presidential Library. Internet Olympiad of schoolchildren in history, social studies and the Russian language (in the first two subjects the Olympiad is included in the List of Olympiads for schoolchildren, approved by the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation) is very popular. Every year about 5-7 thousand schoolchildren from all over Russia take part in it, as well the children as from abroad.

At the end of the meeting it became obvious that formation of the personal information culture with the involvement of the resources of the Presidential Library and the new associated with it school libraries is a process that is gaining momentum and changing the educational environment to actively cognitive.