GAME TECHNOLOGIES AS A MEANS OF DEVELOPING THE COGNITIVE INTERESTS OF SCHOOLCHILDREN

Abstract. The article examines the influence of gaming technologies in the learning process. It is shown how classes using game technologies affect the effectiveness of the means of developing the cognitive interests of younger schoolchildren.

Keywords: game, cognitive interest, game technology, junior student, teacher, school, educational process, development, research, education

Currently, a person is needed who not only consumes knowledge, but is also able to extract it. Non-standard situations of our time require more interest from us. Interest is the real reason for actions, which is perceived by a person as particularly important. This is one of the constant and strong motives of activity.

One of the important types of interest is an interest in knowledge, or, as it is now called, cognitive interest. Its field is cognitive activity, during which a student studies the content of academic subjects and methods or the necessary abilities and skills through which a student receives an education.

One of the ways to develop students' cognitive activity is the use of game technologies in the educational process, as M.A. Besova believed [5]. Playing along with work and learning is one of the main types of human activity, an unusual phenomenon of our existence.    

As psychological and pedagogical studies show, the interests of younger schoolchildren are explained by the manifested emotional attitude to what is especially vividly and effectively revealed in the content of knowledge. Interest in unusual facts, in the description of natural phenomena, events of social life, history, observations with the help of a teacher on the word give rise to interest in language forms.

Studies testing the effect of the deductive path in the cognitive process (L.S. Vygotsky, A.I. Yantsov) also showed that the inductive path, which was considered classical, cannot fully correspond to the optimal development of a younger student [7].

A strong cognitive interest is formed when the emotional and rational are combined in learning. N.N. Ushakov also emphasized how important it is to make a responsible activity exciting for children. To this end, teachers supplement their activities with methods that generate direct interest of the student [19]. They use a variety of interesting cognitive material and plot-role-playing games, mini-quizzes, intelligence tasks, puzzles, charades, entertaining situations. Pedagogical science in the modern world has huge sources, the use of which in practice contributes to the successful outcome of the goals of education and upbringing of schoolchildren.

In our study, we consider cognitive interest as an emotional-cognitive attitude arising from an emotional-cognitive experience, to an object or directly convincing activity, as an attitude that, under favorable conditions, turns into an emotional-cognitive orientation of the individual.

The diversity of opinions on interest has already been noted by many in the modern world, including N. Denisenko, who devoted special chapters to it as a psychological phenomenon in his monographs [11]. V.A. Wenger, in turn, observes that interest appears before us either in the form of a random state, then in the form of a personality property and its expression in systematically recurring experiences and activities [6].

The development of interest can also be attributed to cases of changes in cognitive interest in educational interest. A.Yu. Deikina studied the features of educational interest that differ from other types of cognitive interest. The creation of cognitive interests among schoolchildren begins from the moment of studying at school [10].

Game technologies are an integral part of pedagogical technologies. L. S. Vygotsky, A.N. Leontiev, D.B. Elkonin and others were engaged in the creation of the theory of the game, its methodological foundations, clarification of its social nature, significance for the development of a student in Russian pedagogy [21].

The word "game" cannot be a scientific concept in the exact sense of the word. Perhaps it is precisely because a number of experimenters sought to find something similar between the most diverse and diverse actions denoted by the word "game", we do not have an exhaustive separation of these hobbies and a sufficient explanation of the various forms of the game to date.

Quite interestingly, this definition was characterized by I.M. Baev, namely as the freedom of the individual in the imagination, "the illusory realization of unrealizable interests" [3]. The most complete definition is presented by Yu.N. Kulyutkin [15]. He believes that play is a type of activity in situations aimed at restoring and understanding social experience, during which self-management of behavior is formed and develops.

The technology of the game as a form of organization and transformation of the educational process is considered most profoundly by S.F. Zanko, Y.S. Tyunnikov and S.M. Tyunnikova, who believe that "before the development of the theory of problem-based learning, its basic concepts, principles, methods, the game could not receive, and had no pedagogical logic of construction either in the aspect of didactic interpretation of the structure and content of problems, or in the aspect of the organization of the implementation of the game process" [14].

To study the possibilities of gaming technologies as a means of developing the cognitive interests of primary school children, an experiment was conducted on the basis of the Krasnoyaruzhskaya SOSH in the Krasnoyaruzhsky district of the Belgorod region. The experiment was attended by students of the 4th grade in the number of 20 people. They were divided into two groups. We conducted an experimental study consisting of three stages. At the ascertaining stage of the experiment, we conducted a diagnosis of the levels of formation of cognitive interests of 4th grade students, which showed that most children lack cognitive interests or are at a fairly low level.

The formative stage of the experiment allowed us to conduct a number of classes on the development of cognitive interests of students. During the lessons of this stage, we applied various forms of gaming activity, developed special exercises using game situations.

The control stage confirmed the effectiveness of the classes we developed for the development of cognitive interests of younger schoolchildren. The data of the control stage showed that the material studied during the game activity is forgotten by students to a lesser extent and more slowly than the material in which the game was not used. This is explained, first of all, by the fact that the game organically combines entertainment, which makes the process of cognition accessible and exciting for schoolchildren, and activities, thanks to whose participation in the learning process, the assimilation of knowledge becomes more qualitative and durable.

The study showed that games activate cognitive activity at all stages of learning new material, using the possibilities of methodological techniques aimed at learning the Russian language.

Thus, the introduction of games into the learning process contributes to the deepening of cognitive interest, increasing the motivation of educational activities, and the development of communicative skills. One of the essential tasks of using games in the classroom is the formation of independent work skills, the development of cognitive activity of younger schoolchildren.