Abstract:

Topic Update:
The quality of education in any country is determined by the professionalism of teachers, who need to improve their skills. Professional development of teachers can be carried out in different ways: by taking advanced training courses at institutes, at school as a self-learning organization, and through self-education, using various sources of information. Both of these methods contain a key element of learning is knowledge exchange. Due to advances in digital technology, the process of knowledge exchange is becoming more accessible to teachers. However, practice shows that teachers have no pronounced motivation to share knowledge, take a mostly passive position, and do not actively seek to cooperate with colleagues. This new information is absorbed by them insufficiently, there are difficulties in applying it in pedagogical practice, and it affects the success of schoolchildren. The goal of the article is to describe the conditions for the use of digital technology, aimed at improving the efficiency of knowledge exchange between teachers.

The methodological basis of the study is the provisions of approaches to knowledge exchange in virtual teams through electronic collaboration of Jamie S. Switzer and professional communities of Thomas M. Kulopoulos, Carl Frappaolo. The key idea is that the most intensive knowledge exchange takes place in professional pedagogical communities in a virtual environment. It is important that digital technologies facilitate an intensive process of knowledge exchange through the creation of a professional pedagogical team and productive communication. The study used methods (surveys, online mentoring, pedagogical stories) and various digital resources. A survey of 270 teachers of the Chelyabinsk region and the Chechen Republic of the Russian Federation revealed their difficulties in implementing knowledge exchange in person and virtually.

Results:
The conditions for the use of digital technologies aimed at increasing the effectiveness of the process of knowledge exchange between teachers are proposed. The first condition requires the teacher to act as a moderator of the knowledge exchange process and to be proficient in the technology of online mentoring on digital platforms. The second condition involves the creation of a competent virtual team with psychological and pedagogical knowledge and capable of effectively cooperating and exchanging knowledge. The third condition involves relying on informal ways of exchanging knowledge among teachers through storytelling in which effective pedagogical solutions are integrated. The fourth condition relates to the activation of group decision-making in virtual communities.

It is concluded about the positive results of the implementation of conditions for the use of digital technology. There were 85 educators in 2020-2021 who participated in testing the described conditions in online courses and implementing professional communications in virtual communities. The questionnaire data of teachers revealed the development of their motivation to exchange knowledge, increasing the level of communicative competence, psychological and pedagogical knowledge and satisfaction with professional activity. The practical applicability, risks and opportunities of using the proposed conditions to increase the effectiveness of knowledge exchange between teachers with the use of digital technologies are shown.

Keywords:

Digital technologies, knowledge exchange, general education teachers, virtual communities, online mentoring, pedagogical stories.