Extracurricular educational activities for prospective teachers’ professional identity development

The influence of extracurricular educational activities at the university on prospective teachers’ professional identity development has been grounded on the basis of literature on psychology and education analysis, as the influence reflects the professional identity related to axiological definition of life in profession and a semantic system uniting determination of oneself and one’s profession. The authors define «professional identity», «teacher’s professional identity», a complex of methods evaluating student’s professional identity development dynamics, and clarify the scientific concept of «extracurricular educational activities at the teacher training university». In this work it is understood as an interaction of teachers and students outside the learning process aimed at student’s personality formation as a subject of prospective professional teacher’s work, professional identity, self-perfection, self-education and self-development. Extracurricular educational activities at the teacher training university are regarded by the authors as a part of prospective teachers’ education and professional training. The empirical studies of the professional identity carried out by the authors reflect the role and place of extracurricular educational activities at the teacher training university, as well as their forms and methods for the development of the researched object. Forms, methods and ways of extracurricular educational activities at the teacher training university promoting prospective teacher’s professional identity development were identified and verified experimentally. The recent study makes it possible to assume that the prospective teacher’s professional identity results from extracurricular educational activities at the university.