MODERN APPROACHES TO LAW STUDENTS’ EDUCATION IN HIGHER EDUCATIONAL ESTABLISHMENTS

Abstract

The article reveals the essence of modern approaches to the future lawyers’ training in the process of university education, while studying humanities in particular. The problems of modern higher legal education and the direction of its modernization are highlighted. It is underlined that today the process of a future lawyer’s education is impossible without focusing on the development of students’ creative abilities. Among the problems of modern legal educational system the scientists outline: the development of the lawyer’s creative potential, preparation of  law-students with a creative type of thinking, the need to develop students' creative activity in the learning process, active encouragement of independent work, formation of the bases for students’ professional activity, introduction of new forms and methods of teaching, including simulations, aimed at the preparation of a broad-minded, highly-qualified lawyer etc. Consequently, the educational process in the context of university education should be learner-centered where the law student is an active subject of learning, in which creative cooperation and interaction play a dominant role.

Among key modern approaches to the development of the creative abilities of law students during professional training the following ones are analyzed: creative, competence, activity, learner-centred approaches. Procedural aspects of the future lawyer’s preparation within the framework of the given approaches are presented, future lawyer’s competences are outlined. The competences of a future lawyer include: integral general and special competences. The results of professionally oriented education comprise: social and humanitarian erudition, research skills, communication, professional self-organization, usage of information technologies, etc. Among the professional competences of law students are the following: cognitive, methodological and organizational, technological and informational; intellectual; emotional and moral-ethical ones. The structural components of lawyer’s professional activities are cognitive, communicative, organizationally - constructive, preventive activities, a creative approach to professional tasks solving.

A creative approach in a productive combination with other aforementioned approaches to the greatest extent ensures the development of internal capabilities and creative skills as indicators of the effective preparation of future lawyers, in particular in the process of foreign language education, as it: stimulates the development of personal creative abilities; teaches to act creatively, develops creative thinking; prepares lawyers for further creative professional activities.