KOMPJUTERSKA TEHNOLOGIJA U NASTAVI KVALITETE

YU. VASILKOV, A BOROVKOV,

SUMMARY

S. FUFIN, YARIPK Yaroslavl, Russia

Computer technologies brought many changes to the contemporary process of education.

The use of computer technologies in education makes the teaching process individual-oriented and presentation of the material more visual, it guarantees visualization of education and deeper and comprehensive analysis of the processes running in different systems. Authors uphold this kind of approach to contemporary quality education; they are also describing a project of their own called “Statistical Methods in Quality Control” giving it as an example of how a digital text book should look like.

N. INJAC - Zagreb, Croatia

COMPUTER TECHNOLOGIES OF TEACHING QUALITY

Key words: education, teaching quality, computer technologies, electronic textbook.

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hough nowadays the statistical methods are gradually winning their place in different organizations, they are still used only by specially trained experts. Methods haven’t become a norm in the work of all management lines and all those who are in charge of maintaining and servicing various processes yet. On the one hand, the opinion that statistics, being a science of complicated and huge calculations that can’t be done without a computer, is popular. On the other hand, even when the statistical methods are used skillfully they don’t always give the results expected. It’s of great importance to organize experiments correctly, to do the right computing and interpretation of the results.

The skillfulness of companies and organizations’ personnel in this field is obviously insufficient. At present the special literature on some aspects of this direction is available, mostly for the automobile industry; there are general guidelines on the use of these methods, on the application of rather complicated professional computer programs, but these programs are not in use by those who need them, whether it is a production or an office, service or education.

At the moment the supply in teaching-methodical materials is not enough. There’s a demand in comprehensive and professionally conveyed materials able to demonstrate general and specific causes of nonconformity in working processes, in assessment of product quality, to set the tasks and show methods to analyze quality and processes, to explain the essence of statistical control over the processes.

The statistical methods of quality control

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and management can be significantly effective only if they are applied at all levels. A worker controls a machine or a technological process, a foreman controls processes and people and so on, everywhere one must acquire the methods to detect shortcomings and the ways to improve the process.

To do this they need mass teaching-methodical materials enabling wide range of employees to understand the peculiarities of statistical methods,

their use and possibilities. To solve this task – to teach the masses the methods of quality control and management – nowadays is impossible without upto-date computer technologies.

It’s necessary to develop and improve a new teaching method that will be based, without any doubts, on computer technologies. The use of computer technologies, as a means of training, permits to develop the very process of education,

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to improve its effectiveness and quality. It also makes possible to realize the potential of software of modern computer systems to deliver knowledge, simulate educational situations (cases), conduct training, control results and apply the potential of artificial intellect systems.

The use of computer technologies in education makes the teaching process individual-oriented and presentation of the material more visual. In other

words, it guarantees visualization of education and deeper and comprehensive analysis of the processes running in different systems. The following possibilities of computer technologies in education are obvious: • Automation of education that reduces the influence of a teacher’s personality, increases its “admission capacity” and “cheapen specialists’ training”;

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• The use of computers as a means to demonstrate different processes with the help of the appropriate simulating programs; • Realization of the operative education systems (electronic textbooks, training equipment, business-imitating games and etc.); Continuity of different levels in students’ training should be considered as very important in teaching quality by means of computer technologies. This aspect seems natural when we speak about general and professional education, but it should also be taken into account if it relates to methodical supply of computer technologies in training quality specialists.

An important issue of computer technologies implementation is training the staff of teachers who are able to develop, introduce and actively use computer technologies in teaching quality problems.

This question is of the utmost importance in education, particularly due to a new “intermediary” between a teacher and a student – computer. Here we should consider different aspects: • Psychological readiness of a teacher to use “depersonalized” computer technologies; • Creative “applied” potential that ensures an individual approach in education; • Creative potential of a developer enabling to work out his own software applied to different directions; • Possibility to realize an analytical approach to the results of training and to choose the substantiated directions of further development of computer technologies on the basis of these results.

The use of computer technologies in the field of education doesn’t only increase the effectiveness of training, but can be also useful for the individual training of those people who due to different reasons are unable to attend classes. First of all, we mean the heads of subdivisions and organizations that must have an opportunity to get further highclass education without giving up their direct functions at work. This form of education is backed up by concrete demands of professionally trained specialists engaged in real business who are aware of their needs and truly willing to improve their education level. Therefore, one of the main forms of education must become open and distant, moreover combined with the work (in-company training or, at least, without giving up work). In this case the role

of computer technologies increases greatly.

All the principles and peculiarities of the computer training systems stated above are realized in a number of electronic textbooks and programs that were developed on the basis of the authors’ experience in the sphere of problems related to quality management in different fields, simulating and controlling production processes, in statistical methods, in qualification improvement of students and adult specialists in quality.

The electronic textbook “Statistical Methods in Quality Control” is targeted at independent reading and studying specialized methods of quality control.

It is designed for both specialists in the field of quality and the leaders of any level that are willing “to make decisions on the basis of facts”, i.e. to follow in their activity one of the eight fundamental principles of up-to-date management.

The textbook contains the condensed theoretical material on the role of statistical methods in quality control, presents graphics, including animated, basic concepts of mathematic statistics and recommendations how to use them for the solution of tasks in quality control in the following directions: seven the easiest classical methods of quality control, distribution of random quantities, methods of statistical assessment of quality indices and their changes in processes, methods of causeand-effect analysis, including the assessment of nonquantitative indicators of quality, the peculiarities of the selective control, managerial methods, methods of planning experiment, the basics of “six sigma” methodology and some other practically important sections.

The electronic textbook is aimed, in the first place, to give a trainee the possibility to explore independently the peculiarities of the discussed tools of quality control and to study their basics.

When a trainee understands the essence of these methods – only in this case – he can use them efficiently. The electronic textbook allows the independent and detailed study of the peculiarities of the majority of the given methods; it permits to assess their effectiveness and possibilities, to learn how to apply them in practice, including the analysis of data available for a specialist.

While designing the practical part of the electronic textbook, we considered and realized all the fundamental principles of building the similar teaching programs. First of all, the program is oriented for a practitioner in the field of quality

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control, not for an expert in the area of mathematic statistics, mathematic simulating or other sections of mathematics that are used as the basic methods of quality control. It found its reflection, first of all, in the visual nature of the methods presented in the textbook, in the way and technique of their realization, in gradual, step-by-step revealing the essence of the method. The last was designed allowing for an individual tempo of mastering the material by an adult, which corresponds to the science of teaching grown-up people – androgogics.

All programs in the electronic textbook aimed at the exploration of the essence of methods have all possible visual aids, large possibilities to alter the parameters of methods and the conditions of their appliance. It is necessary to do because it helps a trainee to independently discover conditions of the use, the areas for the preferable usage and etc.(it’s more effective than to hear about it a hundred times).

One more important feature of this textbook is its combined structure. A trainee studies the methods by himself, and then solves the concrete quality problems. In these tasks different spheres of human activity are reflected; it proves the similarity of principles of quality control. The textbook presents the tasks and their solutions that are discussed in detail and illustrated in videos, and the problems to be solved independently.

Trainees have possibilities to check their knowledge with the help of build-in test system.

The structure of the electronic textbook permits to easily translate it into different languages, to introduce new sections to expand the discussed theme.

The teaching-methodical materials for training personnel to solve various quality problems, presented in this work, have been approved by practice, got great interest of trainees and proved to be effective in education.

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KOMPJUTERSKA TEHNOLOGIJA U NASTAVI KVALITETE SAŽETAK Kompjutorske tehnologije unijele su mnoge promjene u suvremeno vođenje nastavnog procesa. Uporaba kompjutorske tehnologije u obrazovanju čini nastavni proces neposrednijim, garantira vizualizaciju obrazovanja i dublju i sveobuhvatniju analizu procesa koji se odvijaju u različitim sustavima. Autori u ovom radu zagovaraju upravo ovaj pristup suvremenoj nastavi, nudeći primjer vlastitog projekta elektroničkog udžbenika «Statističke metode u kontroli kvalitete».

Ključne riječi: obrazovanje, nastava kvalitete, kompjuterske tehnologije, elektronički udžbenik