(CZ) A. S. Makarenko a současnost
(EN) A. S. Makarenko and the Present Time

The author proceeds from the main tasks of our educational policy and socialist education as outlined by the XIVth Congress of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and by the July session of the Party’s Central Committee. On the basis of an analysis of Makarenko’s work he shows in what Makarenko’s theory as well as practice can contribute to solving our present-day tasks, especially as regards to ideological education at schools, training of young people for blue-collar occupations, training of properly educated and class-conscious teachers, and also as regards co-operation between school on the one hand, and social organizations and family on the other.
Makarenko’s works mirrors very clearly is all the principal features of a socialist pedagogy. It is revolutionary by its aim, its mission, its content and its method. Makarenko’s pedagogical theory ceases to be a utopia, a dream, an ideal for the realization of which there is no underlying historical reality, as was the case of many pedagogical thinkers in the past. He draws on the most progressive educational ideas and is also able to put them into practice thanks to the conditions created by the Great October Socialist Revolution. The fundamental principle of his pedagogy is that of the close connection of theory with practice, of education with life. He makes serve the real, humanist self-realization of man, which, however, is not to be understood in the individualistic sense, but in the social and collective sense. Education is a weapon to him in the class struggle for a new man, for a new, socialist and social order. This is what makes Makarenko’s pedagogical work an instructive legacy, which is useful also for our present life under socialism.