Abstract
This article is devoted to one of the topical issues of the modern system of higher education – the formation of soft skills among students. The authors describe the importance and the most important consequences of mastering soft skills by students. The article gives a historical overview of the appearance of the term «soft skills», based on the analysis of the works of foreign scientists, a classification of the most important soft skills necessary for the successful employment of students is developed. In the article, the authors touch upon another equally urgent problem – the use of mass open online courses for formation and development of soft skills, as an example, Coursera platform, which is becoming popular in the higher education system of our country. The article defines mass open online courses, conducts a historical analysis, and presents a literary analysis on the research topic in the Scopus and Web of Science databases. The authors have designed a model of formation students’ soft skills using Coursera, consisting of three blocks, each of which directly affects the formation and development students’ soft skills. The article describes the experience of using Coursera platform by students, undergraduates and doctoral students of the Karaganda University named after academician Buketov. The authors conducted a survey among students in order to determine the effectiveness of using Coursera platform, the survey was based on the pedagogical faculty of the Buketov Karaganda University with students of the educational program 6B01101 – Pedagogy and Psychology. According to the results of the study, recommendations were given to students and teaching staff for the further development of acquired skills, and the authors also announced the principles of selecting the most effective courses necessary for the professional activities of future pedagogues.