Philosophical and pedagogical foundations of the sambo system and their implementation in the modern educational space

Abstract

The article is devoted to the philosophical and pedagogical foundations of the national sambo system and the analysis of how their purposeful integration into the educational space influences the personal development of students. The aim of the study is, based on a systematic analysis of the works of sambo founders, contemporary philosophical and pedagogical studies and regulatory documents, as well as a large-scale empirical study in schools, sports schools, and universities, to identify and quantitatively confirm the educational potential of sambo when implemented as a value-laden rather than merely athletic practice. The methodology includes a theoretical analysis of more than 180 academic sources, the regulatory and legal framework of education and physical culture, as well as an empirical study conducted in 24 educational institutions across six federal districts (1870 respondents: schoolchildren and students aged 10-22, teachers, coaches, and parents) using psychodiagnostic questionnaires, value orientation surveys, interviews, focus groups, and participant observation; statistical data processing was carried out in SPSS 26.0 using Student’s t-test, correlation, and factor analysis. The results show that the implementation of sambo as a holistic philosophical and pedagogical system, including the study of its history and values, ensures a statistically significant increase in academic performance across several subjects, a decrease in anxiety and aggression, and an increase in students’ stress resilience and self-esteem compared to practices where sambo is taught solely as a sport; strong positive correlations were found between years of training and the development of volitional qualities (responsibility, self-control, purposefulness), as well as moderate increases in empathy and decreases in risk-taking tendencies. The discussion of the results leads to the conclusion about the synergetic effect of the philosophical and pedagogical principles of sambo, manifested in the comprehensive transformation of the cognitive, emotional-volitional, and value-semantic spheres of students’ personalities, and substantiates the need to shift the focus of the Sambo in school project from formal coverage toward the methodologically supported implementation of the educational potential of the system, including the development of programs, teaching and methodological complexes, and teacher training.