A Vygotskian Analysis of Children's Play Behaviours

Beyond the Home Corner

Zenna Kingdon

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9780367135928
• eBook ISBN: 9780429648625
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Early Childhood Education

This book brings a refreshing Vygotskian perspective to the importance of children's play, and the role it has in the physical, social, emotional and cognitive development of young children. The authors use a praxeological approach and participatory, ethical research to provide a comprehensive yet accessible addition to the crucial and expanding field of Early Years play.

Including illustrative vignettes and case studies, and covering a range of contexts, theories and approaches, the experienced authors explore a variety of topics, including:

• Role-play and Early Years practice
• Incorporating technology into practice
• Scenario and role development
• Play in the home as well as the classroom

Endorsed by EECERA, A Vygotskian Analysis of Children's Play Behaviours is an ideal choice for Early Years practitioners, researchers, policy makers, and academics researching or lecturing in early childhood education.

PART 1

Contexts and principles

An analysis of Vygotsky’s approach to play

1

PLAY AS ROLE-PLAY

A Vygotskian analysis

Zenna Kingdon

Introduction

In this chapter, I look at the work of Vygotsky in relation to role-play. I begin by providing an agreed definition of role-play. I recognise that just as play has a number of definitions, so does role-play. Thus, it is necessary to provide a definition of what we as the authors what we as authors consider constitutes consider constitutes role-play. I provide an overview of the work of Vygotsky and discuss his concern with the ways in which learners make progress, focussing on process as well as product in assessment (Daniels 2001). I consider his work that sees play as central to child development and his discussions of play that state that defining play as something that gives pleasure to children is inaccurate on two counts: there are other things that provide greater pleasure and not all games are congenial. He recognises that requirements and stimuli change with maturation. We have all yet to meet the toddler that wants to do something a few days in the future (Vygotsky 1978). I look specifically at his definition of play before moving on to consider children’s perspectives on play. It would seem that children and adults define play differently and children are rarely included in discussions of what play means to them. I then consider the relationship between role-play and cognition, recognising the ways in which well-planned and supported role-play opportunities can support children in becoming critical thinkers. Finally, I consider the ways in which a praxeological approach, combining concerns for praxis, power and ethics, utilises a Vygotskian approach and can support both children and practitioners in developing a creative pedagogy in which they construct and use knowledge (Pascal and Bertram 2012).

Defining role-play

Role-play is a central tenet of this book, and therefore, definitions that are essential to demonstrate the term will be used. It appears that role-play is an aspect of play that is discretely human; it has been suggested that this is because of its reliance on language and the ability to use one object to represent another (Smith 2010), all of which is evident in Vygotsky’s definition of play (1978). Role-play, along with play, is problematic to define. Role-play is often titled variously to include terms such as socio-dramatic play, fantasy play, and pretend play (Bolton and Heathcote 1999, Hendy and Toon 2001). This book is concerned with role-play as socio-dramatic play, in which it is necessary for there to be more than one participant that enters a play scenario. Whilst it is possible to engage in role-play activities as a lone player in much of this book, we are focussing on role-play in which there are interactions between children or between children and adults and a shared agreement about the scenario (Broadhead 1997, 2001, 2006, Parten 1932, Siraj-Blatchford 2009). Harris (2000:30) defines role-play as the ‘… shared pretend play in which they temporarily act out the part of someone else using pretend actions and utterances’. Within this book, we use the term role-play rather than socio-dramatic play.

Role-play differs from other forms of play because of its inter-subjective nature (Whittington and Floyd 2009). There is a need for children right from birth to engage in inter-subjective relationships (Göncü 1998, Trevarthen 1998). Newborn babies can imitate the expressions of significant people around them, often from only minutes after birth (Meltzoff 1999). By 2 months of age, they can participate in proto-conversational activity, in which the baby is clearly seen to focus on the face of the speaker and to recognise the need for gaps in order that the conversation partner may respond (Meltzoff 1999, Trevarthen 1998). The attainment of inter-subjectivity is essential in psychosocial development, and one place in which this can take place is within role-play (Göncü 1998). For an activity to become inter-subjective, three criteria must be met: there must be two or more players sharing a joint focus, these players must demonstrate meta-communication – the ability to step outside the play to negotiate its content, and communication using actions and language to construct the play must occur (Whittington and Floyd 2009). For role-play to be successful, the children will need to have reached consensus about the play theme (Umek and Musek 2001). Role-play is active and utilises language and actions, all of which is central to the work of Vygotsky.

Vygotsky: a review of his work

Vygotsky is concerned with the ways in which learners make progress, focussing on process as well as product in assessment (Daniels 2001). He puts the child at the centre of the learning process, seeing the child as an active constructor of knowledge. Vygotsky considers play to be central to child development. Vygotsky posited that it was as a direct result of the child’s interactions with more knowledgeable others and social interactions with members of his community that the child developed the necessary apparatus for thinking and learning (Smith et al. 2003:493). Vygotsky stressed that learning took place within the specific culture in which the child existed clearly demonstrating that cognitive development does not occur in isolation but as an aspect of socio-cognitive context. A central tenet of his work was concerned the Zone of Proximal Development, something that a child can do today with support but tomorrow may be able to complete unassisted (Vygotsky 1978).

Vygotsky’s work is marked by three distinct phases and conceptual shifts (Daniels 2001, Minick 2005). The first phase of Vygotsky’s research took place between 1925 and 1930. During this phase, he concentrated on an analytical unit which he refers to as the instrumental act. In this phase, stimulus-response was the foundation for learning and behaviour in humans and animals. He argues that speech gave humans an exclusive form of stimuli to control their behaviour; it is a mechanism common to both social behaviour and psychological processes, whilst being unique to humans (Minick 2005). During the second phase from 1930 to 1932, his focus moves to psychological systems, arguing that psychological research must focus not on the development of new mental functions but on the relationships between them and the development of psychological systems (Minick 2005). These psychological processes are known as higher mental functions and included voluntary attention, voluntary memory, and rational, volitional, goal-directed thought (Minick 2005). The last 2 years of Vygotsky’s life were marked by his greater and greater emphasis on the analysis of the development of psychological systems and their relationship with social behaviour (Daniels 2001). The significance of Vygotsky’s contributions to social theory is his study of general and meta-theory that underpins psychological phenomena (Daniels 2001). In 1932, Vygotsky delivered a series of lectures in Leningrad, which he later published as Thinking and Speech in 1934 (Minick 2005). In 1932, he also completed a critique of Piaget’s work on children’s egocentric speech (Minick 2005). Vygotsky recognises that psychology owes much to the work of Piaget. He believes that it is no exaggeration to say that Piaget revolutionised research concerning children’s thought and speech. In his text Thought and Language (1959), he states that he will begin with a critical analysis of Piaget’s work, even though ‘…we consider this theory the best of its kind’ (Vygotsky 1989:11). Vygotsky moves on to re-formulate the transition from social to inner-speech focusing on was on what he called ‘functional differentiation’ (Minick 2005:43). He continues to state that he had developed his own theoretical position ‘…in exactly an opposite direction’ to that of Piaget (Vygotsky 1989:11). His work focussed on the centrality of word meaning in communication and social practice, arguing that word meaning is part of the intellectual function of cognitive and social development key aspects of young children’s play (Minick 2005).

It would appear that for Vygotsky, the psychological tool was central to his view of children’s development. Language mediated in socio-cultural contexts supported children’s development of knowledge and understanding. The child, whilst supported by an adult or more able other in the Zone of Proximal Development, would learn and develop societal and collectivist perspectives impacted on the child’s cultural knowledge that were provided by socio-historical contexts and day-to-day experiences.

He recognised that young children develop these skills when engaged in play. Both Piaget and Vygotsky see play as not merely significant but an essential aspect of child development. Whilst Vygotsky does not assign ages and stages to his theory of development, he seems to believe that children under the age of three are not able to participate in meaningful ways in social pretend play.

Psychological theoretical approaches consider children to be ‘… active processors of the experiences that they encounter’, and it is from these experiences and encounters they begin to build a notion of self (Schaffer 2004:154). Piaget (1978) considered children to be lone investigators or scientists scrutinising their world and experiences and developing their own understandings and schema through the process. Vygotsky and Bruner suggested that children developed understanding through socio-cognitive approaches in which they were part of a social or cultural experience (Bruner 1976, 1986; Vygotsky 1978). Such approaches placed the child at the centre of any given experience and considered how they may be supported or scaffolded through an experience or cognitive encounter as a social experience that will also support their understanding of self (ibid 1976, 1978, 1986). Likewise, the child is considered to be part of the culture in which they are situated. Bruner (1986) was particularly concerned with the cultural nature of both knowledge and knowledge acquisition, arguing that children will be influenced by the culture in which they are situated and by those with whom they interact and the ways in which they are enabled to engage in play.

Vygotsky’s definition of play

Play is not ‘the predominant feature of childhood but it is a leading factor in development’ (Vygotsky 1978:101). Vygotsky clearly acknowledges the value of play in children’s development, going on to suggest that children make progress through play activities. He recognises that play changes as children develop, so that in the early stages, children are engaged in activities that are familiar, feeding the doll for example. He believes that as the play moves forward, there is a realisation of its purpose, ‘…it is incorrect to conceive of play as activity without purpose’ (Vygotsky 1978:103). He believes that through play, a relationship is developed between the field of meaning and the visual field and between thought and reality. Vygotsky (1978) concludes that whilst play appears to have little similarity to complex thought on a superficial level, it would only be possible to discover its role in development through insightful internal analysis. It would seem, therefore, that whilst he states that play is not necessarily something that gives pleasure, it is crucial in the intellectual development of the child and supporting them in moving from one stage to another.

Play is a psychological process which is not present in the consciousness of very young children and is absent in animals (Vygotsky 1978). His essential arguments that support his claims are based on research into young children’s visual perception and thought alongside those of brain damaged patients, concluding that words are originally associated with spatial location. Therefore, young children are incapable of repeating something that they can see to be wrong. For example, if they are asked to repeat the sentence, ‘My friend is standing up’, when their friend is clearly sitting down, then they will automatically say what they see. Brain-damaged patients are not able to act independently of what they see. It is from this that ‘…one can appreciate that the freedom of action adults and more mature children enjoy is not acquired in a flash’ (Vygotsky 1978:97). He argues that once a child is of preschool age, approximately 6 or 7 years, they can begin to separate fields of vision from meaning. In this way, it can be observed that in play, ‘… thought is separated from objects and action arises from ideas rather than from thi...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of contributors
• Our pedagogic creed for role-play in early childhood education
• Foreword
• Introduction
• Part 1 Contexts and principles: an analysis of Vygotsky’s approach to play
• Part 2 Approaches and techniques: Vygotsky in action
• Part 3 Case studies: role-play in practice: a Vygotskian analysis of children’s play behaviours
• Conclusion
• Index