Many actions of the two observed children reflect and relate to ideas and theories of child development. Child A involves herself in and sustains pretend play, which links to the ideas of Smilansky, Hartup and Howes. Additionally, elements of her play relate to the idea of egocentrism present in Piaget’s stages of development. Child B’s play includes moments of difficulty to be overcome, and relates to the cognitive developmental theory of Piaget in regards to equilibrium, schemas, accommodation and assimilation. Moreover, themes of moral behaviour and social learning theory are evident. Comparatively, both Child A and B’s play links to research surrounding the concept of sex-typed play behaviour.
In 1968 Smilansky devised a set of four stages,
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The pre-operational stage of Piaget’s theory is characterized by the child’s inability to perform logical thought processes, which relates to the idea of egocentrism. Cognitive egocentrism is defined as being “a lack of differentiation of the physical and psychosocial features” of others in comparison to oneself, and thus “a lack of appreciation of their perspective” (Young, 2011, p.299). This concept links to Theory of Mind, which is the ability to “attribute mental states…to oneself and others, and to understand that others have” mental states that may differ to one’s own (Wikipedia, 2015). It could be inferred that by no longer being egocentric, a child has theory of mind. Piaget found from his research that by the age of seven children have overcome their egocentric thinking. Arguably, by no longer being egocentric we become better at interacting with others and more equipped for life, as we are aware that others may have different thoughts to our own. Therefore, insinuating that not being egocentric is beneficial for a child’s …show more content…
It has been defined as “when children are playing…‘as if’ something or someone is real” (Stagnitti, 2011). Child A takes on the character of a mother figure, and her Mum is her ‘baby.’ Interestingly, despite being under three years of age, Child A manages to remain in character and stay within the pretend play scenario for the full length of the observation. It could be said this is due to her relationship with the other person she is engaging with during this, which is her Mum.
In 1994 Howes suggested, “children’s [pretence] is more sustained and complex when they are playing with friends, compared to acquaintances” (cited in Smith, 2009). Although Child A is not playing with a friend, it can be inferred that her Mum is more than her acquaintance; therefore, Howes’ statement can apply as if Child A was with a friend. Subsequently, this could explain how Child A managed to sustain her pretend play for five minutes at a minimum. Additionally, it has been proposed by Hartup that “mutuality and emotional commitment…may motivate children to sustain cooperative interaction” (1996, cited in Smith, 2009). Likewise to Howes’ perspective, this could explain Child A’s play behaviour. It can be assumed that as parent and child, the pair has an emotional commitment. In addition to this, it is evident from the observation there is cooperative interaction, as the Mum responds to what Child A says and does, and vice versa.
Parten’s idea of child lead stages of play would support JNTCP ‘behaviour that is freely chosen, personally directed’ as when the child is ready to progress they make the personal decision. It could be said that Parten’s job would have influenced the way she views play. Being a psychologist may have led her to believe that child led play is more beneficial for the child’s development as they are able to figure it out for themselves, thus making the child more independent. A teacher idea of play however, would be the opposite to that of a child psychologist, as a teacher would believe that adult led play is more beneficial for a child, as it can have a planned outcome and consequently better the child’s social, emotional and physical development. The Researching Effective Pedagogy in the Early Years (REPEY, 2002) research clearly states that there becomes a point where children need to be supported by an adult in order to further their thinking. Vygotsky theory of proximal development would support the teacher’s idea of child lead play. Proximal development represents the gap between what a child can accomplish alone, and what they can do with the guidance of an adult. Similarly, Bruner’s theory of scaffolding mimics the same idea as Vygotsky, the adult giving a helping hand to the child’s play to better their learning and
Exploring How Psychologists Study the Role of Play in Child Development Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, New Edition, 1995 defines “play” as: “[Children] when children play, they do things that they enjoy, often together or with toys. ” Play is one of the most powerful vehicles children have for trying out and mastering new social skills, concepts and experiences. Psychologists, such as Faulkner (1995), present evidence that play is seen as a mean of developing social skills and interpersonal relationships with others. The first section of the essay will present the different approaches psychologists use in the quest to learn about the role of children’s play and their related issues. This section will briefly define the nature of play and the different types of play that influence social development.
Psychological research has recognized the importance of relationships with friends and peers in the development of social skills. Although previous research has looked at the differentiated experiences that children have in play styles, few studies have focused on the precise nature of these differences and how they are manifested as a function of the social context. Fabes, Martin & Hanish (2003) examined social interactions among children. More specifically, they observed children’s naturally occurring interactions over the course of a school year to examine how active-forceful play, play near adults and gender stereotypic activity choices varied among children by the sex of the child, the sex of the partner they interacted with and whether
Side note: Piaget also felt in this stage children were “egocentric” that everything was about them. For example, when my three-year-old builds a tent and demands for her one-year-old sister to play. If her sister does not join in her fun, she will get mad and yell at her saying, “Mommy Anika come in my tent! Make her!”
Dr. Alison Gopnik’s drew the following truth that “children are intellectually more skilled and far more sophisticated in their thinking then we ever imagined”(Gopnik2009). Gopnik also stated preschoolers are extremely well designed for learning. They are naturally curious. They learn through exploring and playing. “The value of play” was also presented in Gopnik’s research. He clarified that when children engage in pretend play, they will have imaginary characters and explore other world. They are learning peoples’ nature, how people think, do, and work. This helps them understand themselves and other people, to improve their social traits or in balancing school, and to increase their social competences in life. Gopnik demonstrated the idea
Piaget stated that children function in a concrete world and therefore are unable to use language in an abstract way until about eleven years old. Consequently language does not afford young children the structure for appropriate self-expression. Piaget believed that children design symbols to communicate their wishes, ideas and emotions. This system of symbols characterises symbolic play (Piaget & Inhelder,
The word “play” has numerous meanings to different people in different contexts. Therefore it cannot have one definition and is described in a number of ways. Smith (2010) describes play as involvement in an activity, purely for amusement and to take part for fun. That play is “done for it’s own sake, for fun, not for any external purpose.” (Smith, 2010. P4) Therefore, as one precise definition cannot be presented for the word ‘play,’ it is described in a number of ways such as social dramatic play. Briggs and Hanson (2012) portray social dramatic play as the building blocks of a child’s ability to accept the possibility to step into another world, building and developing on children’s higher order thinking, accentuating the child as a social learner. Another example of play is exploratory play, which is described as children being placed in an explorer or investigator role, to identify the cause or affect a resources that is presented to them has. (Briggs, M and Hanson, A. 2012) Games are also another example of play. They are included on the basis that playing games with rules, regardless of age, can develop a child’s intellectual capabilities along with their physical, behavioural and emotional health. (Briggs, M and Hanson, A. 2012).
Piaget, J. 1962. Play, dreams and imitation in childhood. New York: Norton White, J., 2002. The child's mind. London: Routledge/Falmer.
According to Piaget Child C’s thinking could be considered as self centred, he’s at an age (4) where he thinks his views are right and others are wrong. According to Piaget children within the age range of 2 – 6 are in the preoperational stage, at this age children are not yet able to comprehend reasoning, they are unable manipulate information hence the reason why they tend to make statements such as ‘he or she is not sharing’ or ‘it’s not fair’ or ‘I’m not your friend’, this sort of behaviour is referred to as egocentrism.
Piaget performed experiments with the aim of establishing egocentrism in children and discovering the age at which children cease to be egocentric.
Play is such an important part of the learning and growing, especially for children. Children engage in many different types of play, but the play I saw the most when I observe the children of my daycare is sociodramatic play. The book Understanding Dramatic Play by Judith Kase-Polisini defines sociodramatic play as “both players must tacitly or openly agree to act out the same drama” (Kase-Polisini 40). This shows that children play with each other and make their worlds together as equal creators. Children also work together without argument.
One of the basic premises of the Theory of Mind is that a person is able to distinguish between animate and inanimate objects. Once an animate object is identified, a person can allot mental states to oneself and the others, which may be different or similar from his/her own. Consider the following analogy, a child is able to distinguish language from the various paraphernalia of noise present in the environment . Also from a very young age, they are able to distinguish one word from the other and understand what each stands for. Not only this, but similar to adult humans, infants are also able to prioritize hierarchal structures over linear structures without ever having been taught to do so. As mentioned earlier, Chomsky’s Poverty of Stimulus theory, states that this phenomenon of universal grammar is a preexisting ability of the mind to identify, separate, understand and pick up language as a child. Scientifically, what and why this occurs is yet to be proven. But where did this ability evolve
Piaget’s Stage Theory in my eyes was four key stages of development marked by shifts in how they understand the world. To me Piaget’s theories had a major impact on the theory and practice of education.
1. Piaget (1995) denies behaviorism advocates that the organism’s response as a passive only depends on the stimulus in the environment, but rather both the organism and the environment are interaction. Therefore, he believes the children are the active thinker and try to construct the world (Piaget, 2006). Thus, this paper has 4 parts to illustrate his contribution. The first is Piaget’s basic concept and theory (Para. 2-9), the second is compare with other theory (Para.10), and the third is the challenge about the theory and experiment (Para. 11-13), the last is the conclusion.
From stage one, the social development was focused on relationship with parents. In this stage, social development would be focused on the outset of play with others and developing of social skills. In Erikson’s psychosocial theory (1950), children aged between 3 to 5 years old are in the stage ‘initiative vs. guilt’. Initiative ensues when children explore the environment on their own, ask question about the world and imagine possibilities for themselves. Initiative enhances children willingness to join in activities with peers and tackle new tasks. Play can act as a role that children can learn about their social world (Parten, 1932). In my social development, play was begun with nonsocial activity, which is unoccupied, observer behavior and solitary play. Following by parallel play, which I will play beside my brother or other children with similar toy but play it individually and not trying to influence him. Then it would come to simply social play, in which I involve in similar activities with my kinder garden schoolmates, for instance drawing, with some interaction such as smile and talk with them. At last, it was cooperative play. That was theme-based play where children take special role, like I will play the role of chief and my schoolmate act as customer so I can serve them. It creates a small social organization of children who must cooperate to achieve common goal. The act of being cooperative enhances peer sociability and facilitates the development of social skills in early