Theory and methodology for the development of play activity of a preschooler

Development of gaming activities

Subject. The leading role of play activity in the mental development of preschool children

1. Role-playing game is a leading activity in preschool age.

Preschool childhood is a very special period of child development. It is at this age that internal mental life and internal regulation of behavior arise. inner life manifests itself in the child’s imagination, in voluntary behavior, in communication with adults and peers. All these important qualities and abilities arise and develop in a role-playing game.

Role-playing game

- this is an activity in which children take on certain functions of adults and reproduce (or model) the actions of adults and the relationships between them in specially created playful, imaginary conditions.

That is, in role-playing game the need to be like an adult is satisfied. Role-playing is the most difficult activity that a preschool child learns. The main feature of the game is the presence of an imaginary situation.

In such a game, all the mental qualities and personality traits of the child are most intensively formed. Gaming activity influences the formation of voluntary behavior and all mental processes - from elementary to the most complex.

When playing, children concentrate better and remember more than when given direct instructions from an adult.

Play has a strong influence on the mental development of a preschooler. Acting with substitute objects, the child begins to operate in a conceivable, conventional space. The substitute object becomes a support for thinking.

Gradually, play activities are reduced, and the child begins to act internally, mentally.

Thus, the game helps the child move on to thinking in terms of images and ideas. In addition, in the game, playing different roles, the child takes on different points of view and begins to see the object from different sides. This promotes the development of the most important human thinking ability, which allows you to imagine a different view and a different point of view.

Role play is critical to developing imagination.

Game actions take place in an imaginary situation;
real objects are used as other, imaginary ones; the child takes on the roles of imaginary characters. This practice of acting in an imaginary space helps children acquire the ability to creatively imagine
.

Communication

The interaction between a preschooler and his peers also unfolds mainly in the process of playing together. While playing together, children begin to take into account the desires and actions of the other child, defend their point of view, build and implement joint plans. Therefore, play has a huge impact on the development of children’s communication during this period.

The main tasks for developing communication skills in children:

• formation of adequate ways of behavior in conflict situations

• teaching children to jointly search for mutually beneficial solutions in difficult situations;

• development of communicative competence, peer orientation, expansion and enrichment of the experience of joint activities and forms of communication with peers;

• development of skills for self-regulation of emotional states;

• development of sympathy, empathy, adequate self-esteem;

• mastering models of social behavior in role-playing games

As shown by D.B. Elkonin

, play is a historical education, and it arises when a child cannot take part in the system of social labor, because he is still too small for this. But he wants to enter adulthood, so he does this through play, having a little contact with this life.

The essence of playful transformation: a child takes on the role of another person, creates a play situation by assigning new meanings to objects and models relationships between people. Elkonin: role + replacement.

The role of play in the mental development of a child:

 children learn the properties of objects and actions with them, and relationships between people;

 individual mental processes are formed and developed, the child’s position in relation to the world around him changes,

 the motivational-need sphere develops, the arbitrariness of mental functions develops,

 the ability to empathize develops and collectivist qualities are formed, the need for recognition is satisfied (status role) and

 reflection develops (this is a person’s ability to analyze his actions, actions, motives and correlate them with universal human values, as well as with the actions, actions and motives of other people).

 imagination develops on the basis of external play activities; a mental plan of action is formed in the child (creating a play situation, plot planning, distribution of roles);

Thus, role-playing play is the leading activity of a preschooler and constitutes a condition for his normal mental and personal development.

2. Psychological analysis of the structure of role-playing games in different periods of preschool childhood, recommendations for developing the ability to play

Structural components of a role-playing game:

plot, content, roles, rules, game actions, game and real relationships.

Plot

- the area of ​​reality that is reproduced in the game (the external side of the game) which the child takes from life (everyday, social);

Content

- what is reproduced as a central, characteristic moment of activity, relationships between adults, their work and social life

Roles

– a sample of socially desirable relationships, a generalized standard of behavior.

Rules

determined during the game by the children themselves;

Game actions

are mandatory components of the game (can be expressed symbolically). These are actions with meanings; they are figurative in nature. During the game, meanings are transferred from one object to another (an imaginary situation). However, this transfer is limited by the possibilities of showing the action, since it is subject to a certain rule: only an object with which it is possible to reproduce at least a picture of the action can replace an object.

Game and real relationships

Game relationships reflect the relationships between children in terms of plot and role (the daughter listens to her mother in the game). Real relationships - reflect the relationships of children as partners, comrades performing a common task, arise when roles are distributed, during the game, if the rules established by the children themselves are not followed. Game material includes toys, role attributes, and substitute objects.

Levels of development of gaming activity.

D.B. Elkonin

identified four levels of development of role-playing games.

First level:

1) actions with certain objects aimed at an accomplice in the game. This includes the actions of the “mother” or “doctor” directed towards the “child”;

2) roles are determined by action. The roles are not named, and the children in the game do not use in relation to each other the real relationships that exist between adults or between an adult and a child;

3) actions consist of repeated operations, for example, feeding with the transition from one dish to another. Apart from this action, nothing happens: the child does not replay the process of cooking, washing hands or washing dishes.

Second level:

1) the main content of the game is action with an object. But here the correspondence of the game action with the real one comes to the fore;

2) the roles are called children, and a division of functions is outlined. Fulfillment of a role is determined by the implementation of actions associated with a given role;

3) the logic of actions is determined by their sequence in reality. The number of actions is expanding.

Third level:

1) the main content of the game is action with an object. But here the correspondence of the game action with the real one comes to the fore;

2) the roles are called children, and a division of functions is outlined. Fulfillment of a role is determined by the implementation of actions associated with a given role;

3) the logic of actions is determined by their sequence in reality. The number of actions is expanding.

4) the violation of logic is protested. This is expressed in the fact that one says to the other: “It doesn’t happen like that.”

Fourth level:

1) main content - performing actions related to relationships with other people, whose roles are performed by other children;

2) roles are clearly defined and highlighted. During the game, the child adheres to a certain line of behavior. The role functions of children are interconnected. The speech is clearly role-based;

3) actions occur in a sequence that clearly recreates real logic. They are varied and reflect the richness of the actions of the person portrayed by the child;

4) violation of the logic of actions and rules is rejected. The child does not want to break the rules, explaining this by the fact that this is actually the case, as well as the rationality of the rules.

1. Psychological and pedagogical conditions for the development of role-playing games in preschool children.

The main tasks faced when leading role-playing games:

1) development of the game as an activity;

2) using the game for the purpose of educating the children's team and individual children. The development of play as an activity means expanding the themes of children's games and deepening their content. In the game, children should gain positive social experience, which is why it is necessary that it reflects adults’ love of work, friendship, mutual assistance, etc. The more organized the game, the higher its educational impact. The signs of a good game are: the ability to play with concentration, purposefully, take into account the interests and desires of your comrades, resolve conflicts amicably, and help each other in difficulties.

To develop a role-playing game, a pedagogically appropriate selection of toys and gaming materials is necessary, which creates the “material basis of the game and ensures the development of the game as an activity. The selection of toys should be carried out in accordance with the main theme of children's games in a given age group, taking into account the immediate prospects for their development. For children of primary preschool age, a toy is needed that allows them to develop play in the family, kindergarten, etc. In groups of middle-aged and older children, the selection of toys should ensure the development of games on work topics and games that reflect social events and phenomena.

1. The role of the teacher in the development of play in preschool children.

Leadership Techniques

Children's games can be divided into
two groups:
methods of indirect influence and methods of direct guidance.

Indirect game management

carried out by enriching children's knowledge about the surrounding social life, updating gaming materials, etc., that is, without direct intervention in the game. One of the methods of such indirect influence on children’s games is the introduction of toys and the creation of a play environment even before the start of the game. This technique is used to arouse children’s interest in a new topic of the game or to enrich the content of an existing one. The introduction of new toys arouses both playful and cognitive interest of children

Direct leadership techniques

: role-playing participation in the game, participation in the collusion of children, explanation, help, advice during the game, suggesting a new theme for the game, etc. But we must not forget that the main condition for using these techniques is the preservation and development of children’s independence in the game.

Three stages of formation of a plot-role-playing game:

On the first

stage (1.5 – 3 years), the teacher stimulates the child to carry out conventional actions with objects.

On the second

stage (3 years - 5 years) develops in children the ability to take a role, to move from one role to another in the game. This can be most successfully accomplished if you build a joint game with children in the form of a chain of role-playing dialogues between the participants, shifting the children’s attention from conventional actions with objects to role-playing speech.

On the third

stage (5-7 years old), children must master the ability to come up with a variety of game plots. To do this, the teacher can start a game together with the children - invention, which takes place in a purely speech level, the main content of which is inventing new plots that include a variety of events.

Games for preschoolers

The age of preschoolers can be divided conditionally into younger and older. At a young age, children's games are aimed at learning the properties of things and various connections. By the senior preschool period, children have new needs, so preference is given to role-playing games with peers. Already in the third year of life, children develop an interest in group games. Cognitive, active or manipulative games occupy a significant place in the preschool period. Children love to play with construction sets, as well as with a variety of available materials (household furniture, sand, clothes, etc.). At the beginning, collective play, in fact, is not such a thing - each child plays on his own with his own toys, not paying attention to the children playing nearby. However, at some point it suddenly turns out that the game is already general, with certain rules and aimed at solving the problem set by the children themselves. Gradually, preschoolers' play activities change noticeably - their creativity begins to develop, and they want to share it. Children exhibit organizational abilities to varying degrees; they already need play with a plot. Older preschoolers begin to be attracted to games that reflect the lives of adults; the most typical of these can be called games of “mother-daughter,” “school,” and “hospital.”

Didactic games

The most important importance of play activity is the development of children in its process. Didactic games conducted by teachers directly serve this purpose. These games are specially invented for training and education; they have certain rules and a specific result is expected. In fact, a didactic game is a synthesis of a form of learning and play. It sets didactic tasks, defines rules and game actions, and predicts the result. The didactic task refers to the educational impact and purpose of learning. It is well demonstrated by games that reinforce the ability to form words from letters or counting skills. The task in a didactic game is carried out through game actions. The game is based on the play actions carried out by the children themselves. The more interesting these actions are, the more effective and exciting the game will be. The teacher who controls the behavior of children sets the rules of the game. When the game ends, it is necessary to sum up its results. This may mean determining the winners who completed the task best, but at the same time it is necessary to encourage each participant in the game. Adults use didactic games as a way of learning, allowing a smooth transition from gaming to educational activities.