Co-construction of pretend play The teacher’s roles and children’s narrative development

Dorian de Haan

INHOLLAND University

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Overview

1. Socio-constructivist theory: some

basic principles

2. Narrative development and literacy

3. Dutch Vygotsky-based Education

4. Research: questions, theoretical

concepts, method, results

5. Conclusions

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Socio-constructivist theory: basic principles

Social context of development

Play is the ‘leading activity’ in the preschool

Pretend play is “speaking in prose ” (Vygotsky, 1976, p.548) (Narrative / literacy development)

Zone of proximal development • Scaffolding• Guided participation & non-verbal and distal

arrangements (Rogoff)• Activity setting (Wertsch)

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Narrative development & literacy

LiteracyLearning to extract meaning from the text: an autonomous text

Learning to understand & produce genre-specifiek text structures

Learning to reflect about the text: meta-linguistic competence

Pretend playLearning to represent. Vygotsky: “action arises from ideas rather than from things” : an autonomous meaning

Learning to understand & built a narrative structure

Learning to reflect (talk & negotiate) about content and structure of the narrative

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Dutch Vygotsky-based Education “Developmental Education”

Basic principles:Children’s participation: meaningful learning, the learning trajectory is constructed in collaboration with the children

The teacher designs the curriculum rather than following a standard program

• Pedagogical framing: planning, providing resources• Pedagogical interactions

For young children: play based curriculum

Pretend play: “The heart of play development” : involving all developmental domains (Janssen-Vos, 2004)

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Research questions

How do teachers enhance the symbolic play of

young children for whom the language of the

preschool is a second language?

Which roles of the teacher are most favourable for

children’s play development?

• Are there any differences in the teachers’

guidance depending of the (play, language)

development of the children involved?

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Theoretical Concepts ZPD: The teacher

Activity setting:

• Situation definition, goal structures (Wertsch) and distal arrangements (Rogoff)

Roles (Johnson, Christie & Yawkey, 1999)

• Onlooker• Stagemanager• Co-player• Play leader• Director/instructor

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Theoretical Concepts Teacher and Children

Narrative play actions

Representation:

• from context dependency to representation without

contextual support

Narrative structure:

• from single to connected fantasy actions

Reflection:

• from solitary to parallel and co-operative play

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Method

Casestudy: Voorschool & Plusklas

• 80 - 100% non- indigenous children

• Mean age Voorschool 3.6, Plusklas 3.1

• Four teachers

Design-based research: Collaborative, improving

educational practice

Data collection

• Interviews, video observation

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Teachers’ views: definition of activity setting and roles

VOORSCHOOL

Goal structure:

• Focus upon children’s involvement in play

• Co-operative play

Educational arrangement: Preparation with all children

Intersubjectivity: children’s play as starting point for their participation

·Role:

1 Co-player

2 Onlooker

PLUSKLAS

Goal structure:

• Focus upon language acquisition

• a common language, input

Educational arrangement: Creating a small group setting

Intersubjectivity: modelling by the teacher

Role:

1 Stagemanager

2 Play Leader

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Teachers’ views of children’ s development

Voorschool

Actual development

“Some children are just not able to play. But you see, when we start to pay attention toit in the circle, you can make it interesting for them.”

Potential development

“We guide, we suggest and take the lead, we give examples. But the children learn most of play among themselves (..) You have to learn to play yourself (..) We have furnished our room wit lots of material which they can use in their play.”

Plusklas

Actual development

“These children are just not yet ready to play social role play”(..) “They just do not have any representations”(..) “There is no patience to play in the house corner”

Potential development

“Our goal is simple role play, but we often do not succeed (..) When you have done role play very often, you see that they pick it up after some time”

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Observations: teacher’s roles

Verdeling rollen Anneke

TOE

7% STM

16%

STH

17%PAR

14%

SPL

33%

INS

13%

Verdeling rollen Ellen

TOE8% STM

13%

STH20%

PAR23%

SPL28%

INS8%

Verdeling rollen Betty

TOE4%

STM15%

STH10%

PAR33%

SPL33%

INS5%

VOORSCHOOL

PLUSKLAS

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Observations: play actions

TeachersVoorschool PlusklasBarbara Erika Anne

ChildrenVoorschool PlusklasBarbara Erika Anne

RepresentationSupport from context

Without support context

% % %78 66 72.522 34 27.5

% % % 82 79 82 18 21 18

Narrative structureSingle actionMultiple actionConnected action

47 40 5225 31 2428 29 24

60 66 58 20 20 28 20 14 14

Reflection:interaction

Solitary, focus on selfFocus on objectCo-operative play

31 55.5 54.5 5 7 164 39 44.5

31 64 6213 8 157 28 37

Conclusion: The teacher’s role and narrative development

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Representation:

Support from the context for young children is important

Context independent: known script, language proficiency

Narrative structure:

Guidance ‘from inside’ most favourable (play mate, play

leader) for connected action

For young players: stage manager suggesting and modelling

actions ‘from outside’

Reflection:

No evidence of co-occurrence role and dimension of solitairy/

cooperative play

Play mate and play leader: play talk

Stage-manager: off-the-line talk about attributes and action

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Conclusion ZPD

Are there any differences in the teachers’ guidance depending of the (play, language) development of the children involved?

Youngest children:

more stage manager

more single actions, less connected text

more focus on self, less cooperative play

Situation definition: goal structure broadly defined, not in terms of narrative development

For narrative play; focus on participation of the children – ‘doing the words’ - may be more facilitative than focus on language input