Cooperative Formats in Pretend Play Among Young Children

Abstract

Knowledge construction takes place through children's activities in their sociocultural environment, which provides the tools and the means to progress. The social environment intervenes in the regulation of behavior and through exchanges, provides the child with help needed in the construction processes (see, e.g., Perret-Clermont & Nicolet, 1988; Resnick, Levine, & Teasley, 1991; Richards & Light, 1986). A general mechanism of sociocognitive acquisition underlies various interpersonal dynamics: They are based on the encounter of action and thought that generates questions or new ideas and on social validation of ideas or activities. Questions produce a state of disequilibrium in the knowledge system and engage the child in a reorganization process that makes the integration of new information and ideas possible. Reorganization can be the outcome of individual regulation or of collaboration with others, adults or peers. There is abundant evidence that peer interaction plays a role in the knowledge construction process. A rapidly expanding body of literature shows that acquisition in symmetrical exchanges takes place through different modes of co-elaboration in school-age children as well as in preschoolers (e.g., Beaudichon, Verba, & Winnykamen, 1988). Observation and imitation, co-construction by opposition of point of view or by cooperation without conflict, and guidance or scaffolding by a more competent partner can all generate cognitive progress, either in a task proposed by an adult or in spontaneous activities organized by children themselves (e.g., Cooper, Marquis, & Edward, 1986; Gilly, Fraisse, & Roux, 1988; Pontecorvo, 1987). Research on the organization of shared activities among preschoolers shows that these modes of cognitive elaboration can be activated separately or combined over the course of dyadic interaction as a function of the situation. Interpersonal exchange in goal-directed situations can take on different forms in asymmetrical and in symmetrical contexts, as a function of competence and power relationships between the partners (Verba, in press; Verba & Winnykamen, 1992).