Abstract
This research was conducted to analyze play and playmate preferences of preschool girls and boys during free play time. The study group consisted of 48-66 months old preschool children. There were ten girls, seven boys and a preschool teacher in the study group. They were all selected from a public preschool in Cukurova, a district of Adana a city in the south of Turkey in the fall semester of 2014 to 2015 academic year. For two weeks children were observed during their free play time. In addition, the children and teacher were interviewed to determine the play and playmate preferences of the children. An interview with each child took approximately 5 to 6 minutes, whereas the interview with the teacher took 20 minutes. In this research, content analysis method was applied at the data analysis phase. The outcomes of the analysis indicated that there were differences between play area, type of play and playmate preferences between girls and boys. Research indicated that girls usually opt for dramatic (pretend) play such as playing house, role play and gets in role as doctor, mother or kid; while boys prefer to play with blocks and lego for construction and building purposes (block center). The research results show gender effects on girls and boys play behaviors. Key words: Preschool education, gender roles, play and playmate preference, play type, play behaviors.
Highlights
Play is defined as a series of meaningful activities which are developed by children themselves
The outcomes of the analysis indicated that there were differences between play area, type of play and playmate preferences between girls and boys
Since children had never played any structured table/card play during the observations, this play type was not added to the table
Summary
Play is defined as a series of meaningful activities which are developed by children themselves. According to Yavuzer (2006), play consists of physical, educational, social and moral values. A lot of researchers such as Piaget, Freud and Parten had analyzed the phases of play. These researchers said that children‟s behaviors related to play change in accordance with som e parameters such as age and their development levels (Orçan, 2008). It cannot be underestimated that play contributes to the social development of children. While they play, girls model their mothers and boys model their fathers. Girls model their mothers and boys model their fathers This kind of modeling consolidates gender roles. Relative and neighborhood relations by pretending as family members and they are
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