Cultural-historical Concept Research Articles

Conceptual Playworlds: the role of imagination in play and learning

ABSTRACT Increasingly concerns are expressed about the formalisation of early childhood education and the loss of opportunities for children’s play in a range of European and European heritage countries. This paper takes up this challenge by discussing, from a cultural-historical perspective, the relations between play and learning in pre-school settings. A theoretical discussion of practices and affordances of a Conceptual Playworld, grounded in a cultural historical conception of play, is presented. New concepts are needed for understanding the relations between play and learning in pre-school settings, where the focus has traditionally been on play as the leading activity. Theorised are four key characteristics that emerge from the practice of a Conceptual Playworld illustrated through a practice example of Charlotte’s Web. In this context, it is argued that imagination in play is foundational for imagination in conceptual learning, and therefore play-based programs make a key contribution to the development and learning of the young child.

Digital animation: New conditions for children's development in play‐based setting

AbstractThere is increasing recognition of digital childhoods [Danby, S., Fleer, M., Davidson, C., & Hatzigianni, M. (Eds.). (2018). Digital childhood. Amsterdam: Springer] and a corresponding body of research into young child's engagement with digital devices across a broad range of contexts [Marsh, J. A., Plowman, L., Yamada‐Rice, D., Bishop, J., & Scott, F. (2016). Digital play: a new classification. Early Years, 36, 242–253. doi:10.1080/09575146.20161167675]. What is missing from the literature is an understanding of if and how these devices, when used with animation apps in play‐based programs, change pre‐school practices and the developmental conditions of children's play. In drawing upon Vygotsky's [(). Play and its role in the mental development of the child. Voprosy Psikhologii, 12, 62–76] conception of play as the leading motive of pre‐school‐aged children, the naturalistic study reported in this paper seeks to address this gap. Video observations of children (3.3–5.8 years) and teachers digitally engaged across five sites during free‐play time (413.8 h of video observations) were studied using a cultural–historical conception of play [Vygotsky, L. S. (2005). Appendix: from the notes of L.S Vygotsky for lectures on the psychology of preschool children. Journal of Russian and East European Psychology, 43, 90–97]. The findings show that digital animation in a free‐play program where role‐play is featured can enrich the play opportunities of children which in turn promote play complexity and increase social and cognitive demands on children, which together can be theorized as a positive force for children's development. These developmental conditions emerged as a profile of five interrelated key digital practices and psychological characteristics, adding to our understandings of digital play.

Qualitative change in social situation of development as the starting point of children’s role adjustment during the transition to school

ABSTRACTChildren’s transition to school has been widely investigated, but most studies do not clearly define its starting point. By drawing on the cultural-historical concept of the social situation of development, and selecting ‘role adjustment’ as the unit of analysis, this paper seeks to clearly define the starting point of children’s transition to school. Through a case study of two second-generation Chinese Australian children’s role adjustment, this paper finds that it is the qualitative change in children’s social situation of development that signifies the starting point of the dramatic adjustment of their role(s). In particular, the starting point of children’s first dramatic role adjustment marks the starting point of their transition to school, and the starting points of children’s following dramatic role adjustments mark the turning points of their transition to school.

‘We set up a small world’: preschool teachers’ involvement in children’s imaginative play

ABSTRACTGrounded in Vygotsky’s cultural-historical theory, this paper examines how often teachers are involved in children’s imaginative play and discusses their beliefs about their role in supporting children’s imaginative play. To investigate this problem, video (65 hours of digital observations) and interview data (two hours and 30 minutes) of 60 children with 7 teachers from two preschools in Australia were analysed. Using Vygotsky’s [1966. “Play and Its Role in the Mental Development of the Child.” Voprosy Psikhologii 12 (6): 62–76] cultural-historical concept of play, and Kravtsov and Kravtsova’s [2010. “Play in the L.S. Vygotsky’s Nonclassical Psychology.” Journal of Russian and East European Psychology 48 (4): 25–41] conception of ‘subject positioning’ (being inside and outside of the play), it was found that despite the general importance of play, teachers’ involvement in developing children’s imaginative play appears to be minimal. The interviews showed that teachers’ beliefs about their role in children’s imaginative play are directly related to the distance of their physical proximity and understanding of the play narrative being enacted. This paper argues that focusing on teachers’ involvement in children’s play is an important but under-researched dimension of play-based pedagogies in early childhood education.

Шутка как нарративный текст и инструментальное средство развития межличностного взаимопонимания

Not every instrument involved in professional or everyday interaction with others allows one to move in the zone of proximal development in a communicative partnership. Despite a wide range of such work tools, for the most part they are of directive, expert format. The need to find psychotechnic means adequate to cooperative relations draws our attention to comic instruments (humor), namely to one of its forms – joke. Bringing joke into our communication with others appears a kind of tactics that allows partners to make certain statements about necessary things or actions from equal positions, without restricting each other’s freedom, making their intensions, values and meanings clear, while retaining an opportunity to correct their judgments and actions. Explanatory opportunities of the cultural-historical concept and narrative approach in psychology, as well as the ideas incorporated in the method of stage-by-stage formation of action, allow us to consider joke as a means of narrative understanding of the interpersonal relationships.

Cultural-historical concept of L.S.Vygotsky and additional pedagogical education in Russia

Cultural-historical concept of L.S.Vygotsky and additional pedagogical education in Russia

Methodological challenges of investigating in-tellectual cooperation, relational expertise, and transformative agency

Methodological issues arise with the research of societal practices of ‘knowing’. This object of study is understood as concrete human activity that always integrates mental, communicative and practical behaviour in interaction and cooperation with others. Especially with regard to contemporary forms of labour in the high-tech-world, this issue has become a salient task. As it is explained, it implies investigation of people communicating and reasoning while developing concrete forms of activity. In particular, the methodological issues concern the social and psychodynamic quality of this practice. Within the tradition of cultural-historical research and activity theory, mile-stones of this matter have already been reached. Cultural-historical concepts like the ‘motive’ of an activity as well as the ‘emotions’ that bias the ‘experience’ of ‘transformative engagements’ with the world show that their theoretical and methodological understanding are adept to approach the dialectics between the social and the individual quality of practice and agency in general, but also with regard to contemporary challenges of intellectualized cooperation in particular. ‘Double stimulation’, a concept coined by Vygotsky, is relevant in this context as well. However, the paper discusses critically whether it fits with the system theoretical understanding of activities and transformative agency as it can be found in Engeström’s writings. Finally, the core requirements for a VET-research methodology for intellectualized collaboration are resumed.

The Development of a Scientific Motive: How Preschool Science and Home Play Reciprocally Contribute to Science Learning

There are a growing number of studies that have examined science learning for preschool children. Some research has looked into children’s home experiences and some has focused on transition, practices, routines, and traditions in preschool contexts. However, little attention has been directed to the relationship between children’s learning experiences at preschool and at home, and how this relationship can assist in the development of science concepts relevant to everyday life. In drawing upon Hedegaard’s (Learning and child development, 2002) cultural-historical conception of motives and Vygotsky’s (The collected works of L.S. Vygotsky: problems of general psychology, 1987) theory of everyday and scientific concept formation, the study reported in this paper examines one child, Jimmy (4.2 years), and his learning experiences at home and at preschool. Data gathering featured the video recording of 4 weeks of Jimmy’s learning in play at home and at preschool (38.5 h), parent questionnaire and interviews, and researcher and family gathered video observations of home play with his parents (3.5 h). Findings show how a scientific motive develops through playful everyday learning moments at home and at preschool when scientific play narratives and resources are aligned. The study contributes to a more nuanced understanding of the science learning of young children and a conception of pedagogy that takes into account the reciprocity of home and school contexts for learning science.

Perezhivanie as a phenomenon and a unit of analysis for studying children’s interactions with iPads in the early years of school in Saudi Arabia

ABSTRACTIn Saudi Arabia, there is a lack of research into the educational use of touch technologies. The literature focuses on how children use these technologies and how they support learning, but little is known about the impact of these devices on children’s socio-emotional outcomes. This study examines how children relate emotionally to both iPads and each other when they are introduced into educational settings in Saudi Arabia, where no tradition for their use exists. Data (80 hours of video observations and interviews) were collected from a grade one class in a Saudi school. The cultural-historical concept of perezhivanie was used to analyse how iPads affect children’s interaction within the classroom, and it was found that the initial introduction of the iPad acted as a tool for both explicit self-regulation and implicit self-regulation. This study contributes to understanding how the use of touch technologies in Saudi Arabia affects children’s emotional development.

How common knowledge is constructed and why it matters in collaboration between professionals and clients

Professionals are increasingly called upon to work with clients. We employ cultural-historical concepts to reveal how professionals and clients accomplish joint work on problems in services for families with young children. Professional–client interactions in day stay and home visiting services are considered, first focusing on how matters of concern are worked into departures of significance (employing ‘D-analysis’), then conceptualising joint professional–parent work in terms of common knowledge and the object of activity. The importance of motives and their alignment is revealed. We show the value of D-analysis in elucidating how common knowledge can be constructed and why this process may be problematic. Finally, we reflect on the fluid and situated nature of this kind of collaborative work.

06. Transitory moments in infant/toddler play: Agentic imagination

Studying relationships in infant/toddler play, using visual narrative methodology to identify transitory moments, supports our current research on babies and toddlers. We use Vygotsky’s theorisation of play to understand children’s affective and intellectual aspirations in play. The theoretical discussion, using cultural-historical concepts, argues for identification of transitory moments as turning points for learning. Through examining transitory moments in screen- capture snapshots from video, researchers illustrate the actual worlds of infant/toddler play where personal and collective meaning, and affect and resolution, are created and located. Our study of infant/toddler relationships in play reveals several transitory moments reflecting imaginative thought in action: agentic imagination. A case example from Long Day Care brings visual narrative together with a dialogue commentary to provide meaning of the playful circumstances in which babies’ and toddlers’ “affective incentives” (Vygotsky, this issue, p. 9) are realised and resolved in imaginary situations. This paper addresses a gap existing in pedagogical awareness of what transitory moments in play can mean for infant/toddler learning and development in early childhood education.International Research in Early Childhood Education, vol. 7, no. 2, pp. 91–110

02. The history of the reception of Vygotsky’s paper on play in Russia and the West

This article describes the responses of academic researchers and teachers to Vygotsky’s paper on play, published in Russian in 1966 and, in a new translation, in the present issue of this journal. That paper has had a major influence on research in play both in Russia and in the West. Its cultural-historical view of the development of play, and its key theoretical and methodological ideas, have continued to reverberate and to generate and influence a huge body of work. The article identifies the key trends in these responses to Vygotsky’s paper, reviewing the work by major scholars in this field, such as Elkonin, Leonte’ev, and Zaporozhets. The article also describes how Vygotsky’s ideas in this paper became the foundation of the national curriculum for early childhood in the Soviet Union in the 1960s and 1970s. The article critiques some of the research which, using the 1978 translation of Vygotsky’s paper, presented his approach as that of a cognitivist or as a social constructivist and argues that these reflect a tradition in the West of simplifying Vygotsky’s cultural-historical theory and methodology. It also reviews some contemporary studies by researchers working within the cultural-historical approach to play. These are making original contributions to the cultural- historical conception of play or bringing new insights into play as a leading activity in children’s development.International Research in Early Childhood Education, vol. 7, no. 2, pp. 26–37

05. Theorising digital play: A cultural-historical conceptualisation of children’s engagement in imaginary digital situations

In the early childhood education literature, a growing number of studies have referenced digital play. Many of these studies seek to describe how young children play with digital devices, notably, how they engage with different kinds of apps. This work collectively illustrates a range of play behaviours where a number of important understandings about how young children engage in virtual contexts are given. However, little theoretical work has been directed to determining if what children do on these devices would constitute play. This paper seeks to examine this literature and present a theoretical discussion on what might characterise a cultural-historical conception of digital play where the essence of digital play for children aged 3 to 5 years is considered. The analysis and theoretical discussion presented draws attention to the special nature of digital play as including an imaginary digital situation, the emergence of special forms of digital talk, digital placeholders and digital pivots to support imaginary play, and the intermeshing of digital play and social pretend play. Development of digital play, the dialectical relations between play–digital play themes, and the psychological dimensions of digital play were also noted as key for conceptualising digital play. Together, these ideas extend Vygotsky’s (this issue) original conception of play and capture new societal conditions where children readily access and engage in new forms of play on digital devices.International Research in Early Childhood Education, vol. 7, no. 2, pp. 75–90

Noisy Neighbours: A Construction of Collective Knowledge in Toddlers' Shared Play Space

EVIDENCE FROM A LARGER project Studying babies and toddlers: Cultural worlds and transitory relationships in Australian long day care settings is gathered. We argue that toddlers co-construct collective knowledge through expressive play activities with peers and educators. We analyse how educators enter play, taking the toddlers' perspective to develop collective knowledge. We investigate how toddlers creatively produce knowledge through educators' awareness of their play spaces, aiming to find the different ways they affectively participate in processes of producing knowledge. Vygotsky's cultural–historical concepts of the social situation of development and play form the research foundation. Using visual narrative methodology and reflective dialogue to explore toddlers' everyday play activity, one play episode of an educator entering shared collective play with toddlers is analysed. We find educators' involvement and peer interaction significant for learning and social production of collective knowledge in toddlers' play spaces. Responding to toddlers' active expressions by entering play develops collective knowledge.

Посредническое Действие и Развитие

The article looks at the possibility to continue L.S. Vygotsky’s cultural-historical concept in today’s world. The act of mediation in and of itself is presented as a problem, and an object of study, and it is represented as Intermediary Action. In attempts to determine the meaning of a sign the intermediary action becomes a human to which this sign is directed. Assigning a sign is the perception of the very transition “natural—cultural”. Here the meaning acquires the function of a pattern of action . The pattern acts as an object of coaction and is built like a relationship and border between the required and the other. Then, the Intermediary action develops into the perception of the pattern as the supportsystem of activity. The perception of the support system is the inclusion of the action in the space of its possibilities — its field. The inclusion in the space of possibilities needs action individualization. The perception of the limits of the space of possibilities as the scope of intention is the construction of Personal action.

Умное тело или проблема формирования человеческой телесности в ситуации жизненного аутсорсинга. Часть 2

This paper continues to explore the problem of formation of non-organic body of personality touched upon in the previous part. The author shows how this problem is addressed in the works of E.V. Ilyenkov, B. Spinoza and L.S. Vygotsky and, in particular, in the works of D.B. Elkonin and B.D. Elkonin who introduced the concepts of ‘mediatory action’ and ‘event of action’, crucial for the understanding of personality construction. In the final part of the paper the author reviews the practices of blind, deaf and dumb pedagogy as the phenomenon of cultural development and cultural corporeality. Working with blind, deaf and dumb children proves the correctness of the cultural-historical concept aimed at tool/activity-based character of personality structure formation that may well be described in terms of smart corporeality. Without such practices of exploration and acquisition of his/her own behavior the individual becomes a functionally disabled person. Thus the author considers the practice of cultural development an anthropological alternative to the trend of outsourcing that implies the individual’s rejection of his/her basic cultural functions and practices. And this alternative acts as a response to the challenge of the increasing cultural, functional and personal disabilities. The research was conducted with the assistance of the Russian Science Foundation (project №14-18-03087 “Designing Non- classical Anthropology. New Human Ontology”).

Investigating the development of consciousness through ostensions toward oneselffrom the onset of the use-of-object to first words

This paper considers the development of consciousness in a pragmatic and semiotic perspective. Grounded in Vygotsky’s pivotal cultural-historical conception of sign, the role of nonverbal signs through ostensions involving an object that infants address to themselves is investigated, evidencing the link between the material world and the development of the human psyche. The main functions of such ostensions which have been identified are presented and an analysis of the meaning-making processes underlying these functions is suggested.

Family pedagogy: parent–child interaction in shared book reading

How parent–child interaction effectively supports children's bilingual heritage language development in a shared book-reading practice is an under-researched area. The in-depth study reported in this paper examined an episode of one child, a four-year-old girl and her father, reading an English story in Chinese. Approximately 70 hours of video observations were collected over nine months and analysed in order to understand how families used storybook reading to support heritage language development. Vygotsky's cultural-historical concepts of motives and conflicts form the foundation of the analysis. The study found that ‘two-way’ engagement when reading a book, elaborations that went beyond the immediate text and creative playful abstractions connected to family practices all contributed to supporting heritage language development. It is argued that shared book reading not only illustrates effective family pedagogical practices for heritage language development, but also offers insights into building pedagogical practices for early years education.

Conceptualizing science learning as a collective social practice: changing the social pedagogical compass for a child with visual impairment

The international literature on science learning in inclusive settings has a long history, but it is generally very limited in scope. Few studies have been undertaken that draw upon a cultural-historical reading of inclusive pedagogy, and even less in the area of science education. In addition, we know next to nothing about the science learning of preschool children with visual impairment using cultural-historical theory. This paper seeks to fill this gap by presenting a study of one child with Albinism who participated in a unit of early childhood science where fairy tales were used for learning about the concepts of sound and growth. This paper reports upon the social and material conditions that were created to support learning in the preschool, whilst also examining how the learning of growth and sound were supported at home. The study found three new pedagogical features for inclusion: Imagination in science; Ongoing scientific narrative; and Scientific mirroring. It was found that when a dialectical reading of home and centre practices feature, greater insights into inclusive pedagogy for science learning are afforded, and a view of science as a collective enterprise emerges. It is argued that a cultural-historical conception of inclusion demands that the social conditions, rather than the biology of the child, is foregrounded, and through this greater insights into how science learning for children with visual impairment is gained.

The demands and motives afforded through digital play in early childhood activity settings

article i nfo a bstract Available online xxxx In drawing upon cultural–historical concepts this paper examines the demands that children meet when digital tablet technology is introduced during free play in early childhood settings. In particular, this paper reveals how an iPad and movie making program create new demands on children that afford a new relation between play and learning. Through analyses of video observations of children in one child care center in Australia it was found that how children respond to the new demands depends upon their motive orientation as they engage with tablet technology. The concept of flickering is introduced to capture how the microgenetic movement between collective and individual imagining in an activity occurs, between being in and out of an imaginary situation, and between concrete objects and virtual representations. © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.