Pretend Context Research Articles

Preschoolers understand and generate pretend actions using object substitution

Pretend play is often considered to be an imaginative or creative activity. Yet past experimental research has focused on whether children imitate pretense, follow instructions to pretend, or understand others’ pretense. Thus, we cannot be sure that children’s pretense is in fact novel or whether children simply copy or follow others’ instructions. This is the first experiment to show that preschoolers generate their own novel object substitutions. In Study 1, 45 3- and 4-year-olds saw an experimenter use one object as another accompanied by pretend or trying cues. Children differentiated between the experimenter’s intentions by imitating the actions accompanied by pretend cues and correcting the actions accompanied by trying cues. In addition, when the experimenter made her intentions to pretend or try explicit, children produced significantly more novel object substitutions not modeled or verbally requested by the experimenter within a pretend context than within a trying context. Study 2 replicated these findings with 34 3-year-olds using a repeated-measures design. However, it found no relationship between children’s copying or generation of object substitutions and divergent thinking, inhibitory control, or pretense during free play.

Informal music education: The nature of a young child’s engagement in an individual piano lesson setting

The purpose of this study was to gain insight into the nature of a young child’s engagement in an individual music lesson setting based on principles of informal learning. The informal educational space allowed the child to observe, explore, and interact with a musical environment as a process of enculturation and development (Gordon, 2013; McCloskey, 2012). The setting incorporated the piano, and was considered a readiness experience for later formal piano training. Data collection occurred via video recording, with 24 episodes isolated for close analysis. Richly descriptive narratives of each episode were analyzed by line-by-line transformation regarding the nature of the child’s engagement (Van Manen, 1990). The child’s engagement in the setting was viewed through lenses of lived space, lived body, lived time, lived other (Van Manen, 1990), and lived musicality (Kooistra, 2013). Results include that the child engaged in the setting by expanding the boundaries of the room, using the full range of the room, using his body in rhythmic response, directing the time, including the parent in the lesson, creating pretend contexts, making music (singing, chanting, moving, playing the piano and other instruments), embedding music in his activities, and believing in his musicianship.

Experimenter's Pantomimes Influence Children's Use of Body Part as Object and Imaginary Object Pantomimes: A Replication

Young children asked to pretend to use a series of absent objects typically pantomime by using a body part as the object (BPO) rather than by acting as if using an imaginary object (IO). This replication of Lyons's work (1983, 1986) examines whether different pretend contexts when requesting pantomimes influence children's use of IO and BPO pantomimes. Forty-three children aged 3;6 to 6;6 were asked to pretend to use 8 objects in 1 of 3 contexts: request, request after participating in an experimenter-provided imaginary context, and request after seeing the adult model the requested pretend action. The experimenter used IO pantomimes in the last 2 contexts. Children produced, on average, the most IO pantomimes in the modeling context, fewer in the imaginary context, and the fewest in the request context. Older children overall produced more IO pantomimes than did younger children; however, when pretend contexts were examined separately, ontogenetic differences in IO pantomimes were present for the request condition only. Externally directed actions resulted in more IO pantomiming than self-directed actions for only the youngest children.

Ámbitos de profesionalización del educador/a social: perspectivas y complejidad (Areas of social educator professional development: perspectives and complexity)

The figure and profession Educator/a Social are quite complex concepts and in some cases quite unknown. It is a profession that has been built up over time in order to meet the social and educational needs of individuals and social groups. This process has steadily become clear the importance of their work that transcends and even complements the areas of formal education or school. At the same time, about the development and educational intervention to individuals and groups in order to promote social change educational. It is in this context and premises where the figure of the Educator / Social at from the aspect of their professional role, areas of intervention and pretend contexts an approach to this complex figure. It is evident that in recent decades we have witnessed the evolution of a profession, Social Education. The development of it has been determined primarily by two factors: first, the crisis of education systems, unable to respond to new challenges and needs and expectations, and second, the idea of state. We must not forget that the socioeconomic and cultural changes have led to new ideas and perspectives that are embodied in the professional field of Social Educator. It is a permanent construction given profession's need to respond to changes in society itself, to contexts, groups and individuals. Not to mention the role that the university should have in this process, companies, institutions and subject himself to self-employment.

Social pretend play and social interaction in preschoolers

Social interaction was observed during social pretend play and nonpretend activities to determine whether positive and mature social behaviors were differentially associated with the pretend context. A within-subjects design and a semistructured play setting were used to control for individual differences, child and environmental effects. Thirty-seven 4- and 5-year-old children were observed in groups of four for 47.5 minutes, in a series of play sessions. Their interactions within social pretend play and social nonpretend activities were observed and compared. The results indicated that during pretend play, children's social interactions were more enjoyable, lasted longer, involved larger groups, and showed more play involvement and greater reciprocity. The results substantiate prior theoretical and empirical work which high- lights the educational significance of social pretend play in early childhoood. Social pretend play appears to provide a contextual framework within which mature social interaction can occur and social competencies may be acquired.