Elkonin psychology of games read. Game theory D.B. Elkonina. Basic units of gaming activity. Play and mental development
Schiller: play is a pleasure associated with being free from external influences. waste is a manifestation of excess vitality.
Spencer: game is an artificial exercise of strength; in play the lower abilities are expressed, and in aesthetics. activities are the highest.
Wundt: Play is the child of labor; everything in play has a prototype in the form of serious labor, which always precedes it both in time and in its very essence.
Elkonin: human. game - activity, cat. social are being recreated. relationships between people outside the conditions of directly utilitarian activity.
When describing Det. Game psychologists especially emphasized the work of imagination and fantasy.
J. Selley: essence det. The game consists of playing some role.
Elkonin: it is the role and the actions associated with it that constitute the unit of the game.
Game structure:
game actions that have a generalized and abbreviated character
playful use of objects
real. relationship between playing children
The more generalized and abbreviated the game actions, the more deeply the meaning, task and system of relationships of the adult activity being recreated is reflected in the game; The more specific and detailed the game actions are, the more specific the objective content of the recreated activity is.
The plots of the game are decisively influenced by the child’s surrounding environment and social life. conditions of life.
The game is especially sensitive to the human sphere. activities, labor and relationships between people (railroad - played only after they were shown specific relationships, actions).
About the historical role-playing games arose.
Plekhanov:
in human history community work is older than play
the game arose in response to the consumption of society, in the cat. children and assets live. members cat they must become
will amaze. stability det. toys (the same for different peoples)
primitive toys society and recent historical. of the past are essentially the same - the toy responds in some way unchanged. nature especially the child and is not in connection with the life of society (contradicts Plekhanov); but Arkin does not speak about all, but only the original toys: sound (rattles), motor (ball, kite, top), weapons (bow, arrows, boomerangs), figurative (images of bellies, dolls), string (from it is made by figures).
Elkonin: these toys are not original, but also arose from the definition. stages of development of society, they were preceded by the invention of a definition by a person. tools (N., making fire by friction, friction is provided by rotation, hence rotational toys, kubari, etc.)
The initial unity of work and education. Education in a primitive way. general:
equal upbringing of all children
a child should be able to do everything adults do
short period of education
directly participation of children in the lives of adults
early inclusion in work (!!!)
where the child can work with adults right away, there is no game, but where there is a need for pre-game. preparation – yes.
there is no sharp line between adults and children
children become truly independent early on
children play little, games are not role-playing (!!!)
if this work is important, but is not yet available to the child, smaller tools are used to master the tools of labor, with a cat. children practice conventions that are close to real ones, but not identical to them (the Far North - a knife is important, they are taught to use it from early childhood; throw a rope on a stump, then on a dog, then on an animal); building there is an element of a play situation (conventionality of the situation: a stump is not a deer; acting with a reduced object, the child acts like a father, i.e. an element of role-playing game)
the identity of games between children and adults - sports and outdoor games
There are imitative games (imitation of a wedding, etc.), but there is no imitation of the work of adults, but there are games of cat. reproduction of everyday situations, cat. not yet available for children
The complication of tools - a child cannot master reduced forms (if you make a gun smaller, it no longer shoots) - a toy appeared as an object that only depicted tools.
The role-playing game appeared during history. development as a result of changes in the child’s place in the system of societies. relational, social in origin.
Game theories.
Groos exercise theory:
Every. Living being has inherited predispositions that give expediency to his behavior (in the higher classes it is an impulsive desire for action).
At the highest living beings' innate reactions are insufficient to perform complex tasks. vital tasks.
In everyone's life. higher beings are childhood, i.e. period of development and growth, parental care.
The goal of childhood is the acquisition of adaptations that are necessary for life, but do not develop directly from innate reactions.
The desire to imitate elders.
Where the individual from internal prompting and without external goal manifests, strengthens and develops its inclinations, we are dealing with the original phenomena of the game.
Those. we play not because we are children, but we are given childhood so that we can play.
Groos did not create a theory of play as an activity typical of childhood, but only indicated that this activity was for them. def. biological important function.
Objections:
believes that he is an individual. experience arose on the basis of the hereditary, but contrasts them
It is strange that in a game of belly, which is not connected with the struggle for existence and, therefore, takes place in other conditions, not similar to those in the cat. will occur, N., hunting, real adaptations arose, because there is no real reinforcement.
biologically tolerates without reservation. the meaning of the game from animals to people
Stern. He shared Groos’s views, but added:
idea of premature maturation of abilities
recognition of play as a special instinct
the need for the preparation of maturing ways of intimate contact with external impressions. peace
Groos, unlike Stern, does not raise the question of the role of external influences. conditions in the game, because is an opponent of Spencer's position on imitation as the basis of the game.
Bühler. To explain the game, he introduces the concept of functional pleasure. This concept is distinguished from pleasure-enjoyment and from the joy associated with anticipating the outcome of an activity. He further said that for the selection of forms of behavior, it is necessary from the surplus, the wealth of activities, body movements, especially in young animals. The game is also governed by the principle of form, or the desire for perfect form.
Bühler's critique: functional. pleasure is the engine of all trials, including erroneous ones, it should lead to the repetition and consolidation of any actions and movements.
Buytendijk. Argues with Groos:
instinctive forms of action, like the nerve. the fur-we underlying them matures regardless of exercise
separates exercise from play
It is not the game that explains the meaning of childhood, but the other way around: the creature plays because it is young
Main behavioral traits in childhood:
undirected movements
motor impulsivity (young belly is in constant motion)
“pathic” attitude to reality is the opposite of the gnostic, a direct affective connection with the environment. world, arising as a reaction to novelty
timidity, timidity, shyness (not fear, but an ambivalent attitude consisting in movement towards and away from a thing)
All this leads the animal and the child to play.
Limitation of play from other activities: play is always a play with something – something moving. animal games are not games.
The game is not about the department. instincts, but more general drives. Following Freud: 3 outcomes. drives that lead to play:
attraction to liberation, the removal of obstacles emanating from the environment that fetter freedom
attraction to merging, to community with others
tendency to repeat
The game item should be partially familiar and at the same time have unknown capabilities.
The game has its own outcome. form – this is a manifestation of indicative activity.
Claparède objected:
Features of the dynamics of young people the organism cannot be the basis of the game, because:
they are characteristic of cubs and those who do not play
dynamics manifested themselves not only in games, but also in other forms of behavior
There are games for adults too
max. These individuals manifested themselves openly in such activities as fun, idleness and games of very young children. according to Buytendijk, they are not games
Buytendijk limits the concept of play: round dances and somersaults are not considered games by him, although they are precisely characterized by the indicated features of children. speakers
Disadvantages of all these theories:
phenomenological approach to distinguishing play from other types of behavior
identification of the course of mental development of children and animals and their games
Elkonin: the game arose from a definition. stages of belly evolution. world and is associated with the emergence of childhood; play is not a function of the body, but a form of behavior, i.e. activities with things that have elements of novelty. The game is young. belly-x is an exercise not a department. engine systems or department. instinct and type of behavior, and exercise in fast and precise control of the engine. We behave in any of its forms, based on individual images. condition, in cat. the object is located, i.e. exercise in orientation activities.
J. Selley - features of the role-playing game:
the child’s transformation of himself and surrounding objects and the transition to an imaginary world
deep absorption in creating this fiction and living in it
Stern. The smallness of the world, cat. a child lives, and the feeling of pressure he experiences is the reason for the tendency to withdraw from this world, the reason for the emergence of play, and fantasy is the mechanism for its implementation. But Stern contradicts himself: he himself said that the child introduces the activities of adults and objects associated with it into his play, because the world of adults is attractive to him.
Z. Freud. Two primary drives: towards death (the tendency towards obsessive reproduction is associated with it) and towards life, towards self-preservation, towards power, towards self-affirmation. This is the main dynamic forces. psychic life, unchanged in infant and adult. Children's play, like culture, science, art, is a form of bypassing barriers, cat. puts society in touch with the original drives seeking a way out. When analyzing a small child’s play with throwing things away and with the “appearance and disappearance” of a spool of thread, Freud suggests that this game symbolizes the traumatic situation of the child’s departure from the mother.
Objection: the fact of such early symbolization is doubtful.
The period of childhood according to Freud is a period of continuous traumatization of the child, and the tendency to obsessive repetition leads to games, play as the only means of mastering through repetition those unbearable experiences that these traumas bring with them. Those. Since childhood, a person has been a potential neurotic, and play is a natural therapeutic agent.
The game arose on the basis of the same mechanisms that underlie the dreams and neuroses of adults.
An important idea: children's play is influenced by the desire that dominates at this age - to become an adult and do as adults do.
Adler - the feeling of weakness and lack of independence, which is painfully felt, the child is trying to drown out within himself with the fiction of power and domination - plays a wizard and a fairy. Games are attempts to create a situation that reveals those social attitude, on the cat. the affect is fixed, i.e. role-playing game as a semantic center named after. social relationships between adults and between adults and children.
Hartley. Observation of a role-playing game - finding out how the child imagines adults, the meaning of their activities, relationships, and also in roles. game the child enters the real world. relationship with others playing and demonstrates his inherent qualities and certain qualities. emotional experiences.
Disadvantages of Freud's interpretations:
biologization does not teach the history of ontogenetics. human development, identifies the main. desires of a person and a stomach and reduces them to sexual
carries a hypothetical fur-we dynamics psychic. life from adult patients to children
the idea of the relationship between the child and society as antagonistic, leading to trauma, and playing is a form of the child’s withdrawal from reality. really
The games that emerged in the history of society and in the development of the department were ignored. individual, the significance of the game for the psyche is not considered. development
Piaget. The child assimilates the reality around him in accordance with the laws of his thinking, first autistic and then egocentric. Such assimilation creates a special world, in Oct. the child lives and satisfies all his desires. This dream world is the most important for a child, it is for him real reality. The path of development from the point of view of Piaget: first, for the child there is a single world - the subjective. the world of autism and desires, then, under the influence of pressure from the world of adults, the world of reality, two worlds arise - the world of play and the world of reality, and the first is more important for the child. This game world is something like the remnants of a purely autistic world. Finally, under the pressure of the world of reality, these remnants are also repressed, and then a single world appears, as it were, with repressed desires acquiring the character of dreams or daydreams.
Objections. The premises are incorrect: that the child’s needs are given to him from the very beginning in the form of mental. formations, in the form of desires or consumption; that the child's needs are not being met. Lisina’s research: the initial cost of a child is the cost of communicating with an adult. The world of a child is, first of all, an adult. The world of a child is always some part of the world of adults, refracted in a peculiar way, but part of the objective world. And besides, no satisfaction of expenses is possible in an imaginary world.
K. Levin, schematic views:
Psychic The environment of an adult person is differentiated into layers with different degree of reality.
Transitions from one plan to another are possible.
Children also have this, but their differentiation is different. The degrees of reality are not so distinct and transitions from the level of reality to the level of unreality are made easier.
Basic The fur-mom of transition from layers is different. the degree of reality to the unreal layers is substitution.
Basic The nature of the game: it deals with phenomena that relate to the level of reality in the sense that they are accessible to the observation of outsiders, but is much less bound by the laws of reality than non-game behavior.
Sliozberg (research). In a serious situation, the child vol. refusal of game substitution. In the game he often rejects reality. things or real. actions offered to him instead of gaming ones. Very good An important factor in the acceptance of substitution is the degree of consumption intensity. The greater the consumption, the lesser the value of the replacement action becomes.
Levin and Sliozberg: a game is a special layer of reality, but the actions in the game are similar in their dynamics to actions in unreal layers.
Piaget. The child uses his body and department. movements for originality. modeling position, movement and St. in some. objects (Zaporozhets also indicated). The study of imitation leads Piaget to the idea that the born person thinks. the image is an internalized imitation. Thus, according to Piaget, imitation is a sensorimotor separated from undivided ones. movements are pure accommodation to visual or acoustic models. And play is, first of all, simple assimilation, functional or reproductive. Psychic assimilation is the inclusion of objects in patterns of behavior, which themselves are nothing more than a pattern of actions that have the ability to actively reproduce.
One of Piaget’s criteria for play is freedom from conflict.
3 main game structures according to Piaget:
exercise games
symbolic games
games with rules
All of them are forms of behavior, in which assimilation predominates, but their difference is that for each. At this stage, reality is assimilated by different schemes. Whatever the structure of a child’s thought at a given stage of development, such is his play, for play is the assimilation of reality in accordance with the structure of thought.
Symbolic play is egocentric thought in its purest form. Basic The function of the game is to protect the child’s “I” from forced accommodations to reality. The symbol, being the personal, individual, affective language of the child, is the main means of such egocentric assimilation.
The game is so self-centered. assimilation, in cat. a special symbol language is used, creating the possibility of its most complete implementation.
Piaget's ideas about play as an expression of the unconscious. conflicts and the convergence of the symbolism of the game with the symbolism of dreams - the closeness of his understanding of the game to the psychoanalytic one.
Objections: play is not a conservative force, but, on the contrary, an activity that produces a genuine revolution in the child’s attitude to the world, including in the transition from centered to decentralized thinking, and plays a progressive role in the development of the child. Symbolic the game is not egocentric. thought in its pure form, as Piaget thinks, but, on the contrary, its overcoming. In play, the child acts with his experiences, he takes them out, recreating the material conditions of their occurrence, transfers them into a new form, Gnostic (a girl, struck by the sight of a plucked duck, lies on the sofa and says in a muffled voice: “I am a dead duck”).
Piaget believes that in a game, any thing can serve as a fictitious substitute for anything. But that's not true. Vygotsky: some objects easily replace others, building. the similarity is not important, but the functional use is important, the ability to perform a representative gesture with a substitute.
One cannot agree with Piaget in bringing the symbolism of play closer to the symbolism of dreams.
Piaget's merit: he put the problem of play in connection with the transition from sensorimotor intelligence to thinking in ideas.
Chateau. Pleasure, cat. the child receives in the game - this is moral pleasure. It is due to the fact that every game has a definition. plan and more or less strict rules. Fulfilling this plan and rules creates special moral satisfaction. The child has no other means of self-affirmation other than play. Chateau’s self-affirmation is an expression of the desire to improve and overcome difficulties, to achieve new achievements.
Soviet Ψ. Ushinsky emphasized the importance of play for the overall development of the soul (for the development of personality and its moral side), Sikorsky emphasized the role of play in the mind. development.
Vinogradov – taking into account Groos' theory, believes that he did not sufficiently take into account “human factors”: imagination, imitation, emotional moments.
Basov: game named after. structural features, max. A characteristic feature is the child’s absence of smb. def. obligations, this freedom in relationships with the environment leads to special type behavior, the main driving force and feature of the cat. is procedural. The person is an active figure, refusing to be purely naturalistic. theories of play that saw its sources within the individual, and not in the system of relationships between the child and the surrounding environment.
Blonsky. Games:
imaginary games (manipulations)
construction games
imitative
dramatization
movable
intellectual
What we call play is, in essence, the building and dramatic art of a child. The problem of play hides the problems of work and art in preschool age.
Vygotsky.
Children's games are primitive. man is happening. their preparation for future activities. Human game. the child is also aimed at future activities, but the heads. way to act socially. har-ra.
The game is the fulfillment of desires, but not of individual, but of generalized affects. Central and characteristic of a play situation is the creation of an imaginary situation, which consists in the child taking on the role of an adult, and its implementation in a play environment created by the child himself. The rules in the game are the child’s rules for himself, the rules of the internal. self-restraint and self-determination. Everything in the game is internal. processes are given in external action. The game continuously creates situations that require the child to act not on an immediate impulse, but along the line of greatest resistance. Play is, although not the predominant, but the leading type of activity in preschool age. The game contains all development trends, it is the source of development and creates zones of proximal development; behind the game there are changes in consumption and changes in the consciousness of the general character.
Rubinstein. Exodus. the particularity of the game – the particularity of its motives. The motives of the game do not lie in the utilitarian effect and the material result, cat. about. gives this action in practice. non-game plan, but not in the activity itself, regardless of its result, but in the diverse experiences, aspects of the activity that are significant for the child. In the game, actions are expressive and semantic acts rather than operational techniques.
The emergence of play in ontogenesis.
The entire first half of the first year of life passes with the advanced formation of sensory systems. The palpating movements of the hand are important for the subsequent development of the act of grasping. First, the hands accidentally come across an object, resulting in the subsequent direction of the hands towards the object when it is on the target. distance from the eye, bringing into definition. the position of the hand and fingers when seeing an object under the definition. angle of view. During the formation of the act of grasping, the connection between the visual. perception and movement is established instantly. In the process of grasping and feeling, a connection is formed between the retinal image of the object and its action. shape, size, distance, the foundations of spatial object perception are laid.
Development repeat. movements begin with patting the object, then they become more varied. In calling and maintaining repeated and chain actions with objects, a large role belongs to orienting and research activities associated with the novelty of objects and the diversity of their inherent qualities. The child primarily focuses on the new object and grabs it. Manipulative actions in the first year of life appear when all the necessary prerequisites for this arise, as well as coordinated movements regulated by vision. Orientation towards the new, developing throughout the second half of the year, is already a form of behavior, and not a simple reaction. The exhaustion of the possibilities of novelty leads to the cessation of actions with the object. Elkonin does not call the initial manipulative actions a game. By the end of the first year of life, immediate emotional. Communication between a child and an adult is replaced by a new one. a qualitatively unique form, unfolding into a joint. activities with adults and mediated by manipulations with objects. The child seeks adult approval and approval.
The emergence of role-playing play is genetically related to the formation of objective actions under the guidance of adults in early childhood. Item. actions – historically established, assigned to a definition. public objects for their use. Carriers of the item. actions are adults. Subject development. action is a process of assimilation that occurs under the direct guidance of adults. In the process of forming an object. actions, the child first learns the general. a pattern of action with an object associated with its societies. appointment, and only then does the department adjust. operations to physical the form of the object and the conditions for carrying out actions with it. Learning by observing the actions of adults. 2 types of transfer: transferring an action with an object to other conditions and performing the same action, but with a substitute object. For the first time, the replacement of one object with another occurs when it is necessary to supplement the usual situation of action with a missing object. To cut something with a knife - use a stick, because... it can perform externally the same actions.
Naming objects: children name an object after an adult has named it and after an action has been performed on the object.
Children already perform a number of actions performed by adults, but do not yet call themselves by the name of adults. Only at the very end of early childhood, between 2.5 and 3 years, did the first rudiments of a role appear: the doll was named after the character and the child spoke on behalf of the doll. Actions are performed with dolls, but this is a series of departments that are in no way connected with each other. actions, there is no logic in their deployment: first he lulls, then walks, then feeds, then rocks on a rocking chair... There is no logic. lastly, cat. There are actions in life that can be repeated several times. Only towards the very end of early childhood do games begin to appear, representing a chain of life actions. About. in the center is a doll.
During the development of the subject. games, the child does not learn to act better with objects - to wield a comb, a spoon... M/b, in play actions the child does not learn new things. physical St. objects. Into the subject. chapters are learned in the game. In the image of the meaning of objects, an orientation towards their societies arises. function, society usage.
There is a generalization of actions and their separation from objects, a comparison of one’s actions with the actions of adults and calling oneself by the name of an adult occurs.
The child produces an object. actions first on those objects on the cat. they were formed with the help of adults; he transfers these actions to other objects, first offered by adults; calls objects by the names of replaced objects only after actions with them and calling them with adult game names; name yourself after those people who acted cat. reproduces at the suggestion of adults.
Play does not arise spontaneously, but with the help of adults.
Development of play in preschool age.
Arising at the border of early childhood and preschool. age, role play develops intensively and reaches its highest level in the second half of preschool age.
Arkin – 5 main. game development lines:
from sparsely populated groups to increasingly crowded ones
from unstable groups to increasingly stable ones
from plotless games to story-based ones
from a series of unrelated episodes to a systematically unfolding plot
from reflection of personal life and immediate environment to events in public life
Rudik points out a number of new symptoms:
change in the nature of conflicts among older people compared to younger ones
transition, to cat. every the child plays in his own way, to the game, cat. children’s actions are coordinated and children’s interactions are organized based on the roles they take on
a change in the nature of stimulation of play, which at a younger age occurs under the influence of toys, and at an older age - under the influence of a plan, regardless of toys
a change in the character of a role, which at first has a generalized character, and then is increasingly endowed with individual traits and is typified.
Games for juniors age have a procedural character; on Wednesday preschool At age, roles are of primary importance; the interest of the game for children lies in fulfilling the role; At an older age, children are interested not just in this or that role, but also in how well it is performed.
Mendzheritskaya - new children. games:
development of Spanish by children varies. items in the game, which when replacing real. the subject of the game is dressed from distant similarity to increasing demands in relation to similarity
smoothing out with age the contradictions between inventing a plot and the possibility of its implementation
The development of the plot comes from the external image. sides of phenomena to convey their meaning
the appearance in older age of a plan, although schematic and imprecise, but giving perspective and clarifying the actions of each. game participant
strengthening and at the same time changing the role of game organizers towards older age
Slavina's observations.
Characteristic features of older children's games. Children vol. agree on roles and then develop the plot of the game according to the definition. plan, recreating the lens. logic of events in a defined, strict sequence. Every. child's action logical continuation in another action that replaces it. Things, toys, furnishings are defined. game values, cat. are saved throughout the game. Children play together, their actions are interconnected. Actions are subordinated to the plot and role. Their fulfillment is not a goal in itself; they are always a goal. service meaning, only by realizing the role, have a generalized, abbreviated, integral character.
Game Jr. children have a different character. Kids look at the toys and choose the most. attractive and begin to individually manipulate them, performing monotonously repeated actions for a long time, without showing interest in what toys and how the other child plays. But it is important for children that there is a role and an imaginary situation in the game, although in fact they are almost never played out. 2 motivational plans in the game: 1) direct. the urge to act with toys, 2) taking upon oneself the definition. a role that gives meaning to actions performed with objects.
Mikhailenko conducted experiments. In advance series, it was found out whether children could carry out elementary activities. forms of games. activities according to the adult patterns set. Children from 1.5 to 3 years old. The plot was set differently. sp-bami. The first series - in verbal form - building. out of 55 children, only 10 over 2 years old began to play. The second series - the experimenter not only told the plot, but also acted it out in front of the children. Out of 45 children, cat. did not accept the plot in the 1st episode, 32 children accepted. Then a special series - to translate the learned elementary. action with plot. toys in playrooms - they asked children to reproduce the actions with the wrong object, on the cat. they were learned, but with substitute items. Some accepted based on a verbal offer. and some only after the show.
In the course of generalization and reduction of the action, its meaning changed: the action with a spoon turned into feeding a doll. But although the actions became playful in form, they were not yet role-playing. Mikhailenko suggested that the transition to playing a role is associated with two conditions: with the attribution of a number of actions to the same character (the doctor listens, gives medicine, gives an injection...) and with the adoption of the role of the character, cat. assigned in the plot, to oneself.
Development of the role in the game. Expert. First series: playing games with ourselves, adults and friends. Second series: games with a violation of the sequence of actions when the child plays a role. Third series: games with a violation of the meaning of the role.
Younger children refuse to play at themselves, without motivating the refusal. Wed. preschool refusal, but it is always replaced by an offer of another game. The older children suggest something. from vol. classes as the content of the game or offer to repeat the entire routine of the children’s life. garden By implementing this content, children perceive the relationship with the expert not as playful, but as serious. The game is only possible if there is a role!
They willingly take on the role of a teacher, but the elders do not want to take on the role of children. The role of the child is not to serve as the implementation of the motive of the game (the motive of the game is the role), and the relationship with the teacher for them no longer seemed significant in the content of their life.
An offer to take on the roles of comrades from the younger ones. children are met with the same attitude as playing at themselves. And the senior children, taking on the role of another child, identify typical actions, activities, and characteristic behavioral traits for him. Probably, the younger ones can’t isolate this, that’s why they don’t take such roles.
The essence of the game is to recreate social relationships between people. The meaning of the game for children is different. age. groups changes. For the younger ones, it is in the actions of that person, the role of the cat. performed by the child. For the average – in relation to this person to others. For elders - in a typical relationship the person, the role of the cat. performed by a child. For each The role hides the known rules of action or societies. behavior
Game development levels:
First level.
there are roles, but they are determined by the nature of the actions, and do not determine the action
actions are monotonous and consist of a number of repeated operations
the logic of actions is easily violated without protests from children
Second level.
roles are called children, a division of functions is planned, the fulfillment of a role is reduced to the implementation of actions related to this role
The logic of actions is determined by their sequence in real life. really
violation of the sequence of actions is not actually accepted, but is not protested, rejection is not motivated by anything
Third level.
roles are clearly outlined and highlighted, children name their roles before the game starts, roles are defined and guide the child’s behavior
the logic and character of actions are determined by the role taken, actions become varied, specific role speech appears, addressed to a playmate in accordance with one’s role and the role played by the friend
violation of the logic of actions is protested by reference to reality. life
Fourth level.
the roles are clearly outlined and highlighted, throughout the entire game the child clearly follows one line of behavior, the role functions of children are interconnected, speech has a clearly role-based character
actions unfold in a clear sequence that strictly recreates reality. logic, they are varied, the rules referring to real life
violation of the logic of actions and rules is rejected not simply by reference to reality. life, but also an indication of the rationality of the rules
Violation of the meaning of the role (in the expert, the role was placed in conflict with the actions that the child should perform). They asked to play in such a way that the driver hands out tickets, and the conductor drives the train. The second game is mice catching a cat. Children 3 years old, first game - it is impossible to take the child out of the role, i.e. For the child, the role is merged with objects, he acts with cats, so a change of objects is a change of role. At the next level it’s different. The child takes on the new functions of a counselor, calling himself a conductor, but, having begun to act as a counselor, he enters into the role and names himself in unity with the nature of his actions. On last level(oldest preschoolers) children accept with laughter the expert’s proposal to act not in accordance with the role and call themselves not in accordance with the content of their play actions.
The question of stability is in obedience to the rule. They put me in a situation, in a cat. For the sake of fulfilling the role, the child should give away an object that is attractive to him or refuse to perform the action. 4 stages in obeying a rule in a role-playing game:
There are no rules, because in fact there is no role, immediate impulse wins
the rule does not yet appear clearly, but in cases of conflict it already overcomes the immediate desire to act with the object.
the rule clearly plays a role, but the behavior is not yet fully determined and is violated when a desire arises to produce other attractions. action. If a violation is indicated, the error in the execution of the role is immediately corrected
behavior is determined by the roles taken on, there is a cat inside. the rule of behavior clearly appears; in the struggle between rule and desire, the rule wins
Symbolism in role play. Let's lie. the child lives not only in the world of objects, through cats. Be satisfied with spending it. but also in the world of images and even signs (pictures in books, etc.). The process of transforming an object into a toy is the process of differentiation of the signified and the signifying object of the birth of a symbol. Having studied various symbolic forms functions (drawing, designing, playing, using signs), Getzer concluded that already at the age of 3, children can master the arbitrary connection of sign and meaning - and begin learning to read earlier than they usually do.
Lukov: a technique for double renaming items in the game. The number of objects that could perform the roles of adults or children necessary during the game and replace objects was specially limited in order to force children to use objects selected by the expert for replacement (N., first a horse is a child in a kindergarten, then a cook ). At 3 years old, children easily change, following an expert, the purpose of things in the game and their names, but rarely retain the new thing for a long time. gaming usage and name, constantly returning to the original. pre-game sp-bu actions with the subject and to the previous name. At 5 years old, children themselves actively search among the proposed toys for the characters or objects they need to replace them, and if they don’t find them, they agree with the expert’s suggestions, although not with certainty. labor. By changing the actions with the object and its name, the child firmly retains its new purpose for the object, even if it is not in direct accordance with its original, pre-play use. The condition for one toy to replace another is not external similarity, but the possibility of defining it. way to act with a given thing (a horse can be put down, laid down like a child, but a ball cannot). For older children, play activities in relation to substitute objects are also very good. stable By own children never produce secondary materials on their own initiative. substitutions, so the expert's initial attempt to destroy the accepted playful meaning of things encounters some obstacles. resistance, but after several such changes, the children willingly agree to further secondary renamings.
Zd. we see a separation between the use of the object and the specific one. things for the cat. this sp-b is initially fixed, as well as the separation of the word from the subject.
Elkonin. The first series is a renaming game - the child has a number of objects in front of him, he can call the objects by other names, rename them. Second series: 4 objects and their game names are given, a number of actions must be performed with them (N., a pencil is a knife, a ball is an apple: “cut a piece of the apple”). The third series is similar to the second, but they gave, N., a knife as a pencil and a pencil as a knife - the playful use of an object in a conflict situation, in the presence of a real object.
Res. First episode. Already for 3-year-old children, simple renaming does not cause difficulties. But many children, when calling objects by new names, make mistakes, calling the object either by its own name or by another. Naib. the number of errors falls to the youngest. age (3-4 years). The renaming of objects by children is limited to those objects that are in real terms. St. allows you to perform the actions required by the new name. Throughout preschool. age occurs means. expansion of actions assigned to a word with an object and its properties, which creates the possibility of more free, but still limited game renaming.
Episode 2. Half of three-year-old children will have difficulty performing the action of feeding a dog with an apple (a cube - a ball). 4-year-old children are better at this task. There is no noticeable shift in 5-year-olds. All 6-year-olds coped with the tasks of this series much more freely; there was not a single case of failure to complete an action.
Episode 3. The number of children is increasing, cat. do not accept playful use of objects. Special differences between younger and older preschoolers No. Only 3-year-olds give a significant number of refusals, and at other ages the number of children who accept gaming use is almost the same, but younger children have much more resistance than older ones. The introduction of a real object strengthens the connections between the object and actions and weakens the connections between words and actions or even inhibits them altogether.
There are 2 symbolizations in the development of the game:
transferring an action from one item to another when renaming the item
the child taking on the role of an adult, while the generalization and abbreviation of actions act as a condition for modeling social relationships between people in the course of their activities and thereby clarifying their humanity. sense.
Development of the child’s relationship to the rules of the game. Outdoor games with rules.
The younger the children, the more meaningful and direct the connection between the rules to which the child must subordinate his actions and the role he takes upon himself.
The game of relay race is the subordination of the immediate impulse to run towards the experimenter to the rule of running on a signal. Only the youngest children have disobedience to the rule. Children either run until the end of the command, or do not run even after it ends; the immediate impulse to run either wins or is inhibited; There is still no struggle between the impulse to run and the rule. Already at the age of 4 it was different: out of 11 trials, in 9 cases there was obedience to the rule. Complication: game of burners, building. The command is longer, so the impulse to run increases all the time, and it is more difficult to restrain it. Children of 7 years, unlike 5-year-olds, are aware of their impulse and, =>, are already consciously obeying the rule. The introduction of a plot increases the possibility of younger children obeying the rule (when playing a steam locomotive it is better than in a simple relay race). When introducing a plot, there is a kind of alienation of one’s actions, their objectification, hence the possibility of comparing and evaluating them, => greater controllability. Already on Wednesday. preschool At age, it becomes possible to obey a game rule that is not clothed in role content; in older preschool age, games with ready-made rules occupy a significant place; At school age, plot-based role-playing games are relegated to the background.
Expert - a guessing game. The child, together with the teacher, in the absence of the expert, thought about what action the expert should perform, the teacher agreed with the child that they would not tell him what to do, let the guesser guess himself. The expert played the role of a guesser, supposedly not knowing what action was intended. The child simultaneously has a rule to remain silent and an impulse to prompt; they come into conflict. A child (4.5 years old) follows the line of desire; the presence of a teacher at this level does not contribute to the fulfillment of the rule. At the second stage (5-6 years old), behavior changes; the point of the game for a child is not to tell what is planned. The child is guided by the rule, but has difficulty coping with the desire to give advice. Children do not give direct hints, but look intently at what is planned, give guiding instructions, and are happy when the expert guesses right. The presence of a teacher or other child at this stage helps to restrain desires. At the third stage (6.5 - 7 years old) for children, the point of the game is not to tell what is planned, the rule wins, the struggle is not so visible. The rule is observed even when the teacher is absent.
The development of the game goes from an expanded game situation and rules hidden within it to games with open rules and a collapsed game situation.
The game “inventing the rules of the game” (they give a playing field, soldiers, horsemen, a commander, 2 balls, you need to come up with a game with them). Steps:
pre-game; there are no rules, there is no formalized plot, children’s actions come down to manipulating toys
elements of the plot and roles have appeared, the commander stands out, the game is mainly comes down to formation and marching, department. The episodes of the game are not connected with each other, there are no clear rules
the plot appears, the war is played out, the rules are closely related to the plot, the rules are not generalized, but as the game progresses, the division. rules are formed
the rules are isolated and formulated before the start of the game, and purely conventional rules appear, independent of the plot and game situation
Play and mental development.
Game and development of the motivational-need sphere.
Vygotsky brought to the fore the problem of motives and costs as central to understanding the very emergence of role-playing games (rights), pointed out the contradictions between emerging new desires and the tendency to their immediate implementation, cat. not possible implemented.
Leontyev. Item. The world conscious of the child expands; the child is not able to act with all objects. For a child, there is no abstract theoretical theory yet. activity, awareness appears in him primarily in the form of action. The child strives to enter into an effective relationship not only with the things available to him, he strives to act like an adult.
When moving from subject. games to role-playing directly in the objective environment of children, significant changes will not occur. The child still washes the doll and puts it to bed. But all these items and actions with them are now included in the new one. system of the child’s relationship to reality, in the new. affective and attractive activities, thanks to this they objectively acquired a new meaning. The transformation of a child into a mother, and a doll into a child, leads to the transformation of bathing, feeding, and cooking into child care. These actions now express the mother’s attitude towards the child - her love and affection, and perhaps vice versa; it depends on the specifics. conditions of life of a child, those specific. attitude, who surround him. The generality and abbreviation of play actions is a symptom of what a human being is. relationship occurs and that this released meaning is emotionally experienced.
The significance of the game is not limited to the fact that the child has new motives for action and tasks associated with them. What is essential is that new things arise in the game. psychological form of motives. Hypothetically, we can imagine that it is in the game that a transition occurs from motives that have the form of pre-conscious, affectively colored immediate desires, to motives that have the form of generalized intentions that stand on the verge of consciousness.
Game and overcoming “cognitive egocentrism”. J. Piaget characterizes the main quality of thinking of preschool children. age, from cat. All the rest depend on cognitive egocentrism - insufficient delimitation of one’s point of view from other possible ones, and hence its actual dominance. Role-playing leads to a change in the child's position - from his individual and specifically childish position - to a new position as an adult. The game is an activity, on Oct. origin. basic processes associated with overcoming cognition. egocentrism.
Vine's problem about three brothers. While correctly indicating how many brothers he has, the child cannot correctly indicate how many brothers someone has. of his brothers, i.e. take their point of view. Expert Nedospasova: the problem from the three brothers was proposed not in relation to their own family, but in relation to someone else’s or conditional family, h. egocentric the position was not manifested at all or manifested itself to a much lesser extent. That. under experimental conditions. games managed to overcome the phenomenon of cognizance. egocentrism.
Game and development of mental actions. Halperin established the basic stages of formation of mental actions. If we exclude the preliminary stage. orientation in the task, then the formation of intelligence. Actions and concepts with predetermined values follow a natural path. stages:
stage of forming actions on the material. objects or their material substitute models
stage of forming the same action in terms of loud speech
stage of formation of the actual mental action (sometimes there are also intermediate stages, N. formation of action in terms of expanded speech, but to oneself, etc.)
In play, the child already acts with the meanings of objects, but at the same time relies on their material substitutes - toys. Reliance on substitute objects and actions with them is increasingly reduced. Thus, play actions have an intermediate character, gradually acquiring the character of mental actions with the meanings of objects, performed in terms of loud speech and still slightly based on external influences. an action, but it has already acquired the character of a generalized gesture-indication. In the game, the prerequisites for the transition of mentality are formed. actions at the mental stage. actions based on speech.
J. Bruner: preliminary role. manipulations with material (elements of tools) for subsequent decision-I intellectual. tasks. He appreciates the value of games for intellectuals. development, because During the game, such combinations of material and such orientation in its properties may arise, which will lead to the subsequent use of this material as tools for solving problems.
Game and development of voluntary behavior. In the game, every minute the child abandons fleeting desires in favor of fulfilling the role he has taken on. In play, a significant restructuring of the child’s behavior occurs - it becomes arbitrary, i.e. is carried out in accordance with the sample and is controlled by comparison with this sample as a standard.
In all age groups, the duration of maintaining a posture of immobility (N., sentry) in the situation of playing a role exceeds the indicators of maintaining the same posture in conditions of a direct task. Great importance to them. motivation of activity. Fulfilling a role, being emotionally attractive, stimulates the performance of actions in which the role is embodied. In the presence of a group, the immobility pose was performed longer and more strictly than in a situation of solitude. The presence of others seemed to increase control over one’s behavior. The child performs 2 functions in the game: fulfills his role and controls his behavior, i.e. there is reflection, therefore the game can be considered a school of voluntary behavior.
D.B. Elkonin.
Psychology of the game.
M., “Pedagogy”, 1978.
Chapter two
About the historical origins of role-playing games
1. From the history of toys
Central to the theory of role-playing game is the question of its historical origin - this is the question of its nature.
While fighting for a materialistic understanding of the origin of art, G. V. Plekhanov also touches on the issue of play: “The solution to the question of the relationship of work to play or, if you like, game to work is extremely important for elucidating the genesis of art” (1958, p. 336). At the same time, G.V. Plekhanov puts forward a number of provisions that are fundamental for resolving the question of the origin of the game.
The most important is his position that in the history of human society, work is older than play. “First, real war and the need for good warriors it creates, and then the game of war to satisfy this need” (ibid., p. 342). This position, as Plekhanov points out, makes it possible to understand why play in an individual’s life precedes work. “...If we had not gone beyond the point of view of the individual,” writes Plekhanov, “we would not have understood why play appears in his life before work; nor why he amuses himself with precisely these, and not some other games” (1958, p. 343). Play, in the light of these provisions of Plekhanov, seems to be an activity that arises in response to the needs of the society in which children live and of which they are active members. they must become.
In order to answer the question under what conditions and in connection with what needs of society role-playing games arise, a historical study would be necessary.
In Soviet psychology, the first question about the need for historical research to build a full-fledged theory of play was raised by E. A. Arkin: “Only on factual material drawn from the past and compared with the present can a correct scientific theory of games and toys be built, and only from such a theory can healthy, fruitful, sustainable “pedagogical practice” should proceed.” “The history of children’s play and children’s toys,” continues E. A. Arkin, “should serve as the foundation for the construction of their theories” (1935, p. 10).
In his study, E. A. Arkin almost does not touch upon the question of the historical origin of games, in particular role-playing games, but dwells mainly on toys and their history. Comparing toys obtained during archaeological excavations with modern toys, Arkin writes: “In the collections collected by them (archaeologists - D.E.) and stored in museums, there was not a single one that did not have its counterpart in a modern children’s room” (ibid. , p. 21). Not limiting himself to a comparison with an archaeological toy, E. A. Arkin also explores children's toys of peoples at lower levels of development. And here the author comes to similar conclusions - “Indeed, the fact is that, despite the heterogeneity of the sources from which we drew our material, the picture, while changing forms and differences in details, maintains unity, that among peoples separated from each other by vast spaces, a toy remains the same unfading, eternally young, and its content, its functions remain the same among the Eskimos and Polynesians, among the Kaffirs and Indians, among the Bushmen and the Bororos - this fact speaks of the amazing stability of the toy and, consequently, the need that it satisfies , and those forces that create it” (1935, p. 31).
Citing further facts of the identity of not only toys, but also the games of modern children and children of peoples at lower levels of social development, E. A. Arkin concludes his comparison “... the stability of a children's toy, its versatility, the immutability of its basic structural forms and the functions it performs is an obvious fact, and perhaps it was precisely the obviousness of this fact that was the reason that researchers did not consider it necessary to dwell on it or emphasize it. But if the amazing stability of a children's toy is an indisputable fact, then it is completely incomprehensible why psychologists, anthropologists and natural scientists did not draw any conclusions from this indisputable fact, why they did not look for an explanation for it. Or is this indisputable fact so simple and clear that it does not require any interpretation? This is unlikely to be the case. On the contrary, it should seem strange that a child, born and growing up in the culture of the 20th century, often uses as a source of joy and a tool for his development and self-education the same toy, which is the property of a child, born from people who are close in their mental development to the inhabitants of caves and pile buildings, and growing in the conditions of the most primitive existence. And these children from eras of humanity so distant from each other show their deep inner closeness by the fact that they not only receive or themselves create similar toys, but, what is even more amazing, by making the same use of them” (1935, p. 32 ).
We have cited these large excerpts from the work of E. A. Arkin in order to show how historical research that was only apparently led the author to ahistorical conclusions. Having compared the toys of children of primitive societies and archaeological toys of the relatively recent historical past with the toys of modern children, the author did not find anything specific in them. Both here and there are the same toys and the same use of them by the child. Consequently, there is no history of the toy, no development of it. The toy has remained the same as it was at the dawn of human culture.
E. A. Arkin sees the reason for this apparent immutability of toys in the fact that “the human child, like his toys, manifests its unity in the unity of human developmental traits” (ibid., p. 49). E. A. Arkin needed a statement about the historical immutability of the toy to prove the position that with the emergence of homo sapiens, children in all eras - from the most ancient to the present - were born with the same capabilities. Yes, this is definitely true. But one of the paradoxes of children’s development lies in the fact that, coming into this world with the same degree of helplessness and the same opportunities, they go through completely different development paths in societies at different levels of production and culture, reaching both in different ways and in different ways. time of their social and psychological maturity.
E. A. Arkin’s position on the immutability of a toy during the historical development of society logically leads us to the conclusion that the toy corresponds to some unchangeable natural characteristics of the child and is not in any connection with the life of society and the life of the child in society. This fundamentally contradicts the correct position of G.V. Plekhanov that play in its content goes back to the work of adults. It is quite natural that a toy cannot be anything other than a reproduction in one or another simplified, generalized and schematized form of objects from the life and activities of society, adapted to the characteristics of children of a particular age.
E. A. Arkin leaves the historical point of view and becomes, in the words of G. V. Plekhanov, the point of view of the individual. But this point of view cannot explain to us why children play certain games and use certain toys in their games. It is now generally accepted that children’s play in its content is closely related to the life, work and activities of adult members of society. How can it be that the game is determined in its content by the life of society, and the toy - this necessary companion of any game - has nothing to do with the life of society and corresponds to some unchangeable natural characteristics of the child?
The conclusions obtained by E. A. Arkin from his comparative historical research, first of all, contradict the facts. The nursery of a modern preschooler is filled with toys that could not exist in a primitive society and the playful use of which is inaccessible to a child of this society. Is it possible to imagine among the toys of a child of this society cars, trains, airplanes, lunar rovers, satellites, building materials, pistols, sets of parts for construction, etc. E. A. Arkin, to the detriment of facts, seeks unity where the obvious catches the eye difference. This change in the nature of a child’s toys throughout human history clearly reflects the actual history of the toy in its causal dependence on the history of the development of society, the history of the development of the child in society.
True, E. A. Arkin writes not about all toys, but about toys, which he calls the original toys, to which he refers:
a) sound toys - rattles, buzzers, bells, rattles, etc.;
b) motor toys - top, ball, snake, primitive versions of bilboke;
c) weapons - bow, arrows, boomerangs, etc.;
d) figurative toys - images of animals and dolls;
e) a rope from which various, sometimes the most intricate, figures are made.
First of all, it should be noted that the so-called original toys have their own history of origin. It is quite obvious that bows and arrows could become toys only after they appeared in society as tools for actual hunting. Before the advent of tools that required rotational movements for their use, there could not have been any toys driven by this method (buzzers, tops).
To analyze the process of the emergence of each of the “original toys,” a special historical study would have to be conducted, and then it would become clear that they were not “original” at all, but arose at certain stages of the development of society and that their emergence was preceded by the invention of the corresponding tools by man. The history of the emergence of individual toys could be presented in such a study as a reflection of the history of tools of human labor and objects of worship.
All the toys that E. A. Arkin classifies as “original” are actually a product of historical development. However, once they arose at a certain historical stage in the development of human society, they did not disappear along with the disappearance of those tools of which they are copies. The bow and arrow have long since disappeared as hunting tools and been replaced by firearms, but they remain in the world of children's toys. Toys live longer than the tools of which they are images, and this gives the impression of their immutability. Such toys really seem to have frozen in their development and retained their original appearance. However, these toys lack a history only when viewed externally, purely phenomenologically, as physical objects.
If we consider the toy in its function, then we can say with complete confidence that the so-called original toys during the history of human society radically changed their function, becoming in a new relationship to the process of child development.
Studying the historical change of toys is a rather difficult task: firstly, an archaeological toy does not tell the researcher anything about its use by a child; secondly, at present, some toys, even among peoples at the lowest levels of social development, have lost their direct connection with tools and household items and have lost their original function.
Let's give just a few examples. At the early stages of the development of society, people used the friction of one piece of wood against another to make fire. Continuous friction was best ensured by rotation, which was achieved through devices in the form of various drills. Among the peoples of the Far North, it was necessary to drill many holes to secure the sleds. Drilling also required continuous rotation. According to A.N. Reinson-Pravdin (1949), small wooden drills with a primitive bow structure - made from a stick with a cord, which can be set in motion by children and are still common among children's toys of the peoples of the Far North. Learning continuous rotation was necessary, since a child who mastered this skill easily mastered the tools that required this skill.
Such training could be carried out not only on a small model of a drill, but also on its modified versions. Modified versions of the drill were kubari, which are nothing more than a drill driven not by a beam, but by fingers. So, if you remove its beam from the rod of the drill, then in front of us you will find a simple top with a slightly elongated stick.
Another version of the drill was the buzzer, in which continuous rotation was achieved special skill stretch and release the twisted rope. Thus, various kubari and buzzers were modified drills, using which children acquired the technical skills to produce the rotational movements necessary to work with a drill. The toy and the child’s activity with it were at this stage a modification of the tool and the activity of adults with it and stood in direct relation to the child’s future activity.
Centuries have passed, the tools and methods of making fire and drilling holes have changed significantly. Kubari and buzzers are no longer directly related to the work of adults and to the future work activity of the child. And for the child they are no longer miniature drills and do not even represent them. Kubari and buzzers have turned from “figurative toys” into “motor” or “sound”, in the terminology of E. A. Arkin. However, actions with them continue to be supported by adults, and they still exist among children. Actions with these toys have evolved from training specific, almost professional skills to forming some general motor or visual-motor functional systems.
It is interesting to note that in order to cause and maintain the manipulation of these toys, one has to resort to special tricks, invent humming and musical tops, etc., i.e., give them additional properties. It can be assumed that the mechanism that causes and supports actions with these toys, which are only identical in appearance, has fundamentally changed. These toys are always brought into children's lives by adults who demonstrate actions with them. However, if earlier, at the stage when these toys were smaller models of adults’ tools, actions with them were supported by the “toy-tool” relationship, now, when there is no such relationship, their manipulation is supported by an indicative reaction to novelty. Systematic exercise is replaced by occasional use.
The process of development of games with string occurs in a similar way. At that stage of the development of society where tying knots and weaving were essential elements of the work activity of adults, these exercises, which were common among both children and adults, were supported by the needs of society, were directly related to weaving nets, etc. Currently, they have degenerated into purely functional, developing fine movements of the fingers, and entertainment: they are extremely rare and are not directly related to the work activity of adults.
The process of change and development in such “primordial toys” as a bow and arrow is especially clearly visible. Among hunting tribes and peoples at relatively low levels of development, bows and arrows were one of the main hunting weapons. Bows and arrows became the property of a child from a very early age. Gradually becoming more complex, they became in the hands of a child the most authentic weapon, a device for his independent activity, with the help of which he can hunt small animals (chipmunks, squirrels) and birds, says A. N. Reinson-Pravdin (1948). A child who shot small animals and birds with a bow recognized himself as a future hunter, just like his father; adults looked at a child shooting from a bow as a future hunter. The child mastered the bow, and adults were extremely interested in the child mastering this weapon perfectly.
But then it appeared firearms. The bow still remains in the hands of children, but now the action with it is no longer directly related to hunting methods, and exercises with a bow are used to develop certain qualities, such as accuracy, necessary for a hunter who also uses firearms. In the course of the development of human society, hunting gives way to other types of labor activity. Children are increasingly using the bow as a toy. Of course, in our modern society you can find a bow and some children may even get interested in shooting from it. However, the exercises of a modern child with a bow do not occupy the same place in his life that they occupied in the life of a child in the society of primitive hunters.
Thus, the so-called original toy remains unchanged only in appearance. In reality, like all other toys, it arises and changes historically; its history is organically connected with the history of the child’s changing place in society and cannot be understood outside of this history. E. A. Arkin’s mistake lies in the fact that he isolated the history of the toy from the history of its owner, from the history of its function in the development of the child, from the history of the child’s place in society. Having made such a mistake, E. A. Arkin came to ahistorical conclusions that are not confirmed by facts from the history of the toy.
2. Historical origin of the expanded form of gaming activity
The question of the emergence of role-playing games during the historical development of society is one of the most difficult to research. Such a study requires, on the one hand, data on the child’s place in society at various stages of historical development, and on the other hand, data on the nature and content of children’s games at these same historical stages. Only by correlating the life of a child in society with his games can one understand the nature of the latter.
Data on the development and life of a child and his games at the early stages of social development are extremely poor. None of the ethnographers ever set themselves the task of such research. Only in the 30s of our century did special studies by Margaret Mead appear on the children of the tribes of New Guinea, which contained materials about the lifestyle of children and their games. However, the work of this researcher was devoted to some special issues (about children's animism, puberty in a society at a relatively low stage of development, etc.), which, naturally, determined the selection of material. The data, which are scattered across countless ethnographic, anthropological and geographical accounts, are extremely sketchy and fragmentary. In some there are indications of the children's lifestyle, but there are no indications of their games; others, on the contrary, talk only about games. In some studies, the colonialist point of view is so clearly carried out, for the sake of which the researchers tried in every possible way to belittle the level of mental development of the children of oppressed peoples, that these data cannot be considered at all reliable. Correlating the available materials about children with the life of society is also difficult, since it is often difficult to determine at what stage of social development a particular tribe, clan, or community was during the period of description. The difficulties are further aggravated by the fact that, being at approximately the same level of social development, they can live in completely different conditions, and these conditions, in turn, undoubtedly have an impact on the lives of children in society, their place among adults, and thereby on the nature of their games. Regarding the early periods of the development of human society, M. O. Kosven writes. “There can be no talk of actually approaching the starting point of human development or, as they say, to the zero point of human culture. Here only more or less admissible hypotheses are possible, more or less successful approximations to the mystery of our past that is hidden from us forever” (1927, p. 5). This applies even more to the study of a child and his life in a primitive society. Our task is to answer, albeit hypothetically, at least two questions. Firstly, has role-playing always existed, or was there a period in the life of society when this form of play did not exist for children? Secondly, what changes in the life of society and the child’s position in society may be associated with the emergence of role-playing. We cannot directly trace the process of the emergence of role-playing games. The very meager data available make it possible to outline only in the most general terms a hypothesis about the emergence of role-playing games, to establish, and then only approximately, the historical conditions under which the need for this unique form of child’s life in society arose. In our research, we have far from exhausted all available materials and present only those that are sufficient to formulate our assumption, leaving aside all their diversity.
The question of the historical origin of the game is closely related to the nature of the education of younger generations in societies at lower levels of development of production and culture. R. Alt (K. AN, 1956), on the basis of extensive materials, indicates the presence of an initial unity of labor activity and education, that is, the lack of differentiation of education as a special social function. In his opinion, the upbringing of children at the early stages of social development is characterized by the following features: firstly, the equal upbringing of all children and the participation of all members of society in the upbringing of each child; secondly, comprehensiveness of education - every child should be able to do everything that adults can do, and take part in all aspects of the life of the society of which he is a member; thirdly, the short duration of the period of upbringing - children already at an early age know all the tasks that life poses, they early become independent of adults, their development ends earlier than at later stages of social development.
R. Alt considers the main factor that has a formative influence on the development of children to be the direct participation of children in the lives of adults: the early inclusion of children in productive work, associated with a low level of development of productive forces; participation of children together with adults in dances, holidays, some rituals, celebrations and recreation. Pointing to play as a means of education, R. Alt notes that where a child can take part in the work of adults without special preliminary preparation and training, he does so. Where this is not the case, the child “grows” into the world of adults through play activities that reflect the life of society. (Here already contains a hint at the historical origin of the game and its connection with the change in the child’s position in society). Thus, the child’s position in society at the earliest stages of development is characterized primarily by the early inclusion of children in the productive labor of adult members of society. The earlier a society is at a stage of development, the earlier children are included in the productive labor of adults and become independent producers.
In the earliest historical periods of society, children lived a common life with adults. The educational function had not yet been identified as a special social function, and all members of society carried out the upbringing of children, the main task of which was to make children participants in socially productive labor, to convey to them the experience of this work, and the main means was the gradual inclusion of children in the forms of adult labor available to them. Primitive wandering gatherers, according to the testimony of V. Volna (\U. Woll, 1925), together - men, women and children - move from place to place in search of edible fruits and roots. By the age of ten, girls become mothers, and boys become fathers and begin to lead an independent lifestyle. Describing one of the most primitive groups of people on earth, M. Kosven points out that among the Kuku people, the main unit is a small family, the main occupation is collecting fruits and roots; the main weapon is a stick, which is a split bamboo trunk with a naturally pointed end, used for digging up roots and tubers, the only weapon is a wooden spear with a tip made of a sharp bamboo sliver; utensils are coconut shells and hollow bamboo trunks. M. Kosven writes: “Children stay with their parents and follow them together in search of food until they are 10-12 years old. From this age, both boys and girls are considered independent and capable of shaping their own destiny and their future. From this moment on, they begin to wear a bandage that hides their genitals for the first time. During their stay, they build themselves a separate hut next to their parents' hut. But they look for food on their own and eat separately. The connection between parents and children gradually weakens, and often the children soon separate and begin to live independently in the forest” (1927, p. 38). Already in the earliest ethnographic and geographical descriptions of Russian travelers, there are indications of the training of young children to perform labor duties and their inclusion into the productive work of adults. Thus, G. Novitsky, in his description of the Ostyak people dating back to 1715, wrote: “What is common to all is needlework, shooting animals (they kill), catching birds, fish, they can feed themselves with them. These, for they are cunning and study their children, and from a young age they become accustomed to shooting a bow and killing an animal, to catching birds and fish (they teach them)” (1941, p. 43).
S.P. Krasheninnikov, describing his journey through Kamchatka (1737-1741), notes about the Koryaks: “The most praiseworthy thing about this people is that although they love their children excessively, they teach them to work as children; for which reason they are kept no better than slaves, they are sent for firewood and water, they are ordered to carry heavy loads, graze deer herds and do other things like that” (1949, p. 457). V.F. Zuev, who visited the Ob peoples in 1771-1772, wrote about the children of the Ostyaks and Samoyeds: “From a young age, small children have long been accustomed to bear any difficulty, as can be seen from their rough life, which is neither small nor in in any case does not lead to regret. It can truly be said that this people were born to endure unbearable labor and, indeed, if they had not gotten used to it from childhood, then there would be little hope for fathers to see their sons as great helpers for themselves and to bear the labor of amazing helpers. As soon as the boy begins to have little idea, his mother or nanny amuses him with nothing more than the rattling of a bowstring, and when he begins to walk, his father prepares an onion for him. On my journey through the Ostyak yurts, I saw few such guys who, in the simple evening between games, would wander around without a bow, but usually they either shoot at trees or at something on the ground. There the Ezys fence around their yurt, there are constipations; and it seems as if their toys were already foreshadowing a future life. And if you look at the river, made through some river, you can’t see that someday old people with vazhans would sit here, except for the little guys, and the big ones themselves swim along the rivers either with seines, or with caldans and spans, where he either can’t do enough, or doesn’t understand, he can’t keep up” (1947, pp. 32-33).
Famous Russian explorer of the Papuans II. II. Miklouho-Maclay, who lived among them for many years, writes about Papuan children: “Children are usually cheerful, cry and scream rarely, the father and sometimes the mother treat them very well, although the mother usually treats the children less tenderly than the father. In general, Papuans have a very strong love for children. I even saw among them toys that are not often found among savages, namely, something like kubars, small boats that children float on water, and many other toys. But already early the boy accompanies his father to the plantation, wanderings in the forest and on fishing trips. Already in childhood, a child learns practically his future activities and, while still a boy, becomes serious and careful in his handling. I often saw a comical scene, how a little boy of about four years old would very seriously build a fire, carry firewood, wash dishes, help his father peel fruit, and then suddenly jump up, run to his mother, who was squatting at some work, grab her by the chest and , despite the resistance, began to suck. Here the custom of breastfeeding children for a very long time is widespread” (1451, p. 78).
In the descriptions of N. N. Miklouho-Maclay there is an indication of the participation of children not only in everyday work, but also in more complex forms of collective productive labor of adults. So, describing the cultivation of the soil, he writes: “The work is done in this way: two, three or more men stand in a row, deeply stick sharpened stakes (stakes are strong, long sticks, pointed at one end, men work with them, since when working with This tool requires a lot of force) into the ground and then with one swing they lift a large block of earth. If the soil is hard, then stakes are stuck into the same place twice, and then the earth is raised. The men are followed by women who crawl on their knees and, holding their sab stakes tightly in both hands (sab stakes are small narrow shovels for women), crush the earth raised by the men. Children of various ages follow them and rub the earth with their hands. In this order, men, women and children cultivate the entire plantation” (1951, p. 231). From this description it is clear that in Papuan society there was a natural age-based gender division of labor, in which all members of society took part, including children, except the youngest. Pointing to the very widespread love of teaching others among the natives, which is very clearly noticeable even in children, N. N. Miklouho-Maclay explains its origin this way: “This is noticeable even in children: many times small children, about six or seven years old, showed me how they do this or that. This happens because parents accustom their children to practical life very early; so that, while still very small, they have already taken a closer look at and even learned more or less all the arts and actions of adults, even those that are not at all suitable for their age. Children play little: the boys' game consists of throwing sticks like spears, and archery, and as soon as they make little progress, they apply them in practical life. I have seen very small boys spending whole hours by the sea, trying to hit some fish with a bow. The same thing happens with girls, and even more so because they begin to do housework earlier and become assistants to their mothers” (1951, p. 136). We dwelled in such detail on the data of N. N. Miklouho-Maclay because the testimony of this prominent Russian humanist is especially valuable to us for its undoubted and complete objectivity. A number of other authors have similar indications of the early participation of children in adult labor. Thus, J. Vanyan, in his work on the history of the Aztecs, writes: “Education began after weaning, i.e. that is, in the third year of his life. The goal of education was to introduce the child as soon as possible into the circle of those skills and responsibilities that made up the everyday life of adults. Since everything was done using manual labor, children had the opportunity to become involved in the activities of adults very early. Fathers watched their sons learn, mothers taught their daughters. Until the age of six, their upbringing was limited only to moral teaching and advice, they were taught how to use household utensils and perform minor housework.” “Such upbringing,” the author continues, “directly introduced the younger generation into everyday life at home” (1949, p. 87). A. T. Bryant, who lived among the Zulus for about half a century, also points to the early inclusion of children in productive labor together with adults: “Whoever has left childhood, that is, counted six years, be it a boy or a girl, is equally obliged to work and unquestioningly perform assigned work; boys under the guidance of their father, girls under the supervision of their mother” (1953, p. 123). Bryant points whole line work that is the function of children. “Six- and seven-year-old kids drove calves and goats into the meadow in the morning, older guys drove cows” (ibid., p. 157). With the onset of spring, “women and children wandered through the meadows in search of edible wild herbs” (ibid., p. 184). During the period of ripening of grain crops, when the crops were in danger of being devastated by birds, “women and children were forced to spend the whole day, from sunrise to sunset, in the field, driving away the birds” (ibid., p. 191).
Many Soviet researchers of the peoples of the Far North also point to the early inclusion of children in adult labor and special training for work. Thus, A.G. Bazanov and N.G. Kazansky write: “From a very early age, Mansi children are drawn into fishing. They can barely walk, and their parents are already taking them into the boat with them. And as soon as they begin to grow up, small oars are often made for them, they are taught to steer a boat, and accustom them to the life of the river” (1939, p. 173). In another of his works, A.G. Bazanov writes: “A Vogul child has only just turned 5-6 years old, and he is already running around the yurts with a bow and arrow, hunting birds, developing his accuracy. He wants to be a hunter. From the age of 7-8 years, Vogul children are gradually taken into the forest. In the forest they learn how to find a squirrel, a capercaillie, how to handle a dog, where and how to set slops, chirkans, and traps. If a native cuts down poles for the scoops, then his little son puts the scops on guard, loosens the soil, arranges bait, puts sandpipers, pebbles, and berries here” (1934, p. 93). Children, even the youngest, are avid hunters and come to school with dozens of squirrels and chipmunks to their name. A.G. Bazanov, describing fishing, very well noted the basic principle of education in these conditions: “There were four of us adults and the same number of small children... We went out to a sandy cape protruding with a sharp tongue and, standing in two rows, began choose a seine on the platform. There were kids standing between us in the middle. They also clung with their tanned little hands to the edges of the net and helped transfer it to the boat.” “My guide, a Zyryan,” continues A.G. Bazanov, “shouted to one of the guys: “Don’t push under your feet.” The old Vogul looked at him angrily and shook his head. And then he remarked: “You can’t do this, you can’t. Let the children do everything we do” (ibid., p. 94). G. Startsev points out that “at the age of 6-7, children are taught to control deer and catch them with lassoes” (1930, p. 96). S.N. Stebnitsky, describing the life of Koryak children, writes: “In economic life, the independence of children is especially manifested. There are a number of economic sectors and jobs, the execution of which lies entirely with children.” “S.N. Stebnitsky is pointing at the children,” and there is also firewood preparation. In any frost or bad weather, the boy must, harnessing the remaining dogs at home, sometimes drive ten kilometers to get firewood.” “Girls,” continues S.N. Stebnitsky, “enter into all this work playfully. First they will give you a piece of scrap, a serrated dull knife, a broken needle, then they will take up the real one without skill, then they acquire skills and, unnoticed by themselves, are drawn into the age-old female strap” (1930, p. 44-45).
We will not multiply examples, because the materials cited are sufficient to show that in a society at a relatively low stage of development, with a primitive communal organization of labor, children are very early involved in the productive work of adults, taking part in it as much as possible. This happens in the same way as in a patriarchal peasant family, in which, according to K. Marx, “differences in gender and age, as well as natural working conditions that change with the changing seasons, regulate the distribution of labor between family members and the working time of each individual member. But the expenditure of individual labor power, measured by time, appears here from the very beginning as a social definition of the work itself, since individual labor power functions here from the very beginning only as organs of the total labor power of the family.” The employment of mothers and the early inclusion of children in adult labor lead to the fact that, firstly, in primitive society there is no sharp line between adults and children, and, secondly, to the fact that children become truly independent very early. Almost all researchers emphasize this. So, for example, S.N. Stebnitsky writes: “In general, it must be said that the Koryaks do not have a sharp division into children and adults. Children are equal and equally respected members of society. During a general conversation, their words are listened to as carefully as the speech of adults.” The largest Russian ethnographer L. Ya. Sternberg also points to the equality of children and adults among the peoples of Northeast Asia. “It is difficult for a civilized person to even imagine what a sense of equality and respect there is for young people here. Teenagers aged 10-12 years feel like completely equal members of society. The most profound and respectable elders listen to their remarks with the most serious attention, answering them with the same seriousness and politeness as their own peers. No one feels the difference in age or position” (1933, p. 52). Other authors point to early independence as a characteristic feature of children living in a primitive society. The indicated characteristic features of a child living in a primitive society, his early independence and the absence of a sharp line between children and adults are a natural consequence of the living conditions of these children, their real place in society.
Did role-playing exist for children at that stage of development of society, when the tools of labor were still quite primitive, the division of labor was based on natural age and gender differences, children were equal members of society, participating in common labor in accordance with their own (K. Marx, F Engels, Soch., vol. 23, p. 88) possibilities? There are no exact data on children's games at this level of development of society. Ethnographers and travelers who described the life of peoples close to this level of development indicate that children play little, and if they do play, they play the same games as adults, and their games are not role-playing. Thus, D. Levingston, describing the life of one “of the Negro tribes, the Bakalahari, notes: “I have never seen their children play” (1947, p. 35). N. N. Miklouho-Maclay also speaks about the children of the Papuans, that “children play little” (1951, p. 136). A. T. Bryant, who lived fifty years among the Zulus, in the work already mentioned describes a number of games played by Zulu children, but among them there is not a single role-playing game. M. Mead (M M. Mead, 1931), who described the life of children in a society of primitive fishermen in Melanesia, on one of the islands of the Admiralty Archipelago, says that Papuan children are allowed to play all day long, but their play resembles the play of little puppies and kittens. According to M. Mead, These children do not find such models in the lives of adults that would arouse their admiration and desire to imitate them. She emphasizes that in the social organization of adults, children do not find interesting models for their games. Only by chance and very rarely, once a month, did we succeed observe imitative play in which children acted out scenes from the lives of adults, such as paying a bride price for marriage or distributing tobacco at funeral ceremonies. The author observed such games only 3-4 times. The author points out the lack of imagination in these games. Although, according to the author, children have every opportunity to play role-playing games (a lot of free time, the opportunity to observe the life of adults, rich vegetation, which provides a lot of all kinds of material for play, etc.), they never act out scenes from the life of adults , never imitate in their games the return of adults from a successful hunt, nor their ceremonies, nor their dances, etc. Thus, as the above materials show, children living in a society at a relatively low stage of development have role-playing games No. This provision should not lead to the conclusion that children have a low level of mental development, that they lack imagination, etc. etc., as some researchers claim. The absence of role-playing games is generated by the special position of children in society and does not at all indicate a low level of mental development. Children living in the conditions of a primitive society are so far behind their peers, children of modern society, in the development of role-playing games, to the extent that they are superior to them in terms of independence, participation in the work activities of adults and related mental abilities: “The general conditions of primitive education and that independence, under the sign of which childhood predominantly proceeds, writes M. O. Kosvenz, it is necessary to explain the remarkable ability for rapid development and special talent that children of backward tribes and nationalities show in colonial schools. The leap from primitiveness to civilization turns out to be extremely easy for them” (1953, p. 140). The primitive tools and forms of labor available to the child give him the opportunity to develop early independence generated by the demands of society and the direct participation of adult members of society in labor. It is quite natural that children are not exploited, and their work is in the nature of satisfying a naturally occurring need that is social in nature. There is no doubt that children bring specific childish traits into the performance of their work duties, perhaps even enjoying the process of work itself, and, in any case, experiencing a feeling of satisfaction and associated pleasure from activities carried out together with adults and as adults. This is all the more likely because, according to the testimony of most researchers, education in a primitive society, although harsh in content, is extremely soft in form. Children are not punished and are kept in a cheerful, cheerful, cheerful state in every possible way. However, passion for the labor process itself, a joyful mood and a sense of satisfaction and pleasure do not turn these, even the most primitive and simple forms of child labor, into a game. In the conditions of primitive society, with its relatively primitive means and forms of labor, even small children, starting from three or four years old, could take part in simple forms of household labor, in collecting edible plants, roots, larvae, snails, etc. in primitive fishing with simple baskets or even hands, in hunting small animals and birds, in primitive forms of agriculture. The demand for independence presented to children by society found its natural form of fulfillment in joint work with adults. The direct connection of children with the entire society, carried out in the process of common labor, excluded any other forms of connection between the child and society. At this stage of development and with such a position of the child in society, there was no need to reproduce labor and relationships between adults in special conditions, there was no need for role-play. The transition to higher forms of production - agriculture and cattle breeding, the complication of fishing and hunting methods, their transition from passive to increasingly active forms was accompanied by the displacement of gathering and primitive forms of hunting and fishing. Along with the change in the nature of production, a new division of labor occurred in society. “The development of production,” writes M. Kosven, “expressed in the transition to plow farming, and the emergence of cattle breeding led to the most important socio-economic result, which Engels called the first major social division of labor, namely the division between farmers and cattle breeders with all the resulting consequences , in particular the development of home crafts and regular exchange. These profound changes also determined the socio-economic result, which was expressed in a new division of labor by gender, in a change in the place of men and women in social production. The division of labor by gender developed and existed, having, as Engels says, “purely natural origin” already under matriarchy. Now it has acquired an incomparably deeper character and deeper social and economic significance. Cattle breeding became a male-owned industry. The changes that took place in the general economy led to the separation of household production as a special branch, “which became the predominant area of women’s work” (1951, pp. 84-85). Along with the change in the nature of production, a new distribution of labor in society also occurred. With the increasing complexity of means and methods of labor and its redistribution, there was a natural change in the participation of children in various types of labor. Children have ceased to take direct part in complex and inaccessible forms of labor activity. Younger children were left with only certain areas of household labor and the simplest forms of production activity. Although at this stage of development children are still equal members of society and participants in the activities of adults in some areas of their work activity, new features are emerging in their position. Some of the materials we have already cited (materials from studies of the peoples of the Far North) relate specifically to this period of social development. In relation to the most important, but inaccessible to children, areas of work, they are faced with the task of mastering the complex tools of such work as early as possible. Smaller tools of labor appear, specially adapted to children's capabilities, with which children practice in conditions that are close to the conditions of real activity of adults, but not identical with them. What these tools are depends on which branch of labor is the main one in a given society. Here are some relevant materials. Among the peoples of the Far North, a knife is a necessary tool for a reindeer herder and fisherman. People begin to learn how to use a knife from a very early age. N. G. Bogoraz-Tan writes. “The Chukchi have a very happy childhood. Children are not constrained or intimidated in any way. Little boys, as soon as they begin to grasp things tenaciously, are given a knife, and from that time on they do not part with it. I saw one boy trying to cut wood with a knife; the knife was slightly smaller than himself” (1934, p. 101). “Just like an adult hunter,” writes A. N. Reinson-Pravdin), “every boy has a belt to which a knife is attached on a chain or strap, not a toy, but a real one, sometimes even of quite impressive size. An accidental cut will only quickly teach a child how to properly handle the most necessary weapon in life. A boy needs a knife both for food - to cut off a piece of meat, and in order to make a toy, whittle an arrow, skin a killed animal, etc. An ax is also an essential tool for a boy... A small knife, the first in life the child's path, usually a gift from his mother, he receives a large knife with a skillfully finished handle from his father. Under such conditions, it is clear that in the toys of Ob children it is very difficult to find a knife or an ax, toys built from a plank, which we often find among the children of many peoples of this culture, where the child has not been early accustomed to this type of weapon” (1948, p. . 100). “It’s the same with skiing. Very tiny, “doll” skis are very rarely seen in children’s toys. There is no need for them, since the child receives skis literally from the age when he is just learning to walk on his feet.” He further writes: “Children's skis are considered by adults to be the best toy for children. Children organize skiing competitions, and many hunting games are played on skis. Mothers decorate their skis with a small pattern, put colored cloth under the belt, and sometimes even paint the skis red. This emphasizes the playful functions of toy skis. Growing up, the boy learns to make his own skis, and in preparation for hunting, he covers his skis with kamys, that is, he glues skin from the forehead and legs of a deer under them, as the elders do, for hunting over long distances. From this moment on, skis cease to be a toy” (1948, p. 198). It is completely incomprehensible to us why A. N. Reinson-Pravdin classifies a children’s knife and children’s skis as toys. The fact that the knife and skis are adapted to the capabilities of children - they are smaller and colored - does not give grounds to classify them as toys. The fact that children cut out toys with a knife, and children can play competitions on skis, also does not give the right to classify them as toys. These are not toys, but household items, the use of which a child should master as early as possible and which he masters by practically using them in the same way as adults. To these tools common to all the peoples of the Far North, which children should master as early as possible, are added among the hunting peoples - a bow and arrow, among fishermen - a fishing rod, among reindeer herders - a lasso. “Homemade bows, arrows and crossbows, like the ancient Russian ones, and a round stake do not leave the hands of the guys. If one breaks, the guys begin to cut out the other, writes S. N. Stebnitsky. They achieved great perfection in making them. This should also include the so-called sling, that is, a strap with which a stone is thrown. You can guarantee that you will not meet a single Koryak boy between the ages of five and fifteen who does not have this very sling hanging around his neck, which is used at every convenient and inconvenient occasion. Crows, magpies, partridges, mice, hares, lambs, ermines are inexhaustible material for hunting, and it must be said that children are very dangerous enemies for all these animals. I had to see how some kid, shooting from his clumsy bow, knocked down a crow in flight, or used a sling to kill a sea duck or loon swinging on the waves 20-30 meters from the shore” (1930, p. 45). “The Vilsky child has only just turned five or six years old,” writes A.G. Bazanov, “and he is already running around with a bow and arrow, hunting birds, developing his accuracy” (1934, p. 93). “Usually a baby bow is made from one layer of wood. But while the child is growing, the bow-toy is remade several times taking into account the children’s capabilities, writes A. N. Reinson-Pravdin. Gradually becoming more complex, it becomes in the hands of a child the most authentic weapon, adapted for his independent activity, with the help of which he can hunt small animals and birds” (1949, p. 113). “The children of nomads,” writes S. N. Stebnitsky, “to the three listed types of primitive weapons are added a fourth - a lasso, their same constant companion as a sling. They cannot pass by a peg that protrudes somewhat above the ground, past a bush, even with its very tip sticking out from under the snow, without testing the accuracy of their hand on it. This is how they develop that amazing accuracy with which Koryak shepherds unerringly catch from the always restless herd exactly the deer that is needed for the trip or for meat” (1931, p. 46). The art of lassoing quickly and deftly is not acquired immediately, writes Reinson-Pravdin; it is mastered gradually, learning to handle the tynzei from early childhood. Therefore, among the commercial toys that introduce children to reindeer husbandry, the lasso occupies a large place. The sizes of light tynzei are very diverse: 0.5 m, 1 m, 2 m and more. Tynzey, just like the onion, grows with the child as the latter accumulates dexterity and skill. Children's lassos are made from bast (for little ones), for seven-year-old and older children they are made with belts, like those for adults. Games with a lasso for children are no less interesting and effective than games with a bow and arrow. The kids lasso first long narrow stumps, then move on to a moving target - they try to lasso a dog or catch young deer calves” (1448, p. 209).
Among peoples whose main livelihood is fishing, children pick up fishing rods early and catch small fish, gradually moving on to commercial fishing together with adults using other, more complex fishing gear. Thus, a knife and an ax, skis, a bow and arrows, lassos and fishing rods - all this on a reduced scale, adapted to children's hands, is very early transferred to the child's use and children, under the guidance of adults, master the use of these tools. Of particular interest for considering the issue that interests us is the analysis of the functions of the doll, which is common among children of almost all nations at this stage of social development.
Interesting materials on this issue are contained in the works of Soviet researchers of the Far North. N.G. Bogoraz-Tan, describing the dolls of Chukchi girls, says “Chukchi dolls depict people, men and women, but most often children, especially infants. Their size is almost as variable as in cultured children. They are sewn quite similar to reality and are filled with sawdust, which spill out with every accident. These dolls are considered not only toys, but partly also patroness of female fertility. When a woman gets married, she takes her dolls with her and hides them in a bag in the corner under the headboard, in order to get more children from them. You cannot give the doll to someone, since along with this the guarantee of family fertility will be given away. But when the mother has daughters, she gives them her dolls to play with and tries to divide them among all the daughters. If there is only one doll, then it is given to the eldest daughter, and new ones are made for the rest. Thus, there are dolls that pass from mother to daughter over several generations, each time in a corrected and newly renewed form” (1934, p. 49). Thus, N.G. Bogoraz-Tan highlights the special function of the doll - the function of protecting the family; the doll was supposed to provide the girl with fertility and successful childbearing in the future. The making of dolls therefore took on the character of a special occupation. P. M. Oberthaler describes the work of making dolls as follows: “The process of making dolls is unique. Usually in a family, every woman, and from a certain age, a girl, has a fur, beautifully ornamented bag, or a birch bark box where scraps of leather trim, beads, etc. are stored. All this material is used for sewing dolls. Dolls are sewn with great enthusiasm and mainly in the summer, usually in the afternoon, when girls are free from housework. If the family is large, then girls join the sewing mother and begin to sew dolls. Sometimes the girls of one family are joined by others, and then the work becomes common (1935, p. 46). According to P. M. Oberthaler, dolls are made mainly by girls of different ages, from preschool to adolescence inclusive. In connection with the consideration of the issue of the importance of dolls among girls’ toys, A. N. Reinson-Pravdin, along with the function of protecting the clan, also highlights its other function - labor. By sewing outfits for a doll, a girl acquires sewing skills that are extremely important for women of the peoples of the Far North. S. N. Stebnitsky points out that teaching Koryak girls to sew begins very early: “We must not forget that the girl among the Ob peoples,” writes A. N. Reinson-Pravdin, “had a short childhood, ending at the age of 12-13.” , in which she was given in marriage, and that during this short period of childhood she had to master a number of skills: making deer beds, reeds, suede, bird and animal skins, fish skin, sewing clothes and shoes, weaving mats from grass, making birch bark utensils, and in many areas weaving (1948, p. 281). It is quite natural that training in all these skills began very early and took place in two ways. On the one hand, as a number of authors point out, girls were early involved in the work of their mothers, they helped them in cooking, babysat the babies, participated in purely female crafts: harvesting berries, nuts, roots, on the other hand, making dollhouses, mainly the wardrobe (by the wealth and quality of which the future husband judges how much the future wife and mother has mastered all female skills and is ready for married life), served as a school for learning sewing skills.
Dolls of children of the peoples of the Far North, collected in museums, clearly demonstrate the degree of perfection girls achieve in making a doll wardrobe and, therefore, what perfection they achieve in making clothes, shoes, and in general, in using a needle and knife. Thus, the doll, being the subject of constant care on the part of girls, as a guardian of generic functions future woman, from early childhood she taught housekeeping and sewing. Thus, the development of production and the complication of tools led to the fact that before taking part in the most important and responsible work activities with adults, children had to master these tools and learn how to use them. It is quite natural that the age for the inclusion of children in the socially productive labor of adults gradually increased. When children were included in adult forms of productive labor depended primarily on the degree of complexity. “Among the coastal Chukchi, boys begin to carry out various tasks much later than among reindeer herders. When taken on a seaside hunt, they are more of a hindrance than a help. A young man does not take part in serious hunting until he is sixteen or seventeen years old. Until this age, he can shoot a gun at a seal only from the shore or help install seal nets on the ice fields of the so-called coastal fast ice,” writes N. G. Bogoraz-Tan (1934, p. 103).
Among reindeer herders and other pastoral peoples, the inclusion of an adult herder in the work occurs somewhat earlier. G. Startsev reports that “from the age of 6-7, children are taught to control deer and catch them with lassoes. From the age of ten, boys can herd entire herds of deer, and with snares and traps they catch partridges and other game and animals. From the age of 13-15, children become real workers” (1930, p. 98). A knife and axe, a bow and arrows, a lasso, fishing rods, needles, scrapers and similar tools are tools whose mastery is necessary so that a child can take part in the work of adults. Children, of course, cannot independently discover ways to use these tools, and adults teach them this, show them how to operate them, indicate the nature of the exercises, monitor and evaluate the children’s success in mastering these essential tools. There is no school here with its system, organization and program. Adults set children the task of mastering these essential tools. Children strive to learn how to shoot a bow, throw a lasso, wield a knife and axe, a needle and a scraper, etc., just like their fathers, mothers, older sisters and brothers do. Of course, such training did not have the character of systematic training in “all subjects,” but it was special training caused by the needs of society. Perhaps children introduced some playful moments into the process of mastering these tools of activity for adults - passion for the process of activity, joy from their successes and achievements, etc., but this in no way turned this activity, aimed at mastering ways of operating with tools, into a game, and reduced tools into toys, as A. N. Reinson-Pravdin thinks. In contrast to the process of mastering the tools of labor, which occurs with the direct participation of the child in the productive work of adults, here this process is isolated into a special activity carried out in conditions different from those in which productive work occurs. A little Nenets, a future reindeer herder, learns to wield a lasso outside of a herd of reindeer, directly participating in its protection. A little Evenk, a future hunter, learns to use a bow and arrow outside the forest, participating in a real hunt together with adults. Children learn to lasso or shoot a bow first on a stationary object, then gradually move on to shooting at moving targets and only after that move on to hunting birds and animals or lassoing dogs or calves. The tools gradually change, turning from smaller ones, adapted to children's strength, into those used by adults, and the conditions of exercise are increasingly closer to the conditions of productive labor. By mastering how to use tools and at the same time acquiring the abilities necessary to participate in the work of adults, children are gradually included in the productive work of adults. It can be assumed that in these exercises with reduced tools there are some elements of a game situation. Firstly, this is a certain convention of the situation in which the exercise takes place. A stump sticking out in the tundra is not a real shadow; and the target the boy is shooting at is not a real bird or animal. These conventions are gradually being replaced by real objects of hunting or fishing. Secondly, when carrying out an action with a reduced tool, the child produces an action similar to that produced by an adult, and, therefore, there is reason to assume that he compares, and perhaps identifies himself with an adult hunter or reindeer herder, with his father or older brother.
Thus, these exercises may contain elements of role play. In this regard, I would like to note that in general, any action with an object that a child masters according to the model offered by adults is dual in nature. On the one hand, it has its own operational and technical side, containing an orientation towards the properties of the object and the conditions for the implementation of the action, on the other hand, it is a socially developed way of carrying out the action, the bearer of which is an adult, and thereby leads to the identification of the child with the adult. The demands that society places on children regarding mastering the use of essential tools and the closely related abilities needed by a future hunter, cattle breeder, fisherman or farmer lead to a whole system of exercises. It is on this basis that the ground will be created for various types of competition. There is no fundamental difference in the content of these competitions between adults and children. A number of authors point out the identity of games between adults and children, meaning competitions or sports outdoor games with rules.
So, for example, N.I. Karuzin says: “Children play the same games as adults” (1890, p. 33). G. Startsev, describing the life of Samoyeds, gives examples of such common and identical games: “My favorite game is racing. Adult women and men stand in a row and must run a distance of often more than 1 kilometer to the appointed place. Whoever runs first is considered the winner and is spoken of as a good runner. For children, it is especially a favorite topic of conversation, and they themselves, imitating adults, organize the same races.” “Shooting competitions,” continues G. Startsev, “is also a game, and men and women take part in it. A sharp shooter is held in high esteem. Children imitate adults, but practice with a bow and arrow.” G. Startsev points to the widespread use of the game of deer, in which adults and children participate. One of the participants must catch the others with the help of a lasso (see: 1930, p. 141, etc.). E. S. Rubtsova points out the widespread use of such games and exercises: “The harsh nature of Chukotka, as well as difficult winter hunting on ice with extremely primitive means of hunting, required exceptional endurance from the Eskimos. The older generation strictly insisted that the youth train in developing strength, running speed, endurance and agility. Some physical exercises that develop strength and dexterity began to be performed by preschool children. Usually the father or teacher (foster father) would show the boys some kind of training technique. When they mastered one technique, they were taught the next. The girls also performed some training techniques. On long winter evenings the children trained indoors. To develop running speed in the summer, on days free from sea fishing, Eskimos organize running competitions (in a circle), in which both adults and children take part. Usually children exercise separately from adults. In winter, they do not run in circles, but in a straight line and between boundaries established for this purpose. The winner is the one who is the last one remaining on the treadmill.
I got to watch kids train to develop strength. Let us describe one case here. A group of children gathered in front of the yaranga. There lay a large, very heavy stone. The training participants lined up in one line and began to take turns carrying this stone from one wall to another. Each of them carried the stone back and forth until exhaustion. After all the children had done this, they began to take turns wearing the same stone. around the yaranga, and then in a straight line to a certain place. Since the main occupation of the Eskimos is hunting, the elders begin to teach children how to shoot a gun very early. It is not uncommon for eight-year-old boys to shoot very accurately” (1954, p. 251). “Whoever was in the Far North and observed the way of life of the peoples inhabiting it could not help but notice the great interest of both the adult population and children in various sports exercises and mass games,” writes L. G. Bazanov. Describing the holiday “Deer Day,” this author writes: “At the holiday, hunters and reindeer herders, adults and children, compete in running, wrestling, throwing a tynzei, throwing an ax at a distance, hitting a deer’s antlers with a disc, throwing a tynzey on the horns” ( 1934, p. 12).
Isolating from the whole work activity its individual aspects and qualities (strength, dexterity, endurance, accuracy, etc.), ensuring the success of not just one type of work, but a whole series of production processes, was an important step for the entire matter of educating young people. generations. It can be assumed that on this basis special exercises were developed, aimed specifically at the formation of such qualities. Our task does not include consideration of the question of the historical origin of sports games and competitions, just as we do not touch at all on the question of the connection between the content of these games and the fishing activities characteristic of a particular people or tribe. For us, it is only important to point out the connection between children’s mastery of certain tools and competition in the ability to use them. The latter are built on the mastery of tools as a kind of repeatedly repeated exam, in which success in mastering one or another tool and the formation of associated physical and mental abilities are subjected to public assessment and testing.
As we have already noted, at the earliest stages of the development of human society, the early inclusion of children in the work of adults leads to the development of children’s independence and directly implements the social demand for independence. At the next stage of development, in connection with the complication of the means of labor and the production relations closely associated with them, special activity arises in children mastering the tools of adult labor. Throughout the development of the primitive communal system, adults did not have the opportunity to devote much time to the special education and training of their children. The requirement for as early independence as possible remains the main requirement that society places on children. Thus, L. T. Bryant points out “Mothers had to perform the most difficult duties, and they did not have enough time to nurse their children. From the age of four, and even earlier, girls and boys, especially the latter, were left to their own devices. In the kraal and in the adjacent area, the kids frolicked freely and took care of themselves” (1953, p. 127). There are a lot of such indications in ethnographic literature about providing children with complete independence from a very early age in their pastimes and even in caring for their own food. Armed with smaller tools, which are also used by adults, left to their own devices, children spend all their free time practicing with these tools, gradually moving on to using them in conditions approaching the working conditions of adults. Margaret Mead says that the children she observed were left to themselves all day long and knew how to take care of themselves. They have their own kayaks, oars, bows and arrows. All day long they wander along the shore of the lagoon in groups, older and younger together, competing in throwing darts, archery, swimming, rowing, starting fights, etc. Older boys often go fishing among the reed thickets. teaching this activity to the little boys accompanying them (see M. Mead, 1931, pp. 77-78).
N. Miller talks about his observations on the Marquesas Islands - as soon as a child becomes able to do without the help of others, he leaves his parents and in a place chosen according to his own taste builds himself a hut from branches and leaves (see N. Miller, 1928, p. 123-124). E. A. Arkin cites Display’s message that “on the banks of the Niger he often saw children aged 6-8 years who, having left their parental home, lived independently, built their own huts, hunted and fished, and even performed some crude forms of worship ( 1935, p. 59).
Summarizing the ethnographic materials available on this issue, M. O. Kosven writes: “From an unusually early age, children, especially boys, become largely independent; already from the age of 3-4, boys spend most of their time with their peers, they begin to to hunt for themselves, they set traps for birds, they already know how to drive a boat, etc. At 6-8 years old, they often live almost completely independently, often in a separate hut, conduct more complex hunting, fish, etc.
When hunting, children show remarkable endurance and ingenuity. Here are two examples of the hunting of little Congo feasts: lying on their backs, they hold some grains in the palm of their outstretched arm and patiently wait for hours until the bird flies to peck, so that at the same moment they hold it in their hand. Another example: a rope is tied to a tree branch on which monkeys tend to frolic, and one of the boys hiding below holds the end of it. Catching the moment when that monkey is about to jump onto a tied branch, the boy pulls it down, and the monkey falls to the ground, where the little hunters finish it off” (1953, p. 149).
The requirement of independence imposed on children by society at this stage of development is realized not through participation in productive labor along with and together with adults, but through independent life, although separated from adults, but identical in content to it and consisting first of carrying out independent exercises with reduced tools, and then in their direct use in conditions as close as possible to those in which adults use them. Therefore, all authors indicate that such an independent life is common mainly among boys. This indirectly suggests that we are apparently talking about societies that have transitioned to patriarchy, when women were left with all the housework in which girls could take a direct part and thereby learn all women’s work. The independence of girls was thus fostered through direct participation in the work of their mothers, which was more primitive in terms of the tools used and therefore more accessible. The boys could not take direct part in the work of their fathers, and therefore it was to them that the requirement was primarily addressed to independently, through exercise, master the tools used by their fathers. The independent life of children during this period consisted of independent mastery of the means of labor. Adults made smaller tools for children and showed them how to use them. The children practiced on their own and during the exercises mastered the tools to perfection.
It can be assumed that it is precisely to this period in the life of society that the emergence of initiation, which still exists among many peoples at relatively low levels of development, dates back to this period, which is at the same time an initial school, and an exam of independence and the ability to use tools, and initiation into adult members of society.
The data we cited about the absence of role-playing games in children growing up in societies at earlier stages of development also applies to this period. And here, among children, role-playing play in its expanded form does not occur at all or occurs very rarely. There is no social need for it. Children enter the life of society under the guidance of adults or independently; exercises in the use of adult tools, if they take on the nature of games, are sports games or competitive games, but not role-playing. Recreating the activities of adults in specially created play conditions does not yet make any sense here due to the identity of the tools used by children with the tools of adults and the gradual approximation of the conditions of their use to real working conditions. Although children do not participate in labor together with adults, they lead the same way of life as they do, only in somewhat easier, but completely real conditions. At this stage of development, societies still occur, although very rarely. already role-playing games themselves.
So, for example, I. N. Karuzin, describing the life of savages, writes that children play the same games as adults, in addition, they have two more games, both imitative. One of them is to imitate a wedding: the boy takes the girl and walks with her around the table or around some pillar (if the game takes place in the air), and the rest stand on the sides, and those who can sing sing the words: “thou hast laid, thou hast laid " Then two sticks are placed crosswise on the head instead of crowns; after the children have walked around three times, the sticks are removed and the bride is covered with a scarf. The boy takes the girl somewhere aside and kisses her. Then they are brought to the table and seated in a place of honor, the newlywed sits still covered with a scarf, bowing her head, the young man hugs her, after sitting at the table for a while, they either begin to marry another bunk, or, naturally, the newlyweds go to bed together. This game is played by children 5-6 years old, mainly before someone’s wedding and always secretly from their parents, since the latter forbid children to play this game (see N.N. Karuzin, 1890, p. 339).
N. Miller, in the work already mentioned, provides a description of several games that can be classified as role-playing. So, sometimes six-year-old children build houses out of sticks and play as if doing housework. Very rarely they gather for a love game, choosing couples, building houses, jokingly paying bride price and even, imitating their parents, lying together, cheek to cheek. The author points out that little girls do not have dolls and do not have the habit of playing “babies.” The wooden dolls offered to the children were accepted only by the boys, who began to play with them, rock them to sleep, singing lullabies following the example of their fathers, who are very gentle with their children.
Describing these games, M. Mead repeatedly emphasizes that such games are extremely rare, and she was able to observe only isolated cases of such games. It is important to note that among those described there are no games depicting the working life of adults, but games predominate in which those aspects of everyday life and relationships between adults are reproduced that are inaccessible to the direct participation of children and are forbidden for them.
It can be assumed that role-playing games that arise at this stage of development are a special way of penetrating into areas of life and relationships of adults that are inaccessible to direct participation.
In the later stages of the primitive communal system, the productive forces further developed, the tools of labor became more complex, and the further division of labor closely related to this took place. The increasing complexity of tools and the production relations associated with them should have affected the position of children in society. Children gradually seemed to be squeezed out of the complex and most responsible areas of adult activity. There remained an increasingly narrow range of areas of work activity in which they could participate together and alongside adults. At the same time, the increasing complexity of tools led to the fact that children could not master them through exercises with their reduced forms. As the tool became smaller, it lost its basic functions, retaining only an external resemblance to the tools used by adults. So, for example, if a reduced bow did not lose its main function - it was possible to shoot an arrow from it and hit an object, then the reduced gun became only an image of a gun, it was impossible to shoot from it, but it was only possible to depict shooting (firearms sometimes penetrated into societies that stood at the level of the primitive communal system, during colonization or in the process of exchange with Europeans). In hoe farming, a small hoe was still a hoe with which a child could loosen small clods of earth; it resembled its father or mother's hoe not only in form, but also in function. During the transition to plow farming, a small plow, no matter how much it resembled the real one in all its details, lost its main functions: you cannot harness an ox to it and you cannot plow with it. Playing with dolls, common in our society, mainly among girls, has always been cited as an example of the manifestation of the maternal instinct in play. The above facts refute this point of view and show that this classic game of girls is not at all a manifestation of the maternal instinct, but reproduces the social relations existing in a given society, in particular, the social division of labor in caring for children.
It is possible that it is at this stage of development of society that a toy in the proper sense of the word appears, as an object that only depicts tools and household items from the life of adults. In the ethnographic literature there is a lot of indication of the nature of role-playing games during this period. We will give only descriptions of some of them, borrowing these materials from the work of N. Miller (N.Miller, 1928). Children of West Africa, writes N. Miller, make semblances of banana fields out of sand. They dig holes in the sand and pretend to plant a banana in each hole. In South Africa they build small houses in which they stay all day. The girls place small, light stones between two large, hard ones and grind them like they grind flour. Boys, armed with small bows and arrows, play war by sneaking up and attacking. Children of another nation build an entire village with houses 40-50 cm high, light fires in front of them, on which they fry the fish they catch. Suddenly one of them shouts: “It’s already night!”, and everyone immediately goes to bed. Then one of them imitates the crow of a rooster, and everyone wakes up again and the game continues.
Among the peoples of New Guinea, girls build temporary shelters from old leaves. Near them they place slabs with miniature clay pots. The pebble represents a small child. He is laid on the seashore, bathed, and then kept under fire to dry and placed on his mother's breast, but he falls asleep. We will not multiply examples. It is already clear from the examples given that these are role-playing games in which children reproduce not only areas of adult labor that are inaccessible to them, but also those areas of everyday labor in which children do not directly participate.
It is impossible to pinpoint the historical moment when the role-playing game first emerged. It can be different among different peoples depending on the conditions of their existence and the forms of transition of society from one stage to another, higher one. It is important for us to establish the following. In the early stages of the development of human society, when the productive forces were still at a primitive level and society could not feed its children, and the tools of labor made it possible to directly, without any special training, include children in the work of adults, there were neither special exercises in mastering the tools of labor, nor especially role-playing games. Children entered the lives of adults, mastered the tools of labor and all relationships, taking direct part in the work of adults.
At a higher level of development, the inclusion of children in the most important areas of labor activity required special training in the form of mastery of the simplest tools. Such mastery of tools began at a very early age and took place on tools that were reduced in shape. Special exercises with these reduced tools arose. Adults showed children examples of actions with them and monitored the progress of mastering these actions. Both children and adults took these exercises extremely seriously, as they saw a direct connection between these exercises and real work activity.
After a period of mastering these tools, varying depending on the complexity, children were included in the productive work of adults. Only very conditionally can these exercises be called games. The further development of production, the complication of tools, the emergence of elements of home craft, the emergence on this basis of more complex forms of division of labor and new production relations leads to the fact that the possibility of including children in productive labor becomes even more complicated. Exercises with reduced tools become meaningless and mastery of more complicated tools is postponed to a later age. At this stage of development, two changes simultaneously occur in the nature of upbringing and the process of formation of the child as a member of society. The first of them is that some general abilities necessary for mastering any tools are revealed (development of visual-motor coordination, small and precise movements, dexterity, etc.), and society creates special objects for the exercise of these qualities. These are either degraded, simplified, and have lost their original functions, reduced tools of labor that served in the previous stage for direct training or even special items made by adults for children. Exercises with these objects, which cannot be called toys, are shifted to an earlier age. Of course, adults show children how to operate these toys. The second change is the appearance of a symbolic toy. With its help, children recreate those areas of life and production in which they are not yet included, but to which they strive.
Thus, we can formulate the most important position for the theory of role-playing game: role-playing game arises in the course of the historical development of society as a result of a change in the child’s place in the system of social relations. It is therefore social in origin, in nature. Its occurrence is not associated with the action of any internal, innate instinctive forces, but with well-defined social conditions of the child’s life in society.
Along with the emergence of role-playing games, a new period in the development of the child also arises, which can rightfully be called the period of role-playing games and which in modern child psychology and pedagogy is called the preschool period of development. We have already presented facts that quite convincingly show that the complication of tools inevitably led to the fact that the inclusion of children in the productive work of adults is postponed in time. Childhood is lengthening. It is important to emphasize that this lengthening does not occur by adding a new period of development over the existing ones, but by a kind of wedging in a new period of development, leading to an upward shift in time of the period of mastery of the tools of production. A situation arises in which the child cannot be taught to master the tools of labor due to their complexity, and also due to the fact that the emerging division of labor creates opportunities for choosing future activities that are not clearly determined by the activities of the parents. A peculiar period appears when children are left to their own devices. Children's communities emerge in which children live, although freed from worries about their own food, but organically connected with the life of society. It is in these children's communities that play begins to dominate.
Analysis of the process of the emergence of role-playing game led us to one of the central questions of modern child psychology - the question of the historical origin of the periods of childhood and the content of mental development in each of these periods. This question goes far beyond the scope of this book. We can only make the assumption in the most general form that periods of childhood development apparently have their own history: processes of mental development that occur in separate time periods of childhood arose and changed historically. Role-playing game, as we have already indicated, has a unique gaming technique: replacing one object with another and conditional actions with these objects. We do not know precisely enough how children mastered this technique at those stages of social development when play arose as a special form of children’s lives. It is quite obvious that this unique gaming technique could not be the result of children’s amateur creative ingenuity. Most likely, they borrowed this technique from the dramatic art of adults, which was quite highly developed at this stage of social development. Ritual dramatized dances, in which conventional figurative action was widely represented, existed in these societies, and children were either direct participants or spectators of these dances.
There is therefore every reason to assume that play techniques were adopted by children from primitive forms of dramatic art. There is evidence in the ethnographic literature that adults supervised these games. True, these instructions relate only to war games, but it can be assumed that samples of other types of collective activities were offered by adults. The hypothesis we have outlined about the historical emergence of role-playing play and the assimilation of its form is of fundamental importance for the criticism of biologizing concepts of children's play. The above facts show quite clearly that the game is social in origin. On the other hand, this hypothesis has heuristic significance for us, indicating the direction in which we should search for the sources of role-playing play in the course of the individual development of modern children.
Internet publication “Russia-America in the XXI century No. 2 2011
Chapter Five
DEVELOPMENT OF PLAY IN PRESCHOOL AGE
1. Comprehensive characteristics game development
Emerging at the border of early childhood and preschool age, role-playing game develops intensively and reaches its highest level in the second half of preschool age. Studying the development of role-playing games is interesting in two ways: firstly, with such research the essence of the game is revealed more deeply; secondly, revealing the relationship between individual structural components of the game in their development can help in pedagogical guidance, in the formation of this most important activity of the child.
Soviet preschool pedagogy has accumulated extensive experience in organizing and directing games for children of all age groups in the preschool period of development. As a result of many years of observations, special pedagogical research and the study of management experience, data have been accumulated on the characteristics of the games of children of different age groups. These features, identified by teacher-researchers, are complex in nature and can serve as starting points in the study of the development of role-playing games. We will not present in detail the data obtained in pedagogical observations and analyze them. Here are just a few examples of generalization of these data.
Thus, E. A. Arkin, who worked extensively and fruitfully in the field of pedagogy, physiology and hygiene of preschool age, who paid great attention to the study of play and attached great importance to it, characterizes the development of role-playing games as follows: “During preschool age, an evolution occurs from sparsely populated, unstable groups to more populous and stable ones. The structure of games itself is also undergoing great changes: from plotless, consisting of a series of often unrelated episodes, for children of three or four years old they turn into games with a specific plot, becoming more and more complex and unfolding more and more systematically. The theme of the games itself is changing, which in young children (3-4 years old) draws its content in the form of short fragmentary episodes from personal life or immediate environment, while in older groups we often find in games a reflection of the story read, pictures shown, social events -political significance" (1948, pp. 256-257).
This brief generalized description, which is backed by a large amount of material collected by the author and his collaborators, contains an indication of five main lines of development of the game: a) from sparsely populated groups to increasingly more populous ones; b) from unstable groups to increasingly stable ones; c) from plotless games to plot-based ones; d) from a series of unrelated episodes to a systematically unfolding plot; e) from a reflection of personal life and immediate environment to events in public life.
This characteristic, although extremely general, contains a basically correct description of the course of development. However, this is just a description, even without indicating the connections between various lines or symptoms of development. In fact, what determines the sparse population, the instability of groups of younger children, and the unrelatedness of individual episodes of the game? Maybe the sparse population of groups is a direct result of the fact that games reflect personal life and immediate surroundings? Indeed, in this personal life and in the immediate environment, the main real groups are small: father, mother, child and other family members.
Maybe it’s not the size of the group at all? In a group of two people the game can reach a high level of development, but in a larger group it can be at a lower level. There is every reason to assume that already with the transition to playing together, in the presence of roles that recreate a certain system of social relations, a qualitative change occurs during the development of the game, and a further increase in the number of players playing together is not of particular importance.
Thus, the characterization of the game that E. A. Arkin gives can be called a symptomatic description. Of course, such a description cannot satisfy, and it does not provide any special instructions for managing the game.
P. A. Rudik (1948), in addition to the listed developmental features, points to a number of new symptoms. These are: 1) a change in the nature of conflicts among older people compared to younger ones; 2) the transition from a game in which each child plays in his own way, to a game in which the actions of children are coordinated and the interaction of children is organized on the basis of the roles they take on; 3) a change in the nature of the stimulation of play, which at a younger age occurs under the influence of toys, and at an older age - under the influence of a plan, regardless of toys; 4) a change in the nature of the role, which at first is of a generalized nature, and then increasingly endowed with individual traits and typified.
P. A. Rudik also points out a number of psychological features of the game, revealing, as it were, a second, deeper layer of development.
In this regard, we note P. A. Rudik’s indication of the development of motives for play, which at a young age are of a procedural nature: according to Rudik, in these games, which are simple in their content, their meaning for children is precisely in the process of action itself, and not in the result to which this action should lead. In middle preschool age, roles are of primary importance in these games, and the interest of the game for children lies in fulfilling one or another role;
At an older age, children are interested not just in this or that role, but also in how well it is performed; the demands for truthfulness and persuasiveness in fulfilling the role increase. These features, according to the author, are essential and determine all others. In the descriptions of P. A. Rudik, there is an attempt to connect the appearance of new symptoms with the development of motives, in particular with the transition from procedurality to plot, to role fulfillment, but this connection is not explained in any way.
D. V. Mendzheritskaya (1946) expands the list of features of children's play, indicating a number of new ones: firstly, the development of children's use various items in a game, which, when replacing a real object with a game one, goes from distant similarity to increasingly greater demands regarding similarity; secondly, smoothing out with age the contradictions between inventing a plot and the possibility of its implementation; thirdly, the development of the plot, which goes from depicting the external side of phenomena to conveying their meaning; fourthly, the appearance at an older age of a plan, although schematic and imprecise, gives perspective and clarifies the actions of each participant in the game; fifthly, strengthening and at the same time changing the role of game organizers towards older age.
The most significant thing in this list is an indication of the nature of the development of the plot, or rather, it would be more accurate to say, the content of the game.
It remains for us to dwell on the research of A.P. Usova, who has done a lot of work on the analysis of creative role-playing games.
Summarizing her research, A.P. Usova writes: “As a result of the research, we can state the following: plotting as a characteristic feature of creative games, that is, those invented by the children themselves, is already inherent in children’s games junior group kindergarten at age 3; 2-3; 4. These plots are fragmentary, illogical, and unstable. At an older age, the plot of the game represents logical development any theme in images, actions and relationships: the emergence of plot in games should, apparently, be attributed to pre-preschool age.
The development of the plot goes from the performance of role-playing actions to role-images, in which the child uses many means of representation: speech, action, facial expressions, gestures and an attitude corresponding to the role” (1947, pp. 35-36).
“The child’s activity in the game develops in the direction of depicting various actions (swims, washes, cooks, etc.).
The action itself is depicted. This is how action games arise. Children's activities take on a construction character - construction-constructive games arise, in which there are also usually no roles. Finally, role-playing games stand out, where the child creates one or another image. These games follow two distinct channels: director’s games, when the child controls the toy (acts through it), and games where the role is performed personally by the child himself (mother, pilot, etc.)” (1947, p. 36).
The development of the plot depends on a number of circumstances. The first is the proximity of the game's theme to the child's experience. Lack of experience and the resulting ideas becomes an obstacle to the development of the game's plot.
It has been noticed that children in the younger group of kindergarten in games operate with ideas (and relationships) associated with everyday life; older preschoolers are more willing to turn to social events and develop some literary themes.
A.P. Usova notes that the development of the plot is also determined by how consistently the roles develop in the game. Role consistency is needed in every game that has a specific theme. The better children begin to understand each other, the actual motives of behavior of each of the players, the more smoothly the game proceeds.
There is a gradual change in the role of material (and toys) in games. For three- and four-year-olds, the material largely guides the theme of the game. Later, children attribute properties they desire to the material.
“In older preschool age, the child looks for a correspondence between the desired and the actual in toys and materials. Changes in the child’s requirements for play material characterize new stages in the development of play. Older preschoolers are more willing to play with a toy (role-playing games) than with a toy as such, and can easily do without toys...” (1947, pp. 36-37).
Considering some issues of managing children's games, A.P. Usova points out a number of features of the development of games, from which one should proceed when organizing them.
She notes that “children’s games already at the age of three are of a plot nature, and in this direction the game develops intensively until the age of 7”; establishes that “the driving principles that determine the game... consist in the child’s gradual mastery of the role played in a group of children.” “The plot of the game with its roles determines the children’s attitude towards the game... As they approach the age of 6-7 years, new elements have formed in the game. Initially, it consisted of everyday actions performed by children: cooking, washing, transporting (3-4). Then role designations appear, associated with certain actions: I am a mother, I am a cook, I am a driver. Here, in these designations, along with role-playing actions, role-playing relationships appear, and finally the game ends with the appearance of a role, and the child performs it in two ways - for the toy and himself... The experience of playing games shows how perspectives and plans begin to emerge in them instead of random and unformed actions... The unification of children in games, the development of social connections among them is entirely determined by the development of the game itself” (ibid., pp. 38-39).
A.P. Usova correctly sees the presence of a plot already in the games of younger preschoolers and attributes the emergence of plot games to pre-preschool age. What seems important to us is A.P. Usova’s attempt to understand the mutual transitions from one stage of the game to another. Thus, already in the games of younger children she finds elements that lead to further development of the game: in play actions - elements of the role, and in role-playing actions - the future role.
Although A.P. Usova does not dwell in detail on the connection between individual features of children's play and the development of the plot, it is obvious from the entire presentation of the material that she considers these features ultimately dependent on the development of the plot, the main core of any role-playing game.
Over the 30 years that have passed since the publication of these works, a large number of very diverse pedagogical studies of children's play have been conducted. They are aimed mainly at identifying the possibilities of using the game for educational purposes. The importance of the game was studied for the development of children's independence, the development of sociability and collectivism, the assimilation of moral standards, the enrichment of children's ideas about the life around them, etc. There was little research into the general course of development of the game. In this regard, the work of A.P. Usova is still the most complete, but it cannot be considered perfect and complete.
Despite the large amount of factual material collected by Soviet researchers and teachers on role-playing play at different levels of its development, the issue of the development of play throughout preschool age has not yet been fully and systematically developed. We have already pointed out the main drawback of such studies. This is the predominance of symptomatological description. Such a description of a purely external picture of the game process, even with a comparative study of different age groups, at best shows the presence or absence of certain signs, the weakening or strengthening of their manifestation (an increase in the number of children in play groups, the duration of existence of play groups, the quantitative composition of groups and the duration of the game process with various toys, the presence or absence of roles and the degree of their expression, etc.). At this level, using the method of simple, passively recording the fact of observation, a number of psychological studies were carried out. One example of such research is the already mentioned research by M. Ya. Basov’s employees.
Even during the life of L. S. Vygotsky, it became clear that in the study of play it was necessary to move on to its experimental study. Experimenting with the game as a whole and its individual structural elements is very difficult. It requires active intervention in the course of the game, and the game is easily destroyed with such intervention.
From our point of view, an experimental study of play is possible only in the process of long-term formation of the play activity of the same group of children with the special purpose of managing its development in such a way that the main task would be to clarify the possibilities and conditions for the transition from one level of play development to another. This strategy of forming a process to a predetermined level is widely used in the works of many psychologists belonging to the school of L. S. Vygotsky. This strategy, called the experimental genetic method, is fundamentally different from a simple experiment in that it includes the active formation of the transition of a process or activity from lower to higher and higher levels. This strategy is especially important when studying development processes, as it makes it possible to create its experimental model. It has justified itself in the study of the development of individual mental processes (perception, memory), in the study of the transition from elementary to higher forms of thinking, in the formation of scientific concepts, etc. Examples of such studies are given in the works of P. Ya. Galperin, V. V. Davydov, A.V. Zaporozhets and in some of our works.
However, this strategy is just beginning to be applied to game research. At the time when our experimental research on the game began, it had only just begun to be developed in relation to the study of individual mental processes in the works of L. S. Vygotsky and A. N. Leontiev.
The first attempts to use such a strategy in relation to the problem of the transition from object-based to actual role-playing play, both on normal children (N. Ya. Mikhalenko), and on deaf and mute children (G. Ya. Vygotskaya) and mentally retarded children (N. D. Sokolova) presented by us below.
Federal Agency for Education of the Russian Federation
State Educational Institution of Higher Professional Education Pomeranian State University
named after M.V. Lomonosov
Job
Discipline: Developmental psychology.
Abstract of the monograph by D.B. Elkonina
"Psychology of the game"
Performed:
2nd year students of 21 groups
Faculty of Psychology
Ermolina Yulia
Checked:
Postnikova M.I.
Arkhangelsk, 2010
Chapter 1: The subject of the study is an expanded form of gaming activity
The following scientists dealt with the problem of defining the concept of “game”:
E.A. Pokrovsky, F. Buytendijk, W.M. Gelasser, F. Schiller, G. Spencer, W. Wundt.
They all gave different definitions to this concept.
^ D.B. Elkonin:
A game
Subject of study:
The Nature and Essence of Role Playing
Mental structure of the expanded form of gaming activity
The emergence of the game
Development of the game in phylo- and ontogenesis
The importance of play in a child's life
relationships between people carried out through actions with objects
this is what is reproduced by the child as a central characteristic moment of activity and relationships between adults and their working social life
It is the role and the activity organically connected with it that represent the main, further indecomposable unit of the developed form of play.
Chapter 2: On the Historical Origins of the Role-Playing Game
What is the origin of the game?
^ E.A. Arkin: toys remain unchanged during the historical development of society
E.A. Arkin identifies the following “original” toys:
sound toys (ratchets, rattles, etc.)
motor toys (top, ball, etc.)
weapons (bow, arrows, etc.)
figurative toys (pictures, dolls, etc.)
rope from which various shapes are made
BUT: It is impossible to isolate the history of a toy from the history of its owner, from the history of the child’s place in society.
Anti-historical, erroneous conclusions of E.A. Arkina
^ How did role-playing games emerge in the course of historical development?
The position of the child in society at the earliest stages of development is characterized, first of all, by the early inclusion of children in the productive labor of adults.
The earlier a society is at a stage of development, the earlier children are included in the productive labor of adults and become independent producers.
Children who live in a society at a relatively low stage of development do not have role-playing games!
With the transition of society to a higher stage of development, the child becomes increasingly involved in the productive activities of adults, thus increasing the period of childhood.
Chapter 3: Game Theories
General game theories: K. Groos and F. Buytendijk
Every living being has inherited predispositions that give purpose to its behavior.
In higher animals, especially humans, natural reactions are insufficient to perform life tasks.
Every creature has childhood in its life.
Childhood is necessary to acquire the equipment necessary for life. The more complex the organism and its future life, the longer the period of childhood.
Where an individual, out of his own internal motives and without any external goal, manifests, strengthens and develops his inclinations, there we are dealing with the most original phenomena of the game.
we play not because we are children, but because in this way we acquire the adaptations necessary for life.
F. Buytendijk:
There is always a game with something (a game is an indicative activity)
The game is based not on instincts, but on more general drives
They play only with those objects that themselves “play” with the players
Criticism of the theory of K. Groos
^ Development in phylo- and ontogenesis:
orientation activity research activity game
Theories and problems of studying children's play in foreign concepts
Transformation by a child Deep absorption
yourself and surrounding objects by creating fiction and living in it
V. Stern: a child, moving into a fantasy world, living in it, tries to “escape” from the obstacles that he encounters in the real world, because not yet able to overcome them.
S. Freud:
The basis of the existence of all living things is the biological predetermination of the main drives:
Death drive, tendency to "self-reproduction"
Attraction to life, tendency towards self-preservation, self-affirmation
Society and man are antagonists
As a projective diagnostic technique (since the game represents repressed desires)
As a therapeutic agent
Living space of the individual
Layers of different surreal layers
degrees of reality (world of fantasy and dreams)
transition is taking place
Through substitution
J. Piaget: pays great attention to the study of symbolic play. The emergence of a symbol (imitation and use of one object instead of another) is born within the joint activity of the child with
adults. Piaget excludes from play all the so-called functional games of the first months of life with one’s own body.
RESULT:
In all theories, the child is considered isolated from the society in which he lives
The relationship between a child and an adult does not have a direct connection with mental development, which is false
It is not taken into account that the child can master the method of acting with an object only through a model
^ Domestic approaches
^ M.Ya. Basov:“the originality of the game process is based on the peculiarities of the relationship of the individual with the environment on the basis of which it arises”
P.P. Blonsky:
Activities understood as “play”
L.S. Vygotsky: play is the leading type of activity in preschool age
Play is a source of development
Chapter 4: The emergence of play in ontogenesis
The development of play is connected with the entire course of the child’s development. In the first half of the year, the child’s sensory systems are developing. While the motor systems are just beginning to develop, the child’s movements are chaotic, the sensory systems are already becoming relatively controllable.
Of great importance in the emergence of play is the formation of the act of grasping, during which the connection between visual perception and movement is established instantly. Which will subsequently lead to the child’s ability to manipulate objects.
F. I. Fradkina:
The development of the structure of play action within early childhood is understood as a transition from an action uniquely determined by an object, through the diverse use of an object, to actions interconnected by logic that reflects the logic of real life human actions.
^ Prerequisites for transition to role-playing game:
The game involves objects that replace real objects, which are named in accordance with their game value
The organization of actions becomes more complex, acquiring the character of a chain reflecting the logic of life actions
There is a generalization of actions and their separation from objects
There is a comparison of one’s actions with the actions of adults and, in accordance with this, calling oneself by the name of an adult
emancipation from an adult occurs, in which the adult acts as a model of action
there is a tendency to act independently, but following the example of an adult
Chapter 5: Development of play in preschool age
General characteristics of the game development:
there is a transition from sparsely populated groups to crowded ones
transition from unstable groups to more stable ones
transition from storyless games to story-based ones
from a series of unrelated episodes to a systematically unfolding plot
from reflection of personal life and immediate environment to events in public life
there is a change in conflicts among older people compared to younger ones
transition from a game in which each child plays in his own way, to a game in which the actions of children are coordinated and the interaction of children is organized on the basis of the roles they take on
a change in the nature of the stimulation of play, which at a younger age arises under the influence of toys, and at an older age - under the influence of a role, which at first is of a generalized nature, and then increasingly endowed with individual traits and typified
direct encouragement to act with the toys provided to the child
a motive that forms the background for actions performed with objects (taking on a certain role for the child, which determines the choice of toys)
The central part of the game is the fulfillment of the role taken by the child (this is the main motive of the game)
As development progresses, the child's awareness of his role changes: in the first period of early preschool age, the child does not yet fully identify himself with the person whose role he has assumed. In the second period, a critical attitude towards fulfilling one’s role or the role of one’s comrades arises.
The inner essence of the game is to recreate precisely the relationships of people to each other
According to the results obtained during the experiment, D.B. Elkonin highlighted ^
4 levels of game development:
| Level | Game Features |
| First | the central content is performing actions with objects; roles are also determined by the nature of the actions, and the actions are monotonous. |
| Second | For a child, it is important that the game action corresponds to reality; the roles are called children; division of functions is planned; the logic of actions is determined by the sequence of life; the number of actions is expanding |
| Third | The main content of the game becomes the fulfillment of a role; all actions follow from roles that are clearly defined; the logic and nature of actions are determined by the role taken; specific role speech appears; violation of logic action is not allowed |
| Fourth | The main content is performing actions related to relationships with other people; the speech is clearly role-based; the child clearly sees one line of behavior throughout the game; actions unfold in a clear sequence; the rules are clearly outlined; |
At the fourth level of game development, certain rules appear, established by children during the game. In this regard, it is necessary to consider the stages in obeying a rule in a role-playing game.
There are no rules, since in fact there is no role yet. Children are guided by spontaneous desires.
The rules do not yet appear explicitly, but in cases of conflict, the impulsive rule trumps the desire.
The rule clearly plays a role, but does not yet completely determine behavior and is violated when an instant desire arises to perform another attractive action.
Behavior is determined by the roles assumed. Rules define everything.
Chapter 6: Play and Mental Development
According to D.B. Elkonina, play activity plays a very important role in the mental development of a child, but the significance of role-playing play has not yet been sufficiently studied.
^ Game and development of the motivational-need sphere
Here the primary emotional-effective orientation in the meaning of human activity occurs.
An awareness of one’s limited place in the system of adult relationships arises
There is a need to be an adult
A new form of motives arises (motives begin to take the form of generalized intentions)
Play and overcoming “cognitive egocentrism”
changing position when taking on a role
relationship to the playing partner from the point of view of the role played by the partner
actions with objects in accordance with the meanings assigned to them
coordinating points of view on the meanings of objects without directly manipulating them
^ Play and mental development
Conclusions:
A game- this is an activity in which social relations between people are recreated outside the conditions of directly utilitarian activity.
The problem of the game was dealt with : E.A. Pokrovsky, F. Buytendijk, W.M. Gelasser, F. Schiller, G. Spencer, W. Wundt, E.A. Arkin, F. Buytendijk, K. Groos, V. Stern, J. Piaget and other scientists - psychologists.
With the transition of society to a higher stage of development, the child becomes increasingly involved in the productive activities of adults, thus increasing the period of childhood .
According to L.S. Vygotsky, play is the leading type of activity in preschool age, where
The essence of the game is the fulfillment of desires, generalized affects
In the game, the child takes on various adult roles
Every game is a game according to the rules
The game requires action from the child
Play is a source of development
D.B. Elkonin identified 4 levels of game development, which differ in content, the significance of the role for the child, the presence of rules and a number of other characteristics.
The general path to developing obedience to a rule is as follows:
Play has a significant impact on the mental development of the child as a whole. Especially for the development of the motivational-need sphere, mental actions. The game also helps the child overcome cognitive and emotional egocentrism.
Schiller: play is a pleasure associated with being free from external influences. waste is a manifestation of excess vitality.
Spencer: game is an artificial exercise of strength; in play the lower abilities are expressed, and in aesthetics. activities are the highest.
Wundt: Play is the child of labor; everything in play has a prototype in the form of serious labor, which always precedes it both in time and in its very essence.
Elkonin: human. game - activity, cat. social are being recreated. relationships between people outside the conditions of directly utilitarian activity.
When describing Det. Game psychologists especially emphasized the work of imagination and fantasy.
J. Selley: essence det. The game consists of playing some role.
Elkonin: it is the role and the actions associated with it that constitute the unit of the game.
Game structure:
game actions that have a generalized and abbreviated character
playful use of objects
real. relationship between playing children
The more generalized and abbreviated the game actions, the more deeply the meaning, task and system of relationships of the adult activity being recreated is reflected in the game; The more specific and detailed the game actions are, the more specific the objective content of the recreated activity is.
The plots of the game are decisively influenced by the child’s surrounding environment and social life. conditions of life.
The game is especially sensitive to the human sphere. activities, labor and relationships between people (railroad - played only after they were shown specific relationships, actions).
About the historical role-playing games arose.
Plekhanov:
in human history community work is older than play
the game arose in response to the consumption of society, in the cat. children and assets live. members cat they must become
will amaze. stability det. toys (the same for different peoples)
primitive toys society and recent historical. of the past are essentially the same - the toy responds in some way unchanged. nature especially the child and is not in connection with the life of society (contradicts Plekhanov); but Arkin does not speak about all, but only the original toys: sound (rattles), motor (ball, kite, top), weapons (bow, arrows, boomerangs), figurative (images of bellies, dolls), string (from it is made by figures).
Elkonin: these toys are not original, but also arose from the definition. stages of development of society, they were preceded by the invention of a definition by a person. tools (N., making fire by friction, friction is provided by rotation, hence rotational toys, kubari, etc.)
The initial unity of work and education. Education in a primitive way. general:
equal upbringing of all children
a child should be able to do everything adults do
short period of education
directly participation of children in the lives of adults
early inclusion in work (!!!)
where the child can work with adults right away, there is no game, but where there is a need for pre-game. preparation – yes.
there is no sharp line between adults and children
children become truly independent early on
children play little, games are not role-playing (!!!)
if this work is important, but is not yet available to the child, smaller tools are used to master the tools of labor, with a cat. children practice conventions that are close to real ones, but not identical to them (the Far North - a knife is important, they are taught to use it from early childhood; throw a rope on a stump, then on a dog, then on an animal); building there is an element of a play situation (conventionality of the situation: a stump is not a deer; acting with a reduced object, the child acts like a father, i.e. an element of role-playing game)
the identity of games between children and adults - sports and outdoor games
There are imitative games (imitation of a wedding, etc.), but there is no imitation of the work of adults, but there are games of cat. reproduction of everyday situations, cat. not yet available for children
The complication of tools - a child cannot master reduced forms (if you make a gun smaller, it no longer shoots) - a toy appeared as an object that only depicted tools.
The role-playing game appeared during history. development as a result of changes in the child’s place in the system of societies. relational, social in origin.
Game theories.
Groos exercise theory:
Every. a living being has inherited predispositions, which give expediency to its behavior (for higher animals, this is an impulsive desire for action).
At the highest living beings' innate reactions are insufficient to perform complex tasks. vital tasks.
In everyone's life. higher beings are childhood, i.e. period of development and growth, parental care.
The goal of childhood is the acquisition of adaptations that are necessary for life, but do not develop directly from innate reactions.
The desire to imitate elders.
Where the individual from internal prompting and without external goal manifests, strengthens and develops its inclinations, we are dealing with the original phenomena of the game.
Those. we play not because we are children, but we are given childhood so that we can play.
Groos did not create a theory of play as an activity typical of childhood, but only indicated that this activity was for them. def. biological important function.
Objections:
believes that he is an individual. experience arose on the basis of the hereditary, but contrasts them
It is strange that in a game of belly, which is not connected with the struggle for existence and, therefore, takes place in other conditions, not similar to those in the cat. will occur, N., hunting, real adaptations arose, because there is no real reinforcement.
biologically tolerates without reservation. the meaning of the game from animals to people
Stern. He shared Groos’s views, but added:
idea of premature maturation of abilities
recognition of play as a special instinct
the need for the preparation of maturing ways of intimate contact with external impressions. peace
Groos, unlike Stern, does not raise the question of the role of external influences. conditions in the game, because is an opponent of Spencer's position on imitation as the basis of the game.
Bühler. To explain the game, he introduces the concept of functional pleasure. This concept is distinguished from pleasure-enjoyment and from the joy associated with anticipating the outcome of an activity. He further said that for the selection of forms of behavior, it is necessary from the surplus, the wealth of activities, body movements, especially in young animals. The game is also governed by the principle of form, or the desire for perfect form.
Bühler's critique: functional. pleasure is the engine of all trials, including erroneous ones, it should lead to the repetition and consolidation of any actions and movements.
Buytendijk. Argues with Groos:
instinctive forms of action, like the nerve. the fur-we underlying them matures regardless of exercise
separates exercise from play
It is not the game that explains the meaning of childhood, but the other way around: the creature plays because it is young
Main behavioral traits in childhood:
undirected movements
motor impulsivity (young belly is in constant motion)
“pathic” attitude to reality is the opposite of the gnostic, a direct affective connection with the environment. world, arising as a reaction to novelty
timidity, timidity, shyness (not fear, but an ambivalent attitude consisting in movement towards and away from a thing)
All this leads the animal and the child to play.
Limitation of play from other activities: play is always a play with something – something moving. animal games are not games.
The game is not about the department. instincts, but more general drives. Following Freud: 3 outcomes. drives that lead to play:
attraction to liberation, the removal of obstacles emanating from the environment that fetter freedom
attraction to merging, to community with others
tendency to repeat
The game item should be partially familiar and at the same time have unknown capabilities.
The game has its own outcome. form – this is a manifestation of indicative activity.
Claparède objected:
Features of the dynamics of young people the organism cannot be the basis of the game, because:
they are characteristic of cubs and those who do not play
dynamics manifested themselves not only in games, but also in other forms of behavior
There are games for adults too
max. These individuals manifested themselves openly in such activities as fun, idleness and games of very young children. according to Buytendijk, they are not games
Buytendijk limits the concept of play: round dances and somersaults are not considered games by him, although they are precisely characterized by the indicated features of children. speakers
Disadvantages of all these theories:
phenomenological approach to distinguishing play from other types of behavior
identification of the course of mental development of children and animals and their games
Elkonin: the game arose from a definition. stages of belly evolution. world and is associated with the emergence of childhood; play is not a function of the body, but a form of behavior, i.e. activities with things that have elements of novelty. The game is young. belly-x is an exercise not a department. engine systems or department. instinct and type of behavior, and exercise in fast and precise control of the engine. We behave in any of its forms, based on individual images. condition, in cat. the object is located, i.e. exercise in orientation activities.
J. Selley - features of the role-playing game:
the child’s transformation of himself and surrounding objects and the transition to an imaginary world
deep absorption in creating this fiction and living in it
Stern. The smallness of the world, cat. a child lives, and the feeling of pressure he experiences is the reason for the tendency to withdraw from this world, the reason for the emergence of play, and fantasy is the mechanism for its implementation. But Stern contradicts himself: he himself said that the child introduces the activities of adults and objects associated with it into his play, because the world of adults is attractive to him.
Z. Freud. Two primary drives: towards death (the tendency towards obsessive reproduction is associated with it) and towards life, towards self-preservation, towards power, towards self-affirmation. This is the main dynamic forces. psychic life, unchanged in infant and adult. Children's play, like culture, science, art, is a form of bypassing barriers, cat. puts society in touch with the original drives seeking a way out. When analyzing a small child’s play with throwing things away and with the “appearance and disappearance” of a spool of thread, Freud suggests that this game symbolizes the traumatic situation of the child’s departure from the mother.