How to transfer the game culture

Historically, as a means of introducing the child to the culture of society, the game itself has become an element of culture that is passed on to children. Like any human activity, it "lives" in specific people and passes into the material culture of society - is objectified, reified.

This can be explained in the following analogy. For example, musical culture exists in the form of musical instruments, musical notes, concert halls( embodied in them) and musicians who can use these things according to their purpose.

In the same way, the game takes on its "real" side in special subjects for the game - toys, texts, in which rules and plots( national games) are recorded. But to a small child all this stuff does not say anything, just as a music record does not mean anything to an ignorant person.

Being born, the child gets into the already existing, existing world of the game, which will become his world( his game) only if he can carry out the reverse process - "to disassemble" it, to transform into a form of his own activity.

The transfer of any cultural activity can be carried out through direct inclusion of a person in this activity, observing it( an example of activity) and special training( where activity is dismembered and transmitted to the individual element-by-element).

How is the transmission of the game culture to a small child? Who helps him to transfer the reified game into the real process of activity?

Because gaming activities in our society belong to children, it also has a specific living medium( a carrier of game culture) - it is a different age group of children. While there are different age groups for children, the game can be transmitted spontaneously, traditionally from one generation of children to another. It's like a natural mechanism for transferring the game.

Everyone had to watch babies who can stand and watch for a long time what is being done on the playground - how the older children play. Gradually, young children are drawn into the common game: at first as executors of orders, instructions of older children, already able to play, who lacks partners, and then they become full members of the playing group. In naturally folding game groups are children of different ages( from adolescents to preschoolers) with different gaming experiences. Updating the composition of such groups occurs gradually - the kids are drawn in and recruited by the game experience, and older children, growing up, are less involved in the life of the game group. This gradualness ensures the continuity of the game culture, its preservation.

What happens when the traditional transmission of a game is disrupted when the connection of children's generations is interrupted? And are such situations possible? It turns out that they are possible.

In the life of modern society, such gaps in the transfer of the game are due to two reasons: the age division of children, the predominance of families with one child.

In fact, because of the employment of the adult population( after all, most mothers, grandmothers and grandfathers work), children very early fall into the conditions of public education, built on the principle of age-old groups. Therefore, they communicate, as a rule, only with peers who have the same gaming experience. The tendency towards the abolition of the court in the modern city leads to the disappearance of the yard playing groups, which are the main bearer of the game.

Older children are more busy than before. The tendency to early specialized education of children, their inclusion in various circles and sections, music and sports schools leads to the fact that they have very little time for free games and classes( this is one of the reasons why they play less with younger ones).Disappear as well and large families, in which children were a natural age group of different ages.

What is filling the gap in the transfer of gaming experience to children? A toy that becomes the only accessible element of the game culture for a small child. The cultivation of the game in modern society takes place primarily through a toy.

As already mentioned, the toy is a specific subject, in which, in a collapsed and embodied form, a game, ways of playing behavior are presented.

Toy from the earliest childhood is provided for the independent use of the child. However, in the independent activity of the child( if no one plays with him or he does not see the games of others), it is only an object of specific manipulations, conditioned by its functional properties. These manipulations, i.e. actions with game objects, the child produces independently, but this does not mean that he plays. Separate manipulations with the subject, not included in the plot or rules of the game, are not yet a game. The toy and the actions with it must be understood, included in the semantic context. In fact, what can a small child do if he receives checkers, pins, logo from an adult? Build towers from checkers and destroy them, kick the ball until he sees how they play these games, until someone turns it into a joint game and explains its rules.

Can an adult act as a carrier of a game culture for the child, compensate for the lack of a natural game carrier? Yes, it can, but under certain conditions.

This partly happens spontaneously in real life. Daddies and mothers can play new toys that they buy to the child( that is, show them how to play with them), encourage children to imitate the actions of adults( for example, a mother who is busy preparing a dinner can put a toy casserole in front of her daughter who interferes with heroffer: "And you cook dinner Lala").

With such spontaneous, unconscious influences in a better position is a game with rules, rather than the story game. This is due to a number of reasons, and above all, the fact that many games with rules and, accordingly, objects intended for them also function in the life of adults;these games are interesting to them. Examples of such games can serve as checkers, chess, lotto, football, hockey. If an adult buys a child a board game that he does not know himself, he can read the instructions accompanying it, which sets forth the rules of the game, and play it with the child. You can recall some of the games from your own childhood - clear rules and multiple repeatability lead to the fact that in memory they remain longer and clearer.

In the story games, adults do not play. A time span of at least 20 years is enough to forget what it is. If you remember your childhood, your favorite toys, your favorite themes of the game, pop up in your memory, but the game process itself remains elusive. And the dolls and bears are not accompanied by instructions how to deploy a game with them.

So it turns out that adults, if they play with children, they prefer games with rules, and the plot game is left without attention. And the most developmental value in preschool childhood still has a story game.

There may be such a question: after all, children go to kindergarten, perhaps, educators specially trained to deal with children in an appropriate way, can teach them how to play? However, in addition to the fact that it is not easy to teach the game, it is necessary to take into account the moment that this activity is "chamber", and the tutor has 25-30 children in the group. So it's good when parents connect to the children of the game.

We will call a special, conscious transfer to the children of the game culture( as opposed to the spontaneous, traditional) formation of the game. Now we can return to the question that arises in adults: but did they teach us how to play? If they did not teach purposefully, it was in communication with older children, with different playing groups.

Currently, due to the lack of traditional transmission, the special formation of gaming activities by adults becomes more necessary, and modern pedagogy already has ideas on how to do this, and can offer parents some "algorithms" of action.