From simple to complex, children's games

By the age of 3, when the child has already mastered the game action( for fun) - he learned to perform a number of related actions, talk to the doll or bear, on which these actions are directed( "Eat", "I must wash you", etc.), for him opens a new aspect of the game: these actions belong to someone. He fulfills them himself, which means he. But in fact he does not really feed, does not wash the "child", does not walk with him, it's all "as if", for fun. In fact, the mother walks with the baby, his mother feeds. So he is like a mother, now he is a mother, like a mother.

The role of the child appears in the game. To assume the role is to act like someone, put yourself in the shoes of someone else.

What explains the appearance of a role in the children's game?

One way or another, psychologists come to the conclusion that the main reason for the appearance of a role in the game is the child's desire to join the world of adults that is attractive to him. But due to the limited possibilities and the space allotted to him while in the big world, the child can not cook real porridge, get behind the wheel of this car. Therefore, he reproduces all these actions in his playing corner, with toys available to him, while only imagining that he is a mom, a driver, a doctor, etc.

At the age of 3-5 years, the role becomes the central component of the children's game,but this does not mean that the role behavior of the child in 3 years and at 5 was the same. It changes with the child's intellectual development, expansion of his knowledge, experience of communication with adults and peers. What is the change, complication of role behavior in the game?

Let's try to look at the examples and consider several episodes of the game of one boy.

Ilyusha 3 years. He placed in front of a stepladder, left in the corridor after some domestic work, his little chair and, sitting on it, twirls in his hands a small hoop. From time to time he abandons this occupation, climbs up the steps of the ladder and "looks around the neighborhood."Then he returns to the "helm" again.

I ask him:

- What are you doing?

- Sailing on the steamer.

- And who are you?

- Ilyusha( with surprise and bewilderment, because I know perfectly well what his name is).

Six months passed. Mom cooks lunch in the kitchen, and Ilyusha placed all his "children's" dishes and scales beside him on the chairs. Poured water from a teapot into cups.

- What are you doing?- I ask.

- I play like that.

- And who are you?

- Seller in the pharmacy.

Continues to seriously manipulate the bottles.

Ilyusha is the fifth year. He messes around and talks to the dolls in his room. Then comes out with a toy kit "Doctor Aibolit" and turns to the elder sister:

- Let me fly you!

Sister schoolgirl, foreseeing possible "doctoral" executions, says:

- I do not have time, you better go to my mother.

Ilya turns to his mother:

- The doctor has come to you, what's your pain?

- Head, - replies Mom.

For the "doctor", apparently, such a disease is not of interest, and he protests:

- No, let's better - your arm hurt.

This replica does not belong to the "doctor", but to Ilyush himself, but he immediately goes back to the

relationship between the doctor and the patient( Ilyusha and her mother for "you", and the doctor with the patient for "you").

- I'll give you an injection and a bandage.

Beginning "medical" manipulation, prompted by toys and the experience of Ilyusha himself.

- Something you, the doctor, very painfully do an injection, - wants to play along with my mother.

- And I'm not a doctor at all, - laughed Ilya. - I'm disguised as Barmaley. Now I will take you prisoner. ..

In these examples, it is obvious that the transition from simple imitation to the actions of adults to a conscious acceptance of the role, the expansion of role behavior by connecting speech to objective actions, free transition from one role to another, from role-playing to one's own,real.

A child under 3 years old still has no awareness of his playing role. This is still a "role in action" - the implementation of a number of actions specific to an adult( his household or professional functions).A child, like a doctor, listens to a doll, puts a thermometer on it, does an injection, but for the time being does not self-identify as a doctor, he just repeats it after an adult.

In the fourth year, these game actions become more diverse, there is a role-playing speech. The child not only performs specific role-playing activities in relation to the doll, but also talks to her, imitates the puppet's speech( he says in turn: for himself, a doll).It is during this "conversation" that for the first time in a separate game a role appeal appears-the attribution of a certain role to the doll-and the naming of oneself by the name of an adult. Says the doll:

- Sleep daughter!

- I've already had a nap, get up! Mom gives you compost!

- I do not want to!(Changed, thin voice for the doll.)

If after the game ask the child what he was, he is already able to name his playing role( "I was a mom").Thus, the emergence of role-playing in the dialogue with the doll( or with a living partner - an adult, a peer) is a sign of the child's realization of the playing role.

After 4 years in children, as a rule, you can observe not only a greater variety of game actions.in which the role is played, but also a significant expansion of the range of playing roles( inclusion in the game except for family roles - mom, dad, son or daughter and professional roles - doctor, chauffeur, salesman, nurse kindergarten, soldiers, etc., fairy tales and literary characters with the most specific functions - Wolf, Baba-Yaga, Aibolit and Barmalej, etc.).

It can be said that from 3 to 5 years, the child moves from a simple unconscious imitation, imitating the actions of adults to naming oneself to the person who owns the actions reproduced in the game, and further to the conscious acceptance of the role, free operation of it( realizedchange of role in the game, its realization not only through conditional objective actions, but also through speech, through role communication with partners).

This is a typical( averaged) picture of the development of role behavior in the game. In real life, things do not go as smoothly: in some children the role play appears earlier, others have later. For many of them, role behavior remains at the level of imitation of objective, specific actions of adults, the simplest role-playing imitation, without going over to more complex forms.

The development of role behavior in a child largely depends on including it in the community of older children or peers already possessing this way of constructing the game, or from certain stimulating influences of the adult educator in the kindergarten.

At home, these influences come mainly from parents - moms and dads who, from time to time, have to play with the child, encourage him to play a role-playing role by himself, pick up toys that facilitate such a game.