Download PLAY LEADERSHIP IN AMERICAN AND EUROPEAN

PLAY LEADERSHIP IN AMERICAN AND
EUROPEAN PLAYGROUNDS
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HISTORY OF PLAY LEARDERSHIP IN AMERICA
History of American play leadership is
Erratic
Spread across various play context (urban parks, public
and private child development centers, and both rural and
urban neighborhoods.
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Adults responsible for play leadership across these context
hold different view and importance of play, play
environment and appropriate roles and training of play
leaders
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Views also differ across countries.
Play Leadership in Public Parks
• Play leaders came into to the picture due to belief that in
absence of them, playground would foster idleness,
immortality and vandalism (Lee. 1972)
• Playground Association of America (PAA) developed
guidelines for training playleaders, which focused on
physical education and recreation. Included courses like
sociology, social psychology, biology, industrial arts, and
civic relationships.
• Important role of play leader gradually got deemphasized by
1920s and 1930s. But now the early ideals of training play
leaders has not regained an important role in American
public park playground.
Play Leadership in Preschools
• Role of adults in children’s play in preschool settings were
founded on the views of Friedrich Froebel and the early child
development research centers.
• Froebel (1887) viewed play as important for developing the
mind , body, and character.
• Early leaders in the nursery-kindergarten movement
promoted adult’s role in shaping the development of children
during play.
• Till today there is no training of elementary school teachers
regarding the supervision of playground play.
Play Leadership in Public and Private Elementary Schools
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The views and practices of elementary school professional
concerning the roles of adults in children’s play parallel
those of public park professionals.
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Though literature on adult’s role in elementary school is
limited, But Evans’s ( 1990) studies in American school are
the most insightful for understanding the roles assumed by
teachers on playground during recess.
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Research reveals that
1)Adult roles on children’s playground are varied and complex.
2)Roles should include ensuring that children have rich,
challenging, ever changing environments for play
3)Good playground breed good behavior.
4)Rules are needed
THEROTICAL BASES FOR ADULT INTERVENTION IN
CHILDREN’S PLAY
• Piaget and Vygotsky seemed to realize that play had
emotional and therapeutic components.
• Work of Anna Freud, Carl Rogers, and Virginia Axline was
more significant for assisting children in dealing with serious
problems of neglect , abuse , conflict and trauma.
• Plato suggested that children earlier on must take part in
lawful forms of play.
• Jean- Jacques Rousseau emphasized the value of play and
the vast differences in the interest and values of adults and
children.
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Froble, established the first kindergarten (literally garden of
children) in Germany. In these kindergarten, work or
learning activities were infused with pleasure of play.
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John Dewey acknowledge Frobel’s contribution but
suggested that symbolism not essential. His approaches
included cooperative planning Outlined conditions for
balancing formal instruction with life experiences
Provide the context- rich blend of classrooms, playground.
Ensure opportunity for interaction- the social context.
Encourage cooperative planning and acting to develop a
spirit of companionship and shared activity.
There is carry-over of social concern and understanding
into broader community outside the school.
Keep proper balance between the informal and the formal,
the abstract and the practical.
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In early 1900s, psychoanalysis was integrated into play
therapy for children and two schools of thought developed,
advocating a particular form and frequency of intervention.
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Directive school:
Emphasized directed play.
Prescribed materials
Interpreted play to determine the source and natures of
phobias and conflicts.
2)
Nondirective school:
Confirmed, repeated and clarifies the child’s play acts
emphasized the importance of non intervention by adults
into children’s play.
Play identifies as the critical factor in fostering the child’s
social and intellectual development.
• Piaget and Constructivism
• Vygotsky and Social Constructivism
 Viewed that children do not merely construct their knowledge
but performance can be assisted by others.
 Make believe play is a social activity- a product of social
collaboration.
 Vygostsky identified a “ zone of proximal development” (ZPD)
It is defined as a range of tasks between those the child can
handle independently and those which at the highest level
can be handled with the help of adults or more competent
peers.
Vygotsky and Social Construction
• Vygotsky differed with Piaget in the following areas:
– According to Vygotsky, rules are important to play (the absence of rules
is impossible). Piaget maintained that rules emerged after preschool.
– According to Vygotsky, make-believe play is a social activity—a product
of social collaboration. Piaget purported that make-believe play
emerges spontaneously with the onset of representational thought and
cognitive construction which occurs through manipulation of objects.
– Vygotsky. Zone of PD and scaffolding were essential considerations of
coconstructivism. Piaget. Children interact with objects and develop
their own understanding of the world.
 He pointed out that adults and more competent peers could
effectively “scaffold” intervention to match the child’s
independent level, but not beyond his potential level.
• Chaos Theory
 Stems from the paradox that postmodern families and
institutions are experiencing a transformation from
traditional predictable structures to ever more complex and
interdependent ones.
 Theory holds that social systems are nonlinear,
interdependent, and unpredictable.
 The reality of the world is essentially chaotic.
 Parents and teachers most directly responsible for helping
children adapt to chaos cling to outmoded, antiquated views
about teaching, parenting, and the role of play as a
legitimate educational enterprise.
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Vander Ven (1998) proposed a chaotically oriented
approach to education that incorporates play at every
developmental level.
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Her views are based on two principles.
Play is a complex adaptive system that embrace and
generates other complex adaptive systems.
Play is essential for young children to experience
pervasive chaos and to identify themselves as novelty,
surprise, loss of control, and disequilibrium.
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Winsler’s (1995) interpretation of Vygotsky, contends that
adult facilitation of play is essential for children’s
development and for adaptation to a chaotic world
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Winsler proposed a number of chaos theory concept of
play facilitation
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Determinism
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Weak chaos
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Birufication
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Attractor
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Vander Ven proposed that supersymmetry, a concept
embracing both symmetry and chaos. Games, play , and
highly skilled adults can help children to adapt to change
and meet the complex challenges of a chaotic world.
RESEARCH BASES FOR ADULTS INTERVENTION IN
CHILDREN’S PLAY
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Number of researches since 1960 have studies the effect
of intervention, commonly referred to as play tutoring or
training, on children’s play.
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According to studies adult participated in children’s play
Discussing topics that might be used in play
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Encouraging use of nonstructured materials.
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Encouraging children to invite other to join their play.
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Helping elaborates themes
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Making imaginative uses of play materials\
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Encouraging invention.
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Helping create pretend episodes.
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Taking children on trips
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Encouraging reenactment in dramatic play.
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Positive results of play intervention for young children
include
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Enhanced imaginative play.
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Improvement in
cognitive tasks
impulse control,
verbal intelligence
story interpretation
spontaneous engagement in sociodramatic play
Creativity
group activity
attention span,
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Cognitive ability
Perspective taking
Verbal comprehension
Reduced aggression
Social adjustment
Language development
Attachment to adults and peer interaction
• Failure to control experiments for effects of peer interaction
and adult tutoring are seen as methodological weaknesses in
the research
PRACTICING PLAY LEADERSHIP
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Different approaches regarding the nature, type, and
timing of intervention into children’s play are as following
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Providing natural and designed spaces for play.
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Scheduling extensive time for play.
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Providing a challenging mix of natural and manufactured
play materials and equipments.
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Individualizing play intervention through observation and
study of children
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Deciding what strategies to use during personal interaction
with children
Pacific Oaks College Perspective on Practice
• The program was developed over many years at Pacific
Oaks College
• Its theoretical base resides in both cognitive and interactions
theory, especially Piaget’s constructivism.
• Emphasize the importance of language, construction
materials, and bodies in action during both fantasy and
reality play themes.
• Stresses the cognitive challenge that play offer children
• Identify intervention strategies for teachers to assume
during children’s play.
• The teacher pays attention to play.
• Teacher takes steps in as guide and assume the roles of
stage manager, mediator, player, scribe, assessor and
communicator , and planner.
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Vygotskian Perspective on Practice
Adult’s Indirect influences on children’s play
Preparing the environment
Choosing toys and materials
Encouraging children to play together
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Adult’s Direct Influence on children’s play.
Providing experiences that can become play themes
Model how to play with toys
Taking turns
Settling disputes
Describing sequences
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Adult intervention should change and decline as children
mature.
• Adults help infants establish attachment and provide for
interaction with other people, toys, books and object.
• Toddlers are helped to use language to describe action,
interact with peers, to see roles, implicit rules and imaginary
situation.
• Preschooler are assisted by offering props for laying,
organizing activities, planning with children, expanding
pretending and role taking, and providing for scaffolding by
older children and adults.
• Adult domination is avoided in elementary school and
interaction with slightly older peers is encouraged, and selfregulation is promoted.
Adventure Play and Play Leadership in Europe
• C.T Sorenson ,a Danish landscape architect developed in
Denmark, the first of many junk playgrounds, later named
building playgrounds or adventure playgrounds.
• Play work or play leadership is a nationally recognized
national profession in some countries, and training programs
range from on the job to university programs.
• The basic philosophical intent adopted informally but widely
throughout European adventure playgrounds, is rejected in
America playground contexts, where the practices of adult
are basically laissez-faire or didactic.
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Adventure play leaders perform many roles:
Nurture play in an unrestrictive settings.
Act as referees when a situation is getting out of hand.
Maintain friends but are friends to the children.
Ensure that the playground is well staffed, equipped, and
safe.
5. Attract voluntary worker to the playground and involves
families
6. Scrounge for tools and materials needed by the children.
7. Make suggestions but do not demand.
8. Don’t interfere in play but teach interesting skills if asked
9. Accept wide range of ages and individual differences
10. Support the work and play of children with minimum
interference.
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
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Appropriate roles of adults on playgrounds
1.
The play leader studies children to understand whether
intervention into their play is needed.
2.
The play leader ensures that children have access to
challenging playscapes that integrate multiple levels of
complexity, using both natural and built materials.
3.
The play leaders prepares the child for risks,
challenges, and hazards.
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Play leaders prepare children for play.
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The play leader focuses on creative aspects of play.
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The lay leader extends the child’s world
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Play leaders help children cope in an increasingly
chaotic world.
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Play leaders step aside and let children play.