Substitute toys for role-playing games for preschoolers. Consultation on the topic
Substitute toys for role-playing games for preschoolers
In preschool age, play becomes the leading activity, but not because the modern child, as a rule, spends most of his time in games that entertain him; play causes qualitative changes in the child’s psyche.
It is often said that a child plays when, for example, he manipulates an object or performs one or another action shown to him by an adult (especially when this action is performed not with a real object, but with a toy). But real play action will occur only when the child means another by one action, and another by one object.
A toy is found not only in a child’s play, but also in the everyday life of an adult. Often a toy is a friend, a life partner, a source of joy, a tool or material for play. The toy presents in a generalized form the typical properties of objects, including people and animals, which require appropriate actions with them. So, for example, a doll is a generalized image of a child that allows children to reproduce a whole range of appropriate actions: bathing, feeding, changing clothes, etc.
Toys are varied in type, material, manufacturing technique, age and educational purpose. The image in toys is conditional and generalized. The nature, degree of generality and convention depend on the type of toy and its specific purpose. Toys are divided into three groups according to the degree of complexity and generality:
- Realistic toys (a dog of a specific breed).
- Conventionally shaped toys (a dog of an unknown breed, a doll as a generalized image of a person).
- Substitute toys (a stick instead of a thermometer, a chair instead of a horse).
When analyzing the features of a preschooler’s play activity, it is necessary to remember that its development is facilitated by the development of the sign function of consciousness, which consists in the ability to use one object as a substitute for another. A prerequisite for mastering the sign function is the mastery of objective actions and the subsequent separation of the action from the object by the preschool child. Therefore, in addition to toys depicting real objects, the child must have objects that can be used as their substitutes: reels, boxes of various shapes, natural materials (cones, acorns, leaves). During the game, the child can give them a new game name and act in accordance with this name. Substitute items also include those that in practical pedagogy are usually called attributes: all kinds of hats, beads, robes, etc. The situation when a child turns a sofa into a steamboat, chairs into train cars, is also an indicator of the development of the sign function of consciousness, and therefore a high level of mental development.
For the development of children's thinking, imagination, speech and in order to raise play to a higher level, various substitute toys are of particular value. For example, when pretending to iron clothes, a child can take not only a toy iron, but also a brick made of building material. Substitute toys can be wooden and plastic circles, rings with a diameter of 3-5 cm, boards, strips of cardboard, substitute items, children’s favorite treats - candies, apples, etc. Together with the teacher, children can make substitute toys and attributes for games - cut out “pancakes”, “cutlets”, “fish”, “vinaigrette” from cardboard, foam plastic, using all this in games that imitate the labor process. By encouraging children to use gaming materials that replace objects that are well known to them, we create a situation in which the child will be faced with the need to designate substitute objects and actions with them in words, which will contribute to his active development.
The value of this toy is that for the first time children independently operate with conventional concepts. Play actions with a substitute toy are based not on visual signs of the object, but on imagined, assumed ones. Using such a toy, the child generalizes his previous gaming experience. A substitute toy requires more schematic generalized play actions and denoting it with a word so that it enters the context of the game and is understandable to others.
Replacement toys are made from a variety of materials. Dolls and animal toys can be made not only from fabric, but also from natural material (straw, wood, grass, etc.). Substitute items are needed from any natural material (chestnuts, pine cones, shells, straw, etc.) For games, you can prepare different sets of toys, united by a common plot. For example, for playing with a doll: doll, blanket, stroller, furniture (bed, table, chair); for playing with a dog toy: a feeding bowl, a sleeping mat, a leash for walking, etc.
For example, if a child is playing with a doll, then instead of it you can offer him a little chick wrapped in a blanket. Playing with such a “doll,” the child shows the missing, but represented by him, the main parts of the human body: the legs at the bottom of the toy, the head at the top. He plays with her as with an ordinary doll, and gradually the word increasingly begins to designate and replace objects that are missing but necessary for the game, their qualities, imaginary properties and states.
How to teach a child to play with such a toy? First, the adult names the substitute toy, and then the child. He calls it as required by the game's design.
The main requirement for a substitute toy is convenience in performing play actions and proportionality with other play material. If conventionally figurative and realistic toys can be bought, then the introduction of substitute toys into children’s play depends on the adult’s imagination, on his penetration into the content of the child’s game. Children watch with great curiosity how an adult, having understood their game plan, creates an object needed for the game from natural material. It is important that the substitute toy resembles the depicted object with general contours or some typical property, a characteristic detail necessary to display game situations (“The kitten” can be made of soft terry cloth, if it is rolled up and tied with a bow “around the neck”; instead bowls for feeding a kitten, you can offer a circle of cardboard, a plastic lid, etc.).
Often children not only enthusiastically use substitute toys offered by adults, but they themselves choose and agree in advance what they will mean: “This is a cat,” “This is a bowl,” “This will be the mother - a big cat, and this is her kitten.” While playing with such toys, the child tries to explain to other children what the substitute object means: “It’s a cat, touch it, it’s so fluffy, you can’t see the eye, it’s probably sleeping.”
Game substitutes for objects may have significantly less similarity with them than, for example, the similarity of a drawing with the depicted reality. However, game substitutes should allow you to act with them in the same way as with the replaced item. Therefore, by giving his name to the chosen substitute object and attributing certain properties to it, the child also takes into account some of the features of the substitute object itself. When choosing substitute objects, the preschooler proceeds from the real relationships of the objects. He readily agrees, for example, that half a match will be a bear, a whole match will be a mother bear, a box will be a bed for a bear. But he will never accept this option, where the teddy bear is a box, and the bed is a match. “It doesn’t happen like that,” is the child’s usual reaction.
So, communication between an adult and a child should be aimed at developing progressive ways of solving game problems for each age period. Children's activities should take place in increasingly complex game problem situations based on practical and play experience. Children who have mastered how to solve the first game problems should complicate the task. For example, not just give the doll tea, but sit it down at the table, prepare lunch first, etc. As children master game problems that are solved visually and effectively (an indicator of which is children's independent play), it is necessary to demonstrate new, more generalized ways of solving them with the help of substitute toys. For example, instead of a plate, offer a doll who really wants to eat a leaf from a tree. Later, children should be shown new ways to solve game problems using drawn objects (an adult takes the soap shown in the picture for bathing, etc.) And finally, it is necessary to show game actions with an imaginary object (give the doll an imaginary apple).
Familiarization with the environment and educational games create the basis for the emergence of play, but children’s independent play is determined by the appropriate organization of the subject-play environment and the activating communication between the adult and the child during the play. Timely changes in the play environment, selection of toys and play material that activates recent impressions in the child’s memory, direct the child to independently and actively solve a play problem, encourage different ways of implementing it and reproducing reality. The object-game environment changes taking into account the practical and play experience of children. It is important to promptly expand not only the range of toys with different themes, but also to promptly supplement the gaming material. An independent story game is formed more successfully if toys are introduced into it gradually (a conventional toy, a more realistic one, a substitute toy). The ability to use substitute objects in play activities is a necessary element in the development of children's play. It is very important to have a “Build It Yourself” construction corner in the group room, which includes sets of various building materials, a Lego-type constructor, a set of cubes; a corner of theatrical activities, where there are masks, bi-ba-bo toys, various costumes for role-playing games; various waste materials: boxes of different shapes and sizes, natural materials, a set of various rags, threads, spools, etc. For example, you can make a table, chairs, a sofa for dolls from cubes and building material, you can make a house and much more. Counting sticks turn into spoons, ladles, pistols and even pasta. Bricks serve as phones, pieces of bread, cakes, and cones turn into delicious ice cream. Beds are made from pieces of fabric, and food is made from cardboard and foam rubber for dolls.
Thus, substitute toys develop the child’s imagination, thinking, speech, and contribute to the development of relationships with peers. The possibility of using substitute items in play activities should be the subject of special discussion between the teacher and parents, since the latter often strive to buy as many ready-made toys as possible, not suspecting that they thereby harm the mental development of the child, in particular his imagination. But all subsequent schooling will be associated with the need to imagine, imagine, and operate with abstract images and concepts. This is, firstly. And secondly, the ability to use various objects (signs) instead of real objects will allow the child to subsequently learn more complex systems of signs, such as language, mathematical symbolism, and various types of art.
TYPES OF TOYS.
- Thematic or figurative toys (dolls, animal figurines, household items).
- Toys - tools (scoop, spatula, net).
- Technical toys with program or non-program control (transport units, machines).
- Game construction sets - prefabricated.
- Didactic toys and games.
- Toys for sports and outdoor games (balls, jump ropes).
- Theatrical and decorative toys (puppet theater characters, costumes, decorations).
- Fun toys.
- Sounding musical toys.
- Game materials and homemade toys.
- Play equipment (houses, layouts).
- Computer toys and games.
- Educational toys (puzzle games).
Substitute objects in children's play from 2–3 years old
Tatiana Basova
Substitute objects in children's play from 2–3 years old
The most important condition for the formation of creative play is the introduction of substitute objects . This makes the game more interesting, meaningful, and stimulates the development of the child’s creative imagination. Children who know how to play with substitute objects , by the end of their early years, are able to independently invent and act out stories, even without relying on realistic toys.
objects be introduced into the game as the child begins to perform the first play actions with realistic toys and learns the meaning of “make-believe”
. Let's give an example of how you can help a child accept play substitution.
The teacher watches the child “feeding”
spoon from a plate, then sits down next to the baby and asks what the doll is eating.
Depending on the baby’s answer, the adult offers to feed the doll something else. For example, he speaks on behalf of the doll: “Now I want cookies, where do we have cookies?”
The child does not understand what to do and looks at the toys in confusion.
The teacher takes an object shaped like a cookie (make a construction set, a domino, a large button), hands it to the baby and says: “Yes, here it is! Let’s play as if it were a cookie? Give the doll a cookie.” The child takes the “cookie”
and
“feeds it”
give them a doll. The teacher comments on the child’s actions, asks the doll if the cookies are tasty, answers for her, thanks her, etc.
It may happen that the child does not immediately understand the meaning of the substitution and will simply copy the adult’s action. However, after several similar games, he himself will begin to use objects - substitutes - first those that he played with with an adult, and then come up with his own replacements.
After the baby begins to independently use substitute objects , it is enough for an adult to only address the child indirectly to stimulate such play actions. For example: “It seems. Your bunny wants a carrot. Where are our carrots?
or:
“Lalya is sick, she needs to be given medicine.
What will we have in pills?” .
Speech plays an important role in the development of substitutions. At the initial stages of independent play, children, already using some objects as substitutes, do not always clearly imagine what exactly they are replacing. The content of their play actions, as a rule, is dictated by those objects that come into the field of attention. How can you help your child use substitute objects ? Let's give an example.
The teacher notices that while feeding the doll, the child takes a ball from the table and brings it to the doll’s mouth several times. The adult asks him: “What do you feed the doll?”
.
The kid is silent in confusion, doesn’t know what to answer. The adult asks a leading question: “Maybe this is a testicle?”
The child nods his head in agreement:
“Egg
.
After this, he immediately takes a spoon, vigorously taps it on the testicle, “cleanses”
the shell with his fingers, scoops it out with a spoon and feeds it to the doll.
Next time the ball can be called candy, pie, etc.
An adult’s help in selecting items should not be intrusive. object himself , name it, and stimulate his own imagination.
to imagine more and more clearly what and how he replaces, and actively use in the game the word denoting an object - a substitute . This lays the foundation for a real story-based role-playing game.
Mini-study on the topic: “ Substitute objects in children’s play ”
.
Masha and Anya (twins)
3 years 1 month
During the observation period, children played the game “Feed your sister”
.
This game combines several game actions into one plot. Masha started preparing lunch. items were used as products : bread - a wooden cube, potatoes - a yolk from a Kinder Surprise, cabbage - a large green ball, etc.
Masha was preparing lunch, Anya helped her, I asked Masha: “What did you cook?”
.She replied:
“I’m preparing dinner
.
Masha showed various objects that she used. Masha correctly named the objects - substitutes . Shows a green ball and explains that it is cabbage, etc.
Masha cooked cabbage soup, set the table and called her sister Anya for lunch.
In the following days, the girls switched roles.
Anya was preparing dinner, and Masha was eating.
Anya cooked pasta with sausages. Instead of pasta, she took pieces of paper, markers - sausages, cubes - bread. Having prepared lunch, she, with the help of the teacher, set the table and invited Masha to lunch.
While preparing dinner, Masha played with cubes.
For two days the girls took turns preparing lunch, and on the fifth day they prepared lunch together. The teacher suggested that the girls invite other children to visit. The girls agreed.
Anya and Masha prepared salad, cabbage soup, pasta with sausages (from the same items )
and compote.
With my help, the girls set the table. Instead of salad, they put construction kit parts on the plate, cups instead of compote, and pencils instead of spoons.
And they invited the guys. The guys did not refuse and sat down at the table with interest and had lunch. When the children had lunch, the teacher asked: “What should I tell the girls?”
The guys replied:
. ”
Mark 3 years 3 months.
Mark played railroad. Unlike Masha and Anya, he did not always use substitute objects . Mark needed my help.
When Mark was playing with the carriages, I asked him: “What are you carrying by rail?”
Pointing to the different
objects he used.
He didn't answer. I had to help him. We took the puzzles and decided that it was sand. Then, using a tractor-loader, they loaded the sand into the car. Then I explained and showed Mark that a wagon full of sand needed to be transported by rail. We brought the sand to another station and unloaded the sand into a pile using a tractor. We sentenced all the actions, said what we were doing first, what we were doing next, what we were bringing. As the game progressed, I gave the child the opportunity to act on his own.
Mark copied my actions, and then began to use substitute objects . Then he himself used other objects - substitute cubes - bricks, sand - puzzles, wooden sticks from the designer - logs.
Mark really liked the game - replacement, he plays this game with pleasure and invites friends from the group.
Conclusion:
Young children use objects to stimulate the ability to make decisions independently, based on life experience. Therefore, it is necessary to create a play environment, enriching children's experience through observations.
The examples I have given show children actively playing with substitute objects , developing imagination, speech, thinking and fantasy.
