The child's play world at home and the mother's role in the play

Abstract

Aino Ugaste selvitti väitöstutkimuksessaan lapsen leikkimaailmaa kotona, äidin käsityksiä lapsen leikistä ja kehityksestä sekä äidin roolista lapsen jokapäiväisessä elämässä ja leikeissä. Ugaste tutki, leikkivätkö lapset kotona, millaisia leikkejä he leikkivät ja miten äiti tukee ja ohjailee lasten leikkejä kotona.- Lapset leikkivät mieluiten sekä yksin että äidin kanssa roolileikkejä. Roolileikit ovat lapsen monipuolisen kehityksen kannalta tärkeimpiä leikkejä. Näissä leikeissä lapset puhuvat paljon ja leikeissä on paljon kuvitelmia, fantasiaa ja luovuutta, Ugaste huomasi.Kun äiti leikkii lapsensa kanssa, leikit ovat kehittyneempiä ja vaihtelevampia kuin lapsen leikkiessä yksin. Yhteisissä leikeissä äiti ei ole pelkästään leikkikaveri vaan leikissä sen rikastuttaja, kommunikoija ja roolien sosiaalisten merkitysten avaaja.

The aim of this study was to describe and analyse the play of preschool children within the family context. The study was based on the ideas of the cultural-historical approach of play. The child’s play world was observed holistically in connection with the child’s everyday life, play opportunities and mother’s support during the child’s games. The study was carried out at home with four-year-old children and the research material consisted of interview data and observational data. The findings showed that the mothers mostly initiated interactions with their children and the mothers acted as transmitters of knowledge and sharers of experience. The children continually wished to have necessary materials, to show their games or invited their mothers to play together with them. Thus the children needed their mothers as supporters and appraisers of their activity. All the children played role games which they often initiated themselves. The themes of children’s games were connected with everyday events and the child’s knowledge, impressions and experiences formed the basis of their play. The roles in the solitary games were implicit in the children’s actions and the content was one-sided and consisted of repeated stereotypic actions. Playing role games together with their mothers, the children started not only to act with the toys but also to speak and interact according to the theme and content of the play. In the joint games the roles were more defined and more explicit than in the children’s solitary play. In the joint games there were more play scripts and the quality of play scripts was different, consisting of the players’ mutual action and interaction. The mother-child interaction during the games was related to the imaginary situation and the mother helped interpret the social meaning of the role behaviour in the context of the relevant play script. In the joint rule games the mothers paid great attention to the notion of fair play and to joint play between siblings. The mothers attempted to teach their children academic knowledge but the children were not keen to play these games. Instead, children preferred games which involved playfulness, fun and unusual aspects. In the joint games the mothers displayed wide-range repertoires of play promotion.The findings of the study provide some new information and make some contribution to a better understanding of the children’s everyday life and games at home. The results indicated the importance of the different roles that the adults have in creating the children’s play world.