1. Read the following scenario. Reflect on what Piaget might say about the child’s play in terms of the processes of assimilation and accommodation?

Scenario F: Jayden, a 14-month-old toddler, is engaged in playing with a large ball---one of his favourite toys. He rolls it along the floor, drops it, bounces it, and tosses it. His caregiver then passes him a balloon. He seems puzzled when he tries to move it in the same way and it doesn’t move very far. Jayden looks at the caregiver noticeably perplexed.

2. Think about what each of the children is doing in the following scenario. Analyze the children’s play according to Vygotsky and Elkonin’s perspectives. What might each theorist say about the play? What skills might the children be developing?

Scenario G: A group of four children of various ages are outdoors in the playground of their child care centre playing in the mud in the spring. Hamid stands on top of a very small hill and dumps a bucket of water so it runs down the slope. “It’s a waterfall!” he exclaims. Leo and Jessica begin making ‘rivers’ by dragging sticks through the mud to create grooves for the water to run through. Hamid keeps filling and dumping buckets of water. Jessa proposes that they need some boats and the children scavenge in the area for bark chips to float down the ‘rivers’. As the ‘boats’ wash down the slope, Leo suggests, “let’s make a dam so the water doesn’t get away.” The youngest child, Myra, keeps trying to emulate the older children. She crouches down in the mud, grasps a twig in her hand and traces a path down the hill. She carefully places a bark chip in her ‘river’, but appears to be frustrated because she can’t get her ‘boat’ to move. One of the older children, Leo, patiently tries to show her how to do it. He first suggests, “if you dig your river deeper, then the boat will float.” Once the ‘boat’ is floating, he then encourages her to “move the boat up on the hill then it will go down.”

3. Consider the following scenario. Referring back to pages --- to --- in your textbook, analyze the children’s play according to Vygotsky and Elkonin’s perspectives. What might each theorist say about the play? How might it lead their development?

Scenario H: A small group of kindergarten children are engaged in superhero play during their recess break. Hunter and Elisha volunteer to be the ‘bad guys’ and Finn, Mohamed, and Stella are the superheroes. Over the course of a few months, the game evolves from a simple chasing game as the children develop more elaborate scripts. The superheroes begin to say things like “stop, in the name of the law!” and “now I’ve got you and you must pay!” The superheroes take the ‘bad guys’ to a makeshift ‘jail’ at their headquarters (a small wooden play structure) in a spaceship (a large log they perch on and pretend to ride). They switch roles periodically and add elements to the stories. On one occasion, Stella is playing the role of the superhero and she hauls Finn off to the jail, telling him “you have broken the law and now you will pay!” Hunter calls out “stop! It’s not the superhero who decide who’s guilty. He has to go to the high court and a judge will decide.”

4. How might you interpret or critique this scenario from a post-developmental perspective? What changes might the teacher make to address these areas of critique and her own dissatisfaction?

Scenario I: In preparation for the beginning of the school year, Ms. Santos has organized her classroom into specific learning centres. Each centre is carefully labelled and she has symbols to indicate how many children can play there. She has set up a chart where children can see their choices, then place their name card in their desired centre if there is space. The schedule for the day is displayed at the front of the room. She plans to start each morning with a meeting, then she will have some whole group instructional time in the area of literacy (storybook reading, songs, letter recognition, etc.). After this, she plans to do a mandatory or ‘must-do’ learning centre, then give the children some time to explore the centres before clean-up. She ends with snack followed by either gym, outdoor play, or arts. In the early weeks of school, she spends a lot of time teaching the children the norms and expectations during this centre time. She reinforces that they must complete the ‘must do’ centre before their ‘explore time’, saying things like “you can choose what you want to do after you finish your must-do work.” She tells them which centres they are allowed to choose from in order to ensure they learn specific things. She shows them how to check and see how many children are allowed in each area and then put their name card in the space for the centre they want to visit. She teaches them that materials are to be kept in their specific centre and put away before moving to a new centre. In the early weeks, as she is observing their play, she intervenes on a number of occasions to redirect their behaviour and ensure that the expectations are being met. The children seem to adapt to the routine though there is some resistance at clean-up time, but Ms. Santos does not feel that they are learning what she had hoped during their centre play.

5. Return to your own reflection on your childhood play and analyze it from a post-developmental perspective. Which norms and values were being reproduced? Were these consistent with the dominant norms and values in that particular time and place? Would this play have been inclusive for children from a diverse range of classes, genders, races, sexualities, ethnicities, and abilities?