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Preschool Children’s Pretend Play Viewed from a Vygotskyan and a Piagetian Perspective

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Piaget and Vygotsky in XXI century

Part of the book series: Early Childhood Research and Education: An Inter-theoretical Focus ((ECRE,volume 4))

Abstract

Pretend play can be seen as a breeding ground for children’s socialization and it plays an important educational role during the preschool years. To make pretend play work socially, children need to share a co-constructed interactional framework that refers to the pretend world (alternate reality) as well as to the real context (actual reality). Both Piaget’s and Vygotsky’s ideas about children’s development, talk and imagination have had great influences on Swedish preschool practice during the years. The present chapter aims to examine some empirical examples of children’s pretend play adding a Vygotskian and a Piagetian perspective, and to further discuss what topicality Piaget’s and Vygotsky’s diverse ideas about children’s talk and pretending in social peer play has for the preschool practice of today.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The project Preschool as children’s language environment (2009–2013) was funded by the Swedish Research Council, Dnr. 721-2008-5565, led by Professor Eva Björck, School of Education and Communication, Jönkö** University; CHILD.

  2. 2.

    Note that this chapter, like Piaget’s and Vygotsky’s theories, derives from a monolingual view of children’s talk and development. The target data is also taken from monolingual children’s play activities. Had I considered multilingual children’s play, the chapter would have had quite different content, focus and conclusions.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Linkö** University, Linkö**, Sweden

    Polly Björk-Willén

Authors
  1. Polly Björk-Willén
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Correspondence to Polly Björk-Willén .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Lomonosov Moscow State University, Moscow, Russia

    Nikolay Veraksa

  2. Department of Education, Communication and Learning, University of Gothenburg, Göteborg, Sweden

    Ingrid Pramling Samuelsson

Appendix

Appendix

[ ]:

square brackets mark the start and end of overlap** speech

word :

underlining indicates emphasis

WORD:

capitals mark speech that is audibly louder than surrounding speech

° °:

degree signs surround talk in quieter speech (sotto voce)

(2):

pauses measured in seconds

(.):

micro-pause

(( )):

investigator’s comments within double parentheses

::

prolongation of preceding vowel

↓ ↑:

falling or rising intonation

> <:

more rapid than surrounding speech

< >:

slower than surrounding speech

=:

immediate ‘latching’ of successive talk

( ):

uncertain interpretation within parentheses

(x) (xx):

inaudible word or words

svenska :

talk in Swedish

English:

English translations.

points :

nonverbal action transcribed in italics

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Björk-Willén, P. (2022). Preschool Children’s Pretend Play Viewed from a Vygotskyan and a Piagetian Perspective. In: Veraksa, N., Pramling Samuelsson, I. (eds) Piaget and Vygotsky in XXI century. Early Childhood Research and Education: An Inter-theoretical Focus, vol 4. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-05747-2_7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-05747-2_7

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  • Print ISBN: 978-3-031-05746-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-031-05747-2

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