All articles

Paper describes the main approaches to the social and personal development of children of preschool age. The main attention has been paid to the fact that a kindergarten group, as a genetically early stage of social organization, creates the necessary conditions for the development of children’s contacts in the process of an independent and joint activity, the acquisition of communication skills with peers “on equal terms” in a variety of educational situations necessary for the development of a child’s personality.

The methodological basis of the study is the concept of child development as a subject of a child activity and behavior (T.I. Babaeva, A.G. Gogoberidze). Theoretical analysis of psychological and pedagogical literature on the problem of the social and personal development of a child, analysis of PhD dissertations, defended at the Early Childhood Education Department of the A.I. Herzen State Pedagogical University of Russia from the second half of the 20th century to the present was applied as an objective analytical tool.

The main directions of social and personal development of preschoolers, the personal characteristics in the interaction of preschool children with peers have been described. The indicators and conditions for the development and upbringing of the independence of preschool children have been revealed.

The article presents the experimental methodology and findings of research on the possibilities and means of relationship improvement between preschool children in a peer group through developmental activities based on theatre material. The general principles of the developmental methodology, which aim to teach children the expressive creation of characters through the integrated use of theatre tools, are highlighted. These tools are facial gesture, pantomime, gestures, vocal intonations, etc., that convey the acts, characteristic motion , and emotions of the characters interacting with each other according to the plot, allowing the children to experience the whole character by relying on figurative movement with the “whole body”. The data from the control and experimental groups are contrasted in two ways: by creative and sociometric principles. The outcome of the analysis shows a significant improvement in the results of the experimental group, unlike the control group, where there was no difference. The opportunity to improve relationships in the peer group is proved, as well as the efficacy of the experimental methodology for child development through theatre activity as compared to traditional techniques.

The article deals with the application possibilities of sociometric method for understanding the distribution of social preferences of preschool children. A broader view of the technique “Two houses”, which allows to obtain information about each preschool and a group as a whole, is presented. The paper describes the methods, procedure of its usage, data processing and interpretation.