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The relevance of the topic of the article. Support for the role-playing game of preschool children is going through a crisis, largely associated with a change in the content of children’s experience. Research that consider the possibility of reflecting literature experience in a role-playing game are few. At the same time, their analysis shows that such experience can have a significant impact on the content and structure of the role-playing games of preschoolers.

The aim of the research was to study the possibilities of reflecting the literature experience of children, received in the family, on the nature of the construction of role-playing games.

Description of the research progress. The sample consisted of 15 children from 4 to 7 years old and 15 mothers who are regular participants in role-playing games organized in the context of non-formal preschool education (community for supporting role-playing games). In the beginning, a sequence of reading fairy tales to children was organized with the family. The first of the tales is based on the external confrontation of warring heroes, and the second is based on the internal conflict of the heroes and their search for the place in the world. Further, 6 role-playing games were organized supported by the plots of fairy tales based on the model of building a two-stroke game (L.I. Elkoninova). The experimenter motivated the children to play with his involvement in the plot of the game and the support of the two-stroke structure of the fairy tale plot. At the final stage, the features of the reflection of reading experience in a plot-based role-playing game were analyzed according to specially developed criteria.

Research results. It was found that a fairy tale plot, in which there is a confrontation between two warring parties, often causes negative emotions in children in the process of reading and, as a result, a reluctance to get involved in a game according to a given plot. A fairy tale plot, where instead of an external confrontation there is an internal conflict of heroes, it evokes positive emotions and research interest in children, which leads to the desire to actively participate in a role-playing game based on this plot, to bring their own vision and meaning into the storyline.

Conclusions. Role-playing game based on a fairy-tale plot allows children 4-6 years old to reach a new level of development of play activity. Changes were recorded in in-game interaction, the level of the game design, its stability and implementation. The greatest growth in game indicators was noted in role-playing based on a fairy tale plot, in which there was no confrontation between good and evil heroes, the smallest growth was observed in games based on a fairy tale plot based on an external conflict of heroes.

The article discusses the problem of reduced play activity of a modern preschool. An overview of the research on the importance of the play as a factor in the development of the child in the preschool period of childhood is presented. The concept of «play dysontogenesis» is introduced, which means violated, not corresponding to psychological laws development of the play in preschool age due to a number of socio-cultural and educational factors. The reasons for the occurrence of play deprivation are revealed, which have a negative impact on the normal development of the child and the formation of the main neoplasms of preschool childhood. It has been shown that the simplification of the children’s play leads to mental and personal infantilism, a decrease in the ability to plan one’s own actions, a delay in the formation of significant mental functions and personality aspects, and a socio-normative disorientation of a growing person. Based on the data of individual authors and the materials of earlier studies, we suggest a high risk of the formation of various psychological dependencies and deviations, the emergence of play addiction and other socio-behavioral deviations as a result of a lack of play in preschool age. The results of familiarization with training curricula for preschool educational institutions are discussed, which indicate the complete absence in many programs of universities of theoretical disciplines, practical courses and workshops on psychology and pedagogy of children’s play, including applied aspects of teaching future educators how to organize and accompany preschool play. The conditions for the rehabilitation of the play as a unique social, psychological, cultural and age phenomenon, proposed by E.O. Smirnova as fundamental measures in modern preschool education, are outlined.

The theory and research described in this article is based on the Vygotskian approach to human development. As this theory suggests, the promotion of semiotic activity in children is essential for their cultural development. It is argued in this paper that the promotion of semiotic activity in young children within the context of their play activity is an important aspect of the improvement of early childhood education. In a small scale exploratory study we observed pupils of 4-6 year old playing together with a train set. During this play the children were encouraged to make a diagram of their railway track. By analysing their play activity and their schematisations, we tried to find out whether (and how) the promotion of semiotic activity would be possible without affecting the play character of the children’s activity.

The article presents the results of a study on the integration of children’s reading and playing practices implemented within the framework of the Federal innovation platform – kindergarten No. 8 of the Central District of St. Petersburg on the topic “Designing Practices for the Education of Preschool Children in a Changing Sociocultural Situation”.

The aim of the study was to study the possibilities of enriching the practice of subject-role play of children in various age groups (3-7,5 years) as a result of testing the technology of productive reading when children get acquainted with the modern world bestseller of children’s literature, J. Donaldson “Snail and Whale”. It was found that the technology of productive reading has a high developing potential both for organizing children’s perception of the book and understanding its meaning, and for the natural display read in the conditions of play activity. The monitoring and quality analysis of playing activity of children 3-7,5 years revealed that the implementation of the technology of productive reading with preschool children allows, on the one hand, to consider the game as a way of interpreting literary works and on the other hand, to support the game based on the read.

The obtained results show that the implementation of the research plan contributed to the fact that the development indicators of the children’s game begin to approach the normative in the situation of the “zone of proximal development” and the further accumulation of play practice will contribute to the achievement of the normative indicators of the role-playing game in the “zone of the actual development of children”. It is also important that the reliance on the content and structure of the literary text allows the teacher to feel more confident in situations of play interaction with children, as an adult and a child interact in a single story context.

Contradictionary results of studies on the development of self-regulation in different activities in children are identified. The structure of self-regulation includes the ability to goal-setting, modeling conditions of activities, programming actions and self-control. The specificity of the manifestation of these abilities in different types of activity and features in preschool children is shown.

The method includes four problem situations. The first part is aimed at diagnosing the ability to self-regulate cognitive activity (metacognitive abilities). The second part is aimed at diagnosing the ability to self-regulate play activity (metaplay abilities).

Situations 1 and 3 suggest a hypothetical inclusion of the child in cognitive and play activities. The child must identify the goal and objectives, the conditions for the implementation of the activity and the program of action. Situations 2 and 4 are aimed at diagnosing self-control in cognitive and play activities. These situations imply a child’s assessment of «completing the assignment by other children».

Testing results indicate a relatively uniform distribution of the examined children according to the level of development of self-regulation abilities in different types of activities. Close and moderate correlation between the indicators of the abilities in cognitive and play activities was found. However, only 8% of the examined children showed a harmonious profile of metacognitive and meta-play abilities.

Self-regulation in preschool children has its own specifics in different types of activities. To diagnose metacognitive and metaplay abilities, it is necessary to use different diagnostic tasks. The results of testing the method indicate that it can be used in scientific research and for the diagnosis of mental development of preschool children.