Social & Cognitive Play Behavior This study examined the social and cog

Twenty-four children (12 boys and 12 girls) were randomly selected from a large local elementary school. These children were observed during their playground activities. Types of play were recorded using the Parten/Smilansky matrix of social and cognitive categories of play.

Findings of the study indicated that the existing research with preschoolers generalized to samples of first graders. Specifically, it was found that:

(1) As expected, older children (first graders) more frequently engage in the higher order types of social and cognitive play than the lower order types of social and cognitive play.

(2) As expected, girls are more inclined than boys to engage in dramatic play; boys tend to prefer more structured and more organized forms of play.

(3) As expected, the incidence of parallel play was low for both boys and girls; however, boys were slightly more inclined than girls to engage in parallel play.

Explanations for findings were discussed in terms of the social/cognitive categorical models' strengths and weaknesses.

Play, according to Tomlinson-Keasy (1993) severs several useful purposes, the

. . .
ed themselves with only one or two of the Parten/Smilansky categorical matrix. For example, Callahan (1994), in an effort to better understand the need to develop appropriate environments for young children's learning, examined for the effects of Writing Centers on children's level of constructive play. The writing centers were designed to encourage experimentation and use by children in support of constructive play. The specific factors assessed in the study were complexity and variety within six categories of provisions. Observations were taken of 69 preschool age children over the period of three months. Findings indicated that the writing centers did assist in helping children to develop constructive play. In another study of just one type of play, Steffey (1992), noting that sociodramatic play, in Smilansky's view, is composed of six elements that indirectly affect later school achievement. These elements include role-pretense, make-believe, verbal communication and social interaction. The purpose of Steffey' study was to determine if these six elements were present in the classroom sociodramatic play of kindergarten children. Six kindergarten children (three female and three male) were randomly selected as partici
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 3728
Approximate Pages = 15 (250 words per page)

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