Progressive Work with Drawing in Groups of Preschool Children in Mexico and Colombia | Chapter 11 | Perspectives of Arts and Social Studies Vol. 2
It is well known that pre-school age is
the period of significant importance for psychological development and for
preparation of children for learning at school. The process of learning and
achievements at school depend on the types of activities selected at pre-school
level. Unfortunately, it is often to find out that introduction of writing and
reading is among the most common activities in pre-school institutions all over
the world. The goal of our article is to share a formative experience of
drawing as suitable activity for children development at preschool age. Mexican
and Colombian preschool children were included in the study aged between 5 and
6 years. All children belonged to suburban area of the cities state of Tlaxcala
(Mexico) and Bogota (Colombia) and assisted to pre-school official level
without any kind of previous experience in drawing. The original program for
gradual formation of drawing by stages was applied for 8 months daily for 1
hour. The program is based on the conception of the zone of proximal
development, introduced by Vigotsky for developmental psychology. The program
included different stages with multiple activities directed to analyses of
concrete objects and toys and its essential features, denomination,
classification, differentiation, comparison of objects, analyses of basic
shapes and spatial organization of details. All activities within the program
were collective and guided by a teacher, previously trained for this purpose.
After that graphic representation of shapes were used with the help of constant
external orientation. All children were tested before and after application of
the program. Specific tasks were selected from Brief Neuropsychological
Assessment [29] for assessment of children. Among the tasks were included: copy
of objects with elements of spatial orientation, free drawing, production of
drawings by categorical instructions. After program application children from
experimental group showed qualitative positive achievements in graphic
representations of objects, spatial orientation, number of drawings and of
essential features of represented objects. We conclude that drawing is
extremely useful activity for psychological development of children and the
level of preparation for school learning, especially for writing process.
Drawing activity had positive effect for spatial functions and images of
objects in visual modality. We suggest that our program might be used in
pre-school official institutions with in order to guarantee required level
psychological formation of pre-school age. The program might be used even in
groups of children in conditions of poor leaving conditions and social
deprivation.
Author(s) Details
Yulia Solovieva
Faculty of Psychology,
Puebla Autonomous University, Mexico
Luis Quintanar Rojas
Department of
Neuropsychological Diagnosis and Rehabilitation, Faculty of Psychology, Puebla Autonomous
University, Mexico.
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