(selection of books). Child psychology. Preschool psychology. (selection of books) Education and professional activities

Reviewers:

B. D. Elkonin – Doctor of Psychology, Professor

T. D. Martsinkovskaya – Doctor of Psychology, Professor

Part I
Introduction to Child Psychology

Chapter 1
Subject and tasks of child psychology

Child psychology - the science of the child’s soul

Psychology is the science of the soul. Already in this expression, familiar to every psychologist, there is a certain paradox. After all, science is aimed at obtaining clear, objective, rational knowledge about the world. Scientific research requires rigorous measurement, objective analysis independent of the methods used by the scientist, and unambiguity of the results obtained. This means that the subject of scientific research must be measurable, objective (that is, perceived from the outside) and decomposable into its component parts. But such methods cannot be applied to the soul, since it cannot be seen, measured and presented as an object completely independent of the researcher himself. The human soul is in principle unobservable and immeasurable. At the same time, one cannot doubt the truth and objectivity of its existence. Every person knows about the power and reality of his own desires, memories, experiences, passions and many other mental phenomena, which, despite their “invisibility,” are quite objectively existing and produce many quite tangible and externally perceived forms of behavior and changes in the surrounding objective world . It is safe to say that our thoughts, feelings, and relationships are no less real than other objectively existing objects and processes in the world around us. But the former exist not in the environment, but in the inner, mental world of a person and therefore require completely different methods and approaches than those used in the natural sciences that study the phenomena of the external world (physics, chemistry, biology, etc.). Of course, a person can also be considered as a subject of physics or biology. At the same time, we will study not mental phenomena, but the structure and functioning of the human body. Psychology is interested in precisely internal, mental phenomena that are inaccessible to direct observation, but are quite real and extremely important for the life of every person. Obviously, it is extremely difficult to understand, identify and study these phenomena.

It is even more difficult to study the soul of a child. If we can talk about the mental life of an adult from our own internal experience, from the analysis of our experiences and states, then it is almost impossible to feel and understand the soul of a child. At the same time, there is no doubt that already the smallest child has his own inner mental life: he wants something, gets very upset about something, comes up with something, says something, etc. We can do all this without difficulty we can observe in the behavior of children.

But we can only observe external manifestations, only the child’s behavior: his actions, expressive movements, statements, etc. The psychologist is not interested in the external manifestations themselves, but in the mental processes, qualities, states hidden behind them. After all, the same external actions can express completely different states. It’s one thing if a baby cries because he’s in pain, another thing is crying out of resentment, a third thing if he cries because he wants to attract the attention of an adult, a fourth thing if he doesn’t succeed in what he had in mind, etc. d. Each time the same action (in our case crying) will mean completely different experiences for the child. Identifying these experiences based on their external expression is the main and difficult task of a child psychologist.

This is difficult because a child is not like an adult, everything is different for him. For a long time, a child was viewed as a small adult: he doesn’t know much, doesn’t know how, doesn’t understand. He cannot control himself, cannot solve assigned tasks, reason, fulfill his promises, etc. We could go on and on about what the child cannot do. But if we view a child as an unreasonable, underdeveloped adult, we will never understand his attitude to the world, his experiences and actions. After all, the specific characteristics of a child do not lie in the fact that he thinks and perceives the world worse than an adult, but in the fact that he has a qualitatively different attitude towards the environment and himself. There are many things children can do better than adults. They can spend hours drawing pictures, inventing imaginary situations and turning into different characters, suffering over the fate of an unfamiliar kitten, crying or squealing with joy at what is happening on stage, etc. All this is usually inaccessible to an adult. Therefore, it is important to look not for what children cannot yet do, but for how they differ from adults, that is, the specifics of their inner, mental life.

Concepts of growth and development

The main specific feature of young children is that they change quickly and are in constant development. Moreover, the younger the child, the more intense this development occurs. It not only grows, but also develops. Here we must distinguish between two most important concepts of child psychology - the concepts of growth and development.

Growth is a quantitative change or improvement of something that already exists., any specific function or quality. The child’s weight increases, his height increases, he masters more and more actions with objects, more words, etc. These are phenomena of growth, that is, quantitative accumulation. If we consider a child as a small adult, then his entire life path will be reduced only to quantitative changes, that is, to an increase and strengthening of what is initially present in him, and nothing fundamentally new is formed.

In contrast to this, development is characterized by qualitative changes, the emergence of mental neoplasms. For example, a week ago the baby was not at all interested in toys and glanced at them indifferently, but today he reaches out to them and constantly demands new objects. Or, before, the child did not pay attention to the assessments of others, but now he is offended by comments and demands praise. This means that some qualitative changes have occurred in his mental life and in his attitude towards the environment, something new has arisen, and the old has faded into the background, that is, the structure of his mental processes has changed.

Childhood is the period of the most intense human development. At no other age does a person go through so many qualitatively unique stages of his life as in early and preschool childhood. Over the first 5–6 years, he turns from a completely helpless baby into a fairly formed person with his own interests, character traits and outlook on life. The child’s constant movement forward, the emergence of ever new forms of his independence and initiative gives facts characterizing child development. Child psychology operates on these facts.

Despite the differences that certainly exist between children of the same age, each stage of childhood has its own specific characteristics. For example, at 3–4 months all babies are happy with an adult, at about a year old children prefer to play with toys, and at about two years old they begin to speak, etc. These changes are not random, but natural. If in one child or another they occur differently, we can talk about deviations in their mental development: lag, advance or deformation, which always have their own reasons. Finding out the patterns of development and explaining its causes is the most important task of child psychology.

All children go through certain stages or phases in their development, which are characterized by specific features of their mental life. The study of the patterns of mental development of a child is the main subject of child psychology. Its main task is to describe and explain the characteristics of a child’s mental life at each age stage.

Therefore, child psychology is an integral part of developmental psychology, that is, a science that studies age-related patterns of human mental development. But if developmental psychology covers all stages of life, including maturity and old age, then children's psychology deals only with early ages (from 0 to 7 years), when development occurs most quickly and intensively.

What determines this development? The main question that arises here is the question of the relative role of the natural properties of the organism and the human conditions of raising a child.

What does nature give to a child?

To answer this question, it would be necessary to conduct an experiment in which children from the first days of life grow up in isolation from adults: they do not hear their speech, do not see other people, and do not use objects common to humans. If in such conditions children developed in approximately the same way as when surrounded by people, then the child’s mental abilities could be considered innate, inherent in nature itself.

It is clear that not a single scientist and not a single parent will allow such a risky experiment to be carried out on a human child. However, there have been similar experiences in the history of mankind. In particular, there are widely known stories of children who grew up outside of human society, who were found in the den of animals and “raised” by them. They are called “Mowgli children” by analogy with the hero of Kipling’s famous novel.

For example, at the beginning of the twentieth century, the Indian scientist Reed Singh saw a she-wolf taking her wolf cubs for a walk, among whom were two girls - one about six, the other one and a half years old. Singh took the girls with him and tried to raise them. It turned out that these children were deprived of all specifically human forms of behavior without exception. They walked on all fours, ate raw meat, were nocturnal, howled at night, tried to hide, or snapped at the sight of people. In a word, they were much more like wolf cubs than human children. The youngest of them, Amala, died a year later, unable to withstand human living conditions. The eldest, Kamala, lived to be 15 years old. Over the course of nine years, with great difficulty, she was taught to walk upright and some hygienic skills. But full mental development turned out to be completely impossible for her. She was never able to think, feel and speak like a human, and remained a creature with typical wolf habits.

What if no living conditions and no upbringing are imposed on the child? Will he then be able to develop as a human being? The answer to this question comes from observations of children who grew up in conditions hospitalism. This phenomenon is characterized by the isolation of children from adults and the long stay of a young child alone. During wars, there are often cases when children are separated from their mothers and raised in special orphanages.

Thus, the German psychologist R. Spitz described the children of one orphanage who were separated from their mothers at the age of three months. The care, food, and hygienic conditions in this institution were typical of all well-run institutions of this kind. However, all children experienced a sharp delay in not only mental but also physical development. Within two years, about half of the children died. Those who survived at 3–4 years were unable to move independently in any way, could not sit without support, could not eat with a spoon or dress, and did not react to others.

So, children who are left without any attention from adults in the first months of life, despite normal nutrition and physical care, either simply do not survive, or stop developing and remain in an embryonic state. This may indicate that the presence of a human brain is far from the main condition for human development. It is not enough to be born a human to become one. The child absorbs what is given by living conditions and upbringing. And if these conditions are animal - wolf, dog, monkey, the child grows up to be an animal of the corresponding species. If a newborn is left alone with the outside world, without a “nurturing” environment he simply does not survive and does not develop. The human psyche does not arise without special, cultural living conditions. It is not embedded in the child’s brain or body.

At the same time, it has been established that such a special inner, spiritual life is possible only among representatives Homo sapiens and no animal can under any circumstances become human.

Science has repeatedly made attempts to develop in animals qualities that are unique to humans.

For example, the domestic zoopsychologist Ladygina-Kots raised a small chimpanzee in her family from one and a half to four years. The monkey was taught to use things, play with toys, talk and was treated quite humanely. But the results turned out to be very modest. The chimpanzee learned with difficulty some human skills (holding a pencil or a broom, knocking with a hammer, etc.) But the meaning of human actions turned out to be completely inaccessible to him: moving a pencil along the paper, he could not draw anything meaningful; while “sweeping” the floor, he rearranged garbage from one place to another, etc. He did not have any tendency to master words, even with persistent special training.

These data suggest that without the human brain those mental qualities that are unique to humans cannot arise.

Specifics of human child development

What happens? It seems that a child born among people does not have any natural prerequisites for human development, and at the same time only a child Homo sapiens can become human. This means that there is still something in our body that allows it to so quickly and successfully assimilate all forms of strictly human behavior, learn to think, feel, and control itself.

Yes, I have. Oddly enough, the main advantage of a child is his congenital helplessness, his inability to engage in any specific forms of behavior. The extreme plasticity of the human brain is one of its main features that ensures mental development. In animals, most of the brain matter is already “occupied” at the time of birth - innate forms of behavior - instincts - are fixed in it. A child's brain is open to new experiences and ready to accept what life and upbringing give it. Scientists have proven that in animals the process of brain formation basically ends at the time of birth, but in humans this process continues 7–8 years after birth and depends on the living conditions and upbringing of the child. These conditions not only fill the “blank pages” of the brain, but also affect its very structure. Therefore, the first, childhood years are so important, cardinal for the development of a person.

The human brain has remained virtually unchanged since the times of our distant ancestors, who lived several tens of thousands of years ago. At the same time, humanity has made a giant leap in its development over these years. This became possible because human development occurs in a fundamentally different way than the development of living beings in the animal world. In the animal world, certain forms of behavior are inherited, just like the structure of the body, or acquired through the individual experience of an individual. In humans, their characteristic forms of activity and mental qualities are transmitted in a different way - through the appropriation of cultural and historical experience. Each new generation “stands on the shoulders” of the entire previous history of mankind. It comes not to the natural world, but to the world of culture, in which there is music and computers, houses and cars, science and literature and much more. There are also ideas about how children should develop and what they should become by adulthood. The child himself will never invent all this, but he must master it in the process of his human development. This is what cultural or social inheritance is all about.

The development of a helpless creature, which is a newborn baby, its transformation into a full-fledged subject of culture, having its own inner, spiritual world, is the main subject of child psychology.

Childhood as a sociocultural phenomenon

His research showed that until the 13th century, artists did not turn to images of children at all. In 13th-century painting, images of children are found only in religious subjects (angels, baby Jesus); there are no images of real children. Apparently, during this period, childhood was considered a period of little value and quickly passing. This, according to Aries, was facilitated by the demographic situation of that time - high birth rates and high infant mortality caused a general indifference and frivolous attitude towards children. A sign of overcoming such indifference is the appearance in the 14th century of portraits of dead children, which suggests that the death of a child begins to be perceived as a bereavement, and not as a common occurrence. Judging by the history of painting, complete indifference to children was overcome only in the 17th century, when images of real children appeared in portraits for the first time. As a rule, these are portraits of crown princes and influential persons in childhood. Thus, according to Aries, the discovery of childhood began in the 13th century, but the evidence of this discovery is most fully manifested at the end of the 16th and 17th centuries.

One interesting sign of changing attitudes towards children is the change in children's clothing. In the Middle Ages, as soon as a child grew out of swaddling clothes, he was immediately dressed in an adult suit. Only in the 16th–17th centuries did special children's clothing appear. It is typical that boys and girls aged 2–4 were dressed in identical children's dresses. This type of children's costume existed until the beginning of the twentieth century. It is interesting that in those social classes where there are no big differences between the work of adults and children (such as in peasant families before the revolution), children are dressed in adult clothes (of course, in smaller sizes).

F. Aries's research begins in the Middle Ages, since only at this time did images of children appear in painting. However, caring for and raising children, of course, has always been there. Descriptions of the way of life of primitive tribes that have survived to this day allow us to imagine the peculiarities of the upbringing of ancient peoples. One such description is contained in the notes of Douglas Lockwood about his travels to the Gibson Desert (Western Australia) and his meetings with the Pintubi aborigines.

Until 1957, most people of this tribe had not seen a white man, their contacts with neighboring tribes were severely limited, as a result of which the culture and way of life of the Stone Age people were largely preserved in this tribe. The whole life of these people passes in the desert and is focused on the search for water and food. The strong and resilient Pintubi women participate in this quest along with the men. They can walk for hours in the desert with a heavy load on their heads. They give birth to children lying on the sand, helping and sympathizing with each other. They have no idea about hygiene and do not even know the reasons for childbirth. They have no utensils except jugs on their heads. When Lockwood offered them a mirror and a comb, they were unable to use them for their intended purpose, and the image in the mirror caused surprise and fear. Lockwood describes how a 2-3 year old girl, while eating, would put into her mouth either huge pieces of flatbread or pieces of small guana meat, which she herself baked on the hot sand. Her younger sister sat next to her and dealt with a can of stew (from the expedition's supplies), pulling out the meat with her fingers. Another observation: a little girl, not yet able to walk, made a separate fire for herself and, bending her head, fanned the coals so that the fire would flare up and warm her. She was naked, she was probably cold, but she didn’t cry. Lockwood notes that although there were three small children in the camp, they never heard a child cry.

Evidence of children's early maturation can be found in many sources. Thus, in the literature of the 19th century there are many examples of the absence of childhood among proletarians. Children sometimes began to work from the age of five, often from the age of six, and almost all children of poor parents worked from the age of eight; the working day lasted 14–16 hours. Let us recall the famous character in N. Nekrasov’s poem “A Little Man with a Marigold,” who at the age of six considers himself a full-fledged man.

These and many other materials allowed the outstanding Russian psychologist Daniil Borisovich Elkonin to put forward the position of the historical conditioning of childhood. Childhood arises when a child cannot be directly included in the system of social reproduction, since he cannot yet master the tools of labor due to their complexity. If these tools are simple and primitive, if the main way of obtaining food is gathering and hunting, the child can very early become familiar with the work of adults, practically mastering the methods of action of adults. Under such conditions, when the child is directly involved in the life of adults, there is no need for special preparation for future working life. The development of civilization inevitably led to the fact that the inclusion of children in the productive labor of adults turned out to be impossible and was pushed back in time. With the development of mankind, childhood became increasingly longer. This lengthening of childhood did not occur by adding new periods, but by a kind of “wedging in” of a new period of development, which leads to an “upward time shift” in the period of inclusion in adulthood. D. B. Elkonin brilliantly revealed the nature of such a wedging of a new period using the example of the emergence of role-playing games, and with it a new stage of development, which in modern psychology is called preschool.

Questions about the historical origin of periods of childhood, about the connection between the history of childhood and the history of society are extremely important for understanding the psychology of the modern child. It should be remembered that the type of education that we are seeing currently is just one of the possible ones and far from the only one.

Moscow

Doctor of Psychological Sciences, Professor.

Head of the Center for Psychological and Pedagogical Expertise of Games and Toys, Professor of the Department of Preschool Pedagogy and Psychology, Faculty of Educational Psychology, Moscow State Psychological and Pedagogical University.

Founder and director of the Center for Games and Toys (Moscow).

Member of two specialized dissertation scientific councils. Expert in the scientific and technical sphere of the Federal State Budgetary Institution Scientific Research Institute "Scientific Research Institute - Republican Research Scientific Consulting Center of Expertise."

Member of the editorial board of the journals “Questions of Psychology”, “Psychological Science and Education”, member of the editorial boards of the journals “Perinatal Psychology and Psychology of the Reproductive Sphere” and “Preschool Education”.

Member of the Russian Psychological Society, the Association of Child Psychiatrists and Psychologists (APP), and the International Society for Study Behavioral Development ISSBD.

In 1971 she graduated from the Faculty of Psychology of Moscow State University. M.V. Lomonosov.

In 1977 she defended her PhD thesis on the topic “The influence of communication with adults on the effectiveness of teaching preschoolers.” In 1992 - doctoral dissertation on the topic “Conditions and prerequisites for the development of voluntary behavior in children.”

In 1993–2009 headed the laboratory of mental development of preschool children at the Psychological Institute of the Russian Academy of Education.

In 2004, she became the scientific director of the Moscow City Center for Psychological and Pedagogical Expertise of Games and Toys at the Moscow City Psychological and Pedagogical University.

Scientific and practical activities.

Scientific interests: child psychology, developmental psychology, psychology of games and toys.

Continuing and developing the concept of M. I. Lisina, she is actively developing problems in the development of communication between children and adults and peers. Her theoretical approach to understanding interpersonal relationships is closely related to the problem of developing a child’s self-awareness and moral development. Particular attention in her works is paid to problematic forms of interpersonal relationships - aggressiveness, touchiness, demonstrativeness, etc. The program of moral education and correction of interpersonal relationships developed by her (together with V. M. Kholmogorova) is used in preschool institutions.

For a number of years, E. O. Smirnova was the leader of a scientific and practical experiment on the development of new forms of pedagogical work with young children, carried out with the support of the Moscow Committee on Education. Under her leadership, an innovative comprehensive program for the education and development of young children, “First Steps,” was developed, aimed at supporting the development of a child’s personality. This program is already being widely implemented in Moscow children's institutions.

Under the leadership of E.O. Smirnova has developed a concept and methodology for psychological and pedagogical examination of toys and gaming materials, on the basis of which specific practical work is already being carried out. The center conducts a series of studies devoted to the analysis of the play activities of modern children and the influence of toys on children's play. A professional development program “Games and toys in the work of a teacher and psychologist” is being implemented.

Gives lectures on child psychology, developmental psychology, preschool pedagogy, as well as on the development of communication and interpersonal relationships. Under the scientific supervision of E. O. Smirnova, 17 candidate's theses were prepared and successfully defended.

Main publications:

Smirnova E. O., Galiguzova L. N., Meshcheryakova S. Yu. Educational program for young children “First Steps”. - M.: Mosaika-Sintez, 2009.
Smirnova E. O., Boguslavskaya Z. M. Educational games for preschoolers. - M.: Education, 1992.
Smirnova E. O. Development of will and volition in early and preschool ages. - M.: Publishing house “Institute of Practical Psychology”; Voronezh: NPO "MODEK", 1998.
Smirnova E. O. Child psychology: Textbook for pedagogical schools and universities. - M.: Shkola-Press, 1997.
Smirnova E. O. Child psychology: textbook. for students higher ped. textbook institutions studying in the specialty “Preschool pedagogy and psychology”. - M.: Humanitarian. ed. VLADOS center, 2006.
Smirnova E. O. Child psychology: textbook. for pedagogical universities. - St. Petersburg, “Peter”, 2009.
Smirnova E. O., Kholmogorova V. M. Interpersonal relationships of preschool children: diagnosis, problems, correction. - M.: Humanitarian. ed. VLADOS center, 2005.
Galiguzova A. S., Smirnova E. O. The art of communicating with a child from one to six years old: advice from a psychologist. - M.: ARKTI, 2004.
Smirnova E. O. Preschooler in the modern world. - M.: Bustard, 2006.
Smirnova E. O., Kholmogorova V. M. Conflict children. - M.: EKSMO, 2009. Smirnova E. O. Sliders and walkers. The first three years of a baby's life. - M.: “Losonosov”, 2009.
Smirnova E. O. The best educational games. - M.: EKSMO, 2010.

?Awards:

Medal of K. D. Ushinsky
Medal of G. I. Chelpanov “For contribution to the development of psychological science”, II degree (2001)
Laureate of the Moscow Grant competition in the field of science and technology in education (2002)
Laureate of the Moscow Grant competition in the field of science and technology in education (2005)
Prize of the Government of the Russian Federation in the field of education (2011) for the series of works “System of education and development of children from birth to seven years”

Smirnova V.G., Milner B.Z. etc. Organization and its business environment (Document)

Ilyin E.P. Psychology of Sports (Document)

Smirnova E.O., Kholmogorova V.M. Interpersonal relationships of preschool children: diagnosis, problems, correction (Document)

Flint V.E., Smirnova O.V. Conservation and restoration of biodiversity (Document)

Gagarin A.V. Animal psychology and comparative psychology (Document)

n1.doc

E. O. Smirnova

CHILD PSYCHOLOGY

M.: Humanite. Ed. VLADOS Center, 2003.

CHAPTER 1

Subject and tasks of child psychology

Child psychology - the science of the mental development of a child

Childhood is the period of the most rapid and intensive human development. At no other age does a person go through so many unique stages as in early and preschool childhood. Over the first 5-6 years of life, he turns from a completely helpless baby into a fairly formed person with his own interests, character traits, habits, and views. It is during these years that the child begins to walk, act with objects, speak, think, communicate, imagine, etc. This huge path of mental development of the child is the main subject of child psychology.

The speed at which new qualities appear in a child impresses adults. The child’s constant movement forward, the emergence of ever new forms of his independence and initiative are characterized by facts inherent in child development. Child psychology operates on these facts.

For a long time, a child was viewed as a small adult: he doesn’t know much, doesn’t know how, doesn’t understand. He cannot organize and control himself, cannot reason, keep his promises, etc. We could go on and on about what the child cannot do. But if we consider a child as an unreasonable, underdeveloped adult, we will never understand where his abilities, qualities, and actions come from. There are many activities that children can do better than adults. They can spend hours drawing pictures, inventing imaginary situations and turning into different characters, suffering for the fate of a homeless kitten, etc. All this is usually inaccessible to an adult. Therefore, it is important to look not for what children cannot yet do, but for how they differ from adults, that is, the specifics of their inner mental life.

The main difficulty in studying the mental life of young children is that this life is in constant development, and the younger the child, the more intense this development occurs. It not only grows, but also develops. The concepts of “growth” and “development” should be distinguished.

Height - It is a quantitative change or improvement in a function. The child’s weight and height increase, he functions better with objects, speaks, walks, etc. This is quantitative accumulation. If we consider a child as an inferior adult, then his entire life path will be reduced only to quantitative changes - that is, to an increase and strengthening of what was initially present in him, and nothing fundamentally new will be formed,

In contrast to this, development characterized primarily by qualitative changes, the emergence of mental neoplasms. For example, a week ago the baby was not at all interested in toys, but today he reaches for them and constantly demands them from the adult. Previously, he did not pay attention to the assessments of others, but now he is offended by comments and demands praise. This means that some qualitative changes have occurred in his mental life, something new has arisen, and the old has faded into the background, i.e. the structure of his mental processes has changed. Development is characterized by the uneven emergence of different structures, when some of them “lag behind” and others “run ahead.”

Despite the differences that certainly exist between children of the same age, each stage of childhood has its own specific characteristics. For example, at 3-4 months all babies are happy with an adult, at about a year old children prefer to play with toys, and at about two years old they begin to speak, etc. These changes are not random, but natural. If in one child or another they occur differently, we can talk about deviations in their mental development: lagging behind or deformation, which always have their own reasons. Clarifying the patterns of development and explaining its causes is the most important task of child psychology.

All children go through certain stages or phases in their development, which are characterized by specific features of their mental life. The study of the patterns of mental development of a child is the main subject of child psychology. Its main task - describe and explain the features of a child’s mental life at each age stage.

Specifics of child development

What determines the specifics of child development? The main question that arises here is the question of the relative role of the natural properties of the body and the human conditions of raising a child. To answer this, it would be necessary to conduct an experiment in which children, from the first days of life, would grow up in conditions of isolation from adults: they would not hear speech, would not see other people, would not use objects common to us. If under such conditions children developed in approximately the same way, the child’s mental abilities could be considered innate, inherent in nature itself. It is clear that not a single scientist and not a single parent will allow such a risky experiment to be carried out with a child. However, similar cases have happened in the history of mankind. Children grew up outside human society and were raised by animals. They are called “Mowgli children”, by analogy with the hero of the famous novel by R. Kipling.

For example, at the beginning of the 20th century. Indian scientist Reed Singh saw a she-wolf taking her wolf cubs for a walk, among whom were two girls - one about eight, and the other one and a half years old. Singh took the girls with him and tried to raise them. It turned out that these children were deprived of all specifically human forms of behavior without exception. They walked on all fours, ate raw meat, were nocturnal, howled at night, snapped at the sight of people and tried to hide. In a word, they were much more like wolf cubs than human children. The youngest of them, Amala, died a year later, unable to withstand human living conditions. The eldest, Kamala, lived to be 17 years old. Over the course of 9 years, with great difficulty, she was taught to walk upright and some hygienic skills. However, full mental development turned out to be impossible for the girl. She was never able to think, feel and speak like a human, remaining a creature with typically wolfish habits.

Can a child develop as a human being if human living conditions are not created for him and he is not raised as a human being? The answer to this question is provided by observations of children who grew up in hospital conditions. The phenomenon of hospitalism is characterized by the isolation of children from adults and the long stay of a young child alone. During the war, it happened that children were separated from their mothers and raised in special orphanages.

Thus, the German psychologist R. Spitz described the children of one orphanage who had not seen their mothers since they were 3 months old. The care, food, and hygienic conditions in this institution were typical of satisfactorily functioning institutions of this kind. However, all children experienced a sharp delay in not only mental but also physical development. Within 2 years, about half of the children died. Those who survived at 3-4 years of age were absolutely incapable of independent movement, could not sit without support, could not eat with a spoon or dress independently, and did not react to others.

So, children who are left without any attention from adults in the first months of life, despite normal nutrition and physical care, either simply do not survive, or stop developing and remain in an embryonic state. This may indicate that the presence of a human brain is far from the main condition for human development. It is not enough to be born a human to become one. The child absorbs what is given by living conditions and upbringing. And if these conditions are animal - wolf, dog, monkey, the child grows up to be an animal of the corresponding species. If a child is left alone with the outside world, without a “nurturing” environment he simply does not survive and does not develop. The human psyche does not arise without human living conditions. It is not embedded in the child’s brain or body.

And at the same time, mental, spiritual life is inherent only to man, and no animal under any circumstances can become a man.

Science has repeatedly attempted to develop human qualities in animals. For example, the Soviet zoopsychologist N.N. Ladygina-Kots raised a small chimpanzee from one and a half to four years old in her family. The monkey was taught to use things, play with toys, talk and was treated quite humanely. But the results turned out to be very modest. The chimpanzee learned with difficulty some human skills (holding a pencil or a broom, knocking with a hammer, etc.) But the meaning of human actions turned out to be completely inaccessible to him: moving a pencil along the paper, he could not draw anything meaningful; while “sweeping” the floor, he rearranged garbage from one place to another, etc. He did not have any tendency to master words, even with persistent special training. These data suggest that without the human brain, human mental qualities cannot arise.

What happens? It seems that a child does not have any natural prerequisites for human development, and at the same time, only a human child can become a person. This means that there is still something in the human body that allows it to so quickly and successfully assimilate all forms of human behavior, learn to think, worry, and control oneself.

Yes, I have. Oddly enough, the main advantage of a child is his congenital helplessness, his inability to engage in any specific forms of behavior. The extreme plasticity of the human brain is one of its main features that ensures mental development. In animals, most of the brain matter is already “occupied” at the time of birth - innate forms of behavior - instincts - are fixed in it. A child's brain is open to new experiences and ready to accept what life and upbringing give it. Scientists have proven that in animals the process of brain formation basically ends at the time of birth, but in humans this process continues for many years after birth and depends on the living conditions and upbringing of the child. These conditions not only fill the “blank pages” of the brain, but also affect its very structure. Therefore, the first, childhood years are so important, cardinal for the development of a person.

The human brain has remained virtually unchanged since the times of our distant ancestors, who lived several tens of thousands of years ago. At the same time, humanity has made a giant leap in its development during this time. This became possible because human development occurs fundamentally differently than development in the animal world. If in the animal world certain forms of behavior are inherited, just like the structure of the body, or acquired through the individual experience of an individual, then in humans the forms of activity and mental qualities characteristic of them are transmitted in a different way - through the inheritance of cultural and historical experience. Each new generation “stands on the shoulders” of the entire previous history of mankind. It comes not to the natural world, but to the world of culture, which already has science, literature, music, houses, cars and much more. There are ideas about how children should develop and what they should become by adulthood. The child himself will never invent all this, but he must master it in the process of his human development. This is what cultural or social inheritance is all about. Therefore, the development of a child is determined not only and not so much by the maturation of the body, but, first of all, by the social and cultural conditions of life and upbringing of the child in society. These conditions vary significantly in different cultures in different historical eras.
Childhood as a sociocultural phenomenon

Historically, the concept of childhood is associated not with the biological state of immaturity, but with a certain social status of children in various historical eras, the range of rights and responsibilities of the child, and the types of activities available to him. Researching the history of childhood is quite difficult, since it is impossible to conduct observations in this area, and cultural monuments related to children are extremely poor. Of unique interest are the works of the French demographer and historian F. Aries, who tried to recreate the history of childhood using the material of works of fine art. His research showed that until the 13th century. artists did not turn to images of children at all. In painting of the 13th century. images of children are found only in religious scenes (angels, baby Jesus), images of real children are absent. Apparently, then childhood was considered a period of little value and quickly passing. This, according to Aries, was facilitated by the demographic situation of that time - high birth rates and high infant mortality. There was general indifference and a frivolous attitude towards children. A sign of overcoming such indifference is the appearance in the 14th century. portraits of deceased children, which suggests that the death of a child begins to be perceived as a bereavement, and not as a common occurrence. The overcoming of complete indifference to children, judging by the history of painting, occurs only in the 17th century, when images of real children first appeared in portraits. As a rule, these are portraits of crown princes and influential persons in childhood. Thus, according to Aries, the discovery of childhood began in the 13th century, but the evidence of this discovery is most fully manifested at the end of the 16th and 17th centuries.

One of the interesting signs of a changed attitude towards children is the appearance of new elements in children's clothing. In the Middle Ages, as soon as a child grew out of swaddling clothes, he was immediately dressed in an adult suit. Only in the XVI-XVII centuries. special children's clothing appears. It is typical that boys and girls aged 2-4 were dressed in identical children's dresses. This type of children's costume existed until the beginning of the 20th century. It is characteristic that in those social classes where there are no big differences between the work of adults and children (as, for example, in peasant families before the revolution), children are dressed in adult clothes (of course, smaller sizes).

F. Aries's research begins in the Middle Ages, since only at this time did images of children appear in painting. However, concern for children and their upbringing, of course, has always been there. Descriptions of the way of life of primitive tribes that have survived to this day allow us to imagine the peculiarities of the upbringing of ancient peoples.

One such description is contained in the notes of Douglas Lockwood about his travels to the Gibson Desert (Western Australia) and his meetings with the Pintubi aborigines. Until 1957, most people of this tribe had not seen a white man, their contacts with neighboring tribes were severely limited, as a result of which this tribe largely preserved the culture and way of life of the Stone Age people. The whole life of these people passes in the desert and is focused on the search for water and food. The strong and resilient Pintubi women participate in this quest along with the men. They can walk for hours in the desert with a heavy load on their heads. Children are born lying on the sand, helping each other. They have no idea about hygiene and do not even know the reasons for childbirth. They have no utensils except the jugs that they carry on their heads. When Lockwood offered them a mirror and a comb, they were unable to use them for their intended purpose, and the image in the mirror caused surprise and fear. Lockwood describes how a 2-3 year old girl, while eating, stuffed into her mouth either huge pieces of flatbread or pieces of small iguana meat, which she herself baked on the hot sand. Her younger sister sat next to her and dealt with a can of stew (from the expedition's supplies), pulling out the meat with her fingers. Another observation: a small girl who could not walk made a separate fire for herself and, bending her head, fanned the coals so that the fire would flare up and warm her. She had no clothes and was probably cold, but she didn’t cry. Lockwood notes that although there were three small children in the camp, he never heard a child cry.

Evidence of children's early maturation can be found in many literary sources of the 19th century. Children sometimes began to work from the age of 5, often from the age of 6, and almost all children of poor parents worked from the age of 8; the working day lasted 14-16 hours. Let us remember the famous character in N. Nekrasov’s poem “A Little Little Man”, who at the age of 6 considers himself a full-fledged man.

These and many other materials allowed D. B. Elkonin to put forward the position of the historical conditioning of childhood. Childhood arises when a child cannot be directly included in the system of social reproduction, since he cannot yet master the tools of labor due to their complexity. If these tools are simple and primitive, the main methods of obtaining food are gathering and hunting, the child can very early become familiar with the work of adults, practically mastering the methods of action of adults. Under such conditions, when the child is directly involved in the life of adults, there is no need for special preparation for future working life. The development of civilization inevitably led to the fact that the inclusion of children in the productive labor of adults turned out to be impossible and was pushed back in time. With the development of humanity, childhood has lengthened. This lengthening of childhood did not occur through the addition of new periods, but through a kind of “wedging in” of a new period of development. Elkonin brilliantly revealed the nature of such a “wedging” of a new period using the example of the emergence of role-playing games, and with it a new stage of development, which in modern psychology is called preschool.

Questions about the historical origin of periods of childhood, about the connection between the history of childhood and the history of society are extremely important for understanding the psychology of the modern child. It should be remembered that the type of education that we are seeing at the present time is just one of the possible and far from the only one.

Child psychology in the system of sciences

Child psychology is a relatively young science. It originated at the end of the 19th century, and its beginning is considered to be the appearance of the Darwinist scientist Wilhelm Preyer’s book “The Soul of a Child.” In it, Preyer records daily observations of the development of his own son. Despite the obvious biological orientation of these observations, Preyer was the first to carry out an objective study of the child’s psyche, which is why he is traditionally considered the founder of child psychology. Throughout the 20th century. Child psychology developed quite rapidly and intensively. However, having become a separate field of knowledge, it has strong connections with other sciences. Let's consider the place of child psychology in the system of other sciences.

The study of a child’s mental development is possible only with certain general ideas about what a person is and what his essential characteristics are. Such ideas are given philosophy. It may be recalled that psychology originally arose within the framework of philosophy and existed for a long time as its integral part. Subsequently, it became an independent field of knowledge and itself divided into many separate disciplines. But still, every scientist trying to study a person, whether he wants to or not, necessarily relies on a certain philosophical basis, on a certain understanding of the essence of man. Therefore, philosophy, or philosophical anthropology, is the foundation of psychology in general and child psychology in particular. On the other hand, questions related to the origin of consciousness, activity, and human personality, which are central to philosophers, are specifically and in detail developed in child psychology. Many famous philosophers (V.B. Ilyenkov, F. T. Mikhailov and others) constantly turned to materials from child psychology and largely based their philosophical concepts on them. Therefore, we can say that child psychology, on the one hand, is based on philosophy, and on the other hand, it provides it with the necessary empirical material.

The psychology of modern man, including the child, is fundamentally different from the psychology of man in the Middle Ages or the Renaissance. However, the historical and cultural development of mankind, phylogeny, other sciences are involved - history, cultural studies, anthropology. The subject of child psychology is individual human development, or ontogeNez, which always occurs in a certain historical and cultural situation, at a certain stage of phylogenesis. A child psychologist needs to take into account the historical and cultural background against which child development occurs. At the same time, ontogenetic development has its own deeply specific patterns.

Qualitative changes in mental life, i.e. development, occur not only in childhood, but throughout all ontogenesis. And in the life of an adult, qualitative changes are possible in his views on the world, the emergence of new needs and new forms of activity. All these changes have their own psychological mechanisms and patterns. They constitute the subject of a special scientific discipline - developmental psychology, or genetic psycho logy. Of course, child and genetic psychology have much in common, since the most intensive and effective mental development of a person occurs in childhood. Genetic psychology is mainly based on facts and patterns obtained in child psychology. In turn, child psychology uses the laws of human mental development discovered in developmental psychology. But child psychology is limited to an early age (from 0 to 7 years) and strives to describe as fully as possible the qualitative changes that occur with a child throughout childhood.

Child psychology is based on concepts and methodology general psychology. The identification of such aspects of a child’s mental life as activity, mental processes, personality, etc., became possible due to the fact that these aspects were identified and described in general psychology. At the same time, general psychology dealing with an adult cannot do without facts from child psychology. The features of the mental life of an adult cannot be understood without analyzing their origin. The psyche of an adult is very complex; many processes and tendencies simultaneously exist in it in a collapsed, compressed form, which cannot be studied and analyzed without referring to their genesis. Child psychology in this regard has an undeniable advantage: here everything is just beginning, and all the processes of the emergence of new forms of activity, consciousness, and thinking can be traced in an open, expanded form. Therefore, child psychology can be considered as a kind of genetic method general psychology, which allows us to trace the formation of the most complex forms of mental life of an adult.

At the same time, child psychology is an independent fundamental science that provides a scientific basis for such applied sciences as educational psychology and pedagogy. The subject of educational psychology is the development and substantiation of methods of teaching and raising children at different ages. It is obvious that the development of methods for teaching and educating preschool children is impossible without knowledge of the characteristics of the child’s psyche in the early stages of ontogenesis, which is provided by child psychology. Only understanding the capabilities (and the limits of these capabilities) of a child at different stages of childhood allows an educational psychologist to develop adequate and effective methods for teaching and raising children for each age. At the same time, educational psychology provides invaluable material for child psychology, since it makes it possible to clarify the influence of various strategies for raising and teaching children on the characteristics of their mental development. The fundamental problem of the connection between the mental development of a child and his education and upbringing lies in the plane of both child and educational psychology. Therefore, child and educational psychology are inextricably linked disciplines. Pedagogical psychology of a preschooler can be considered as a special area of child psychology associated with the development of applied issues related to the teaching and upbringing of children.

Knowledge of the basics of child psychology is necessary for practical work with children. The most important condition for the successful work of educators and teachers in nurseries, kindergartens, and various educational centers is knowledge of the patterns of mental development of the child, understanding of the interests of each child, the characteristics of his thinking and emotional life. Knowledge of child psychology helps the teacher establish contact with children, promptly identify and overcome deviations in their mental development, and choose appropriate forms of communication and education for them.

Recently, the profession of a practical child psychologist has become increasingly widespread in our country. The task of this specialist includes diagnosing and correcting the mental development of children, as well as working with “difficult” children and their parents. A necessary basis for this profession is knowledge of child psychology. Only an understanding of age norms and patterns of mental development allows a practical psychologist to identify the individual characteristics of each child, their compliance with age norms, diagnose deviations in the mental development of individual children and choose adequate and effective correction methods.

RESULTS

Childhood is the period of the most intensive and effective human development.

Child psychology is a science that studies the characteristics of a child’s mental life and the patterns of mental development in childhood. This development is carried out as qualitative transformations in the child’s psyche, a change of different, qualitatively unique age stages of mental life, each of which has its own specific characteristics. In contrast, the growth of a child is a process of quantitative accumulation, i.e., an increase in the same quality.

The mental development of a child occurs in a different way than the development of animals. It occurs not as the development of innate biological inclinations or the accumulation of individual experience, but through the appropriation of cultural and historical experience, the transformation of social values and norms of activity into the child’s own, individual abilities.

Child psychology as an independent, fundamental science has close and mutual connections with other disciplines. On the one hand, it is based on philosophy, cultural studies, developmental psychology and general psychology and provides empirical material for them, on the other hand, it is the scientific foundation for educational psychology, pedagogy and practical psychology.

CHAPTER 2

Methods of child psychology

M method (from the Greek “path to something”) is a general approach, a way of research. The method is determined by the subject of study and general ideas about it. For example, if a scientist studies the mental development of a child and proceeds from the idea that this development is determined by natural, biological factors, his main method will be the maximum possible elimination of all external social influences on the subject of study. If, on the contrary, he believes that this development is determined by the influences of the social environment, he will specifically organize these external influences and analyze the nature of their influence on the characteristics of the child’s psyche. Thus, different views on the subject give rise to different research strategies, or different methods.

It is necessary to distinguish between research methods and techniques. In contrast to a method, a methodology is a private, tactical way of obtaining facts, which depends on the specific working conditions of the scientist, the characteristics of his object (for example, the age of the children), the ingenuity of the researcher himself, etc. There are a great many research methods in child psychology. There are only two methods - observation and experiment. True, each of them has several options.

Observation method

Initially, child psychology was a purely descriptive science. Its task was to phenomenologically describe the processes of the child’s mental development and their symptoms, and the main strategy was, accordingly, to observe the developmental processes. These observations usually took the form of diary entries. One of the first researchers to monitor child development was Charles Darwin. In 1881, it was he who first described the appearance of a child’s smile on the 45-46th day of life, attachment to an adult at the end of the 5th month of life, and many other important facts.

As already noted, the first book on child psychology was the work of the German physiologist W. Preyer, “The Soul of a Child” (1882). In Preyer's study, the child was first subjected to systematic observation from birth to the end of the 3rd year of life, daily, at the same time intervals. Many prominent psychologists kept diaries of their children's development. Thus, the famous German child psychologist W. Stern (1871-1938) used diary entries that he kept with his wife to substantiate his hypotheses. The prominent Swiss psychologist J. Piaget (1896-1980), highlighting the stages of mental development of a child, often referred to observations of his own grandchildren. The famous Soviet child psychologist D. B. Elkonin (1904-1984) used observations of his grandson to describe the process of formation of the child’s objective actions.

There were entire scientific institutions where the method of observing children was the main one. For example, N.M. Shchelovanov organized in 1920 a clinic for the normal development of children, in which mainly foundlings and orphans lived. The development of children in the clinic was monitored around the clock, thanks to which we received many classic works on child psychology. They were the first to identify and describe the complex of revitalization in infants, interesting features of the development of walking, object manipulations of children, etc.

The observation method can provide very important results. But it all depends on what and how to observe. In this regard, several observation options are distinguished.

Firstly, it may be solid And selective . Continuous observations simultaneously cover many aspects of the child’s behavior. Its task is to describe the overall picture of behavior. Of course, it is impossible to record all the child’s movements and words. Only what seems most important and significant to the observer is recorded, especially what is new that can be seen in the child at the moment of observation. But what exactly will be new and important, the researcher does not know in advance (or does not formulate).

In contrast, sample observations record one aspect of behavior that is determined in advance. For example, the child’s expression of emotions, his actions with toys, the peculiarities of the child’s words, etc. At the same time, the child’s behavior in any special natural situations or at certain periods of time (during play, communication with adults, etc.) is recorded.

Secondly, observation can be hidden And included . With covert observation, the figure of the observer should be invisible to the child or should not attract his attention. For this, a special device is used - a mirror with one-way permeability (or a Gisel mirror, in honor of its inventor Gisel). It is placed between the room where the child is and the room where the researcher sits. In the first room there is an ordinary mirror hanging on the wall, and in the second there is a window through which you can watch the child. Currently, television installations and film cameras are used for covert surveillance. It can also be carried out by an adult who is familiar and invisible to the child. The main thing is that it does not violate the ease and naturalness of the child’s behavior.

Participant observation is different in that the observing adult is not only visible and noticeable to the child, but also participates in joint actions with him (plays, feeds, reads books, etc.) He is included in the child’s activities. At the same time, he not only plays or feeds, but also observes the baby (noting his reactions, proactive and reactive actions, emotions, statements, etc.), then describes his observations. This task is quite difficult. Here you need not only to notice and remember all the manifestations of the child, but also to be able to observe yourself, to take into account your own actions that cause certain manifestations of the observed baby. Such participant observation is often used by educators, teachers, parents and other adults who are in constant contact with children.

Thirdly, observation can be disposable (slice) And long-term (prolonged , or longitudinal). One-time observation is carried out once, at a time. Using this method, the researcher usually compares the behavior of different children (boys and girls, children of different ages, children from different cultures, etc.) in the same situations and draws conclusions about the characteristics of their psyche.

Prolonged (longitudinal, or longitudinal) observation lasts a long time (several years) and is carried out on the same children. With this method, the researcher compares not different groups of children, but different stages in the development of one child (or several children). Long-term observation makes it possible to trace the emergence of new abilities and interests of the child, and to describe the various stages of his development. The diary entries from parents and psychologists mentioned above are typical cases of longitudinal observations.

However, in all cases, the researcher can trace only the external, observable aspects of the child’s behavior: his statements, expressive movements, his actions with toys, etc. But the psychologist is not interested in the external manifestations themselves, but in the internal, mental processes that are hidden behind them, inaccessible direct observation. To understand these processes and be able to interpret the observed behavior of a child, a psychologist must have a preliminary idea of what he can and wants to see, he must operate with concepts, be able to use the language with which he will describe the child’s behavior. The success of observation depends on how clearly the purpose of observation is formulated for the researcher and how clearly he understands what he will observe. If this is not the case, his impressions will be vague and indefinite, the main thing will be mixed with the secondary, and it will be impossible to obtain any factual material.

The observation method has a number of undeniable advantages. It allows us to unfold before us the concrete life of a child, gives many living, interesting facts, but allows us to study the child in the natural conditions of his life. It is indispensable for initial orientation in the problem and obtaining preliminary facts. But this method also has a number of disadvantages, the main one of which is its extreme labor intensity. It requires high psychological education of the researcher and a huge investment of time, which does not at all guarantee the receipt of new facts. The researcher is forced to wait until the phenomena of interest arise by themselves. In addition, observational results often do not allow us to understand the reasons for certain forms of behavior. Many researchers have noticed that when observing, a psychologist sees only what he already knows, and what he does not yet know passes by his attention. Therefore, another, more active and targeted method - experimentation - turns out to be more effective.
Experimental method

A psychological experiment allows a psychologist to purposefully evoke mental phenomena that interest him. In an experiment, a psychologist specifically creates and modifies the conditions in which the child finds himself. The child’s behavior under different experimental conditions (its qualitative and quantitative analysis) allows us to draw some conclusions about his psychological characteristics. For example, in order to find out what form of communication with an adult preschoolers prefer, the experimenter organizes various situations of communication with the child. In one of them, an adult plays toys with him, in another, he reads books or talks about something educational, in the third, he talks about personal topics: about his relationships with friends, various human qualities, etc. Then the experimenter compares the nature of the child’s behavior in these situations and finds out which of them is preferable for the preschooler. This experiment allows us to establish the main form of communication of the child. Such experiments are called ascertaining, since they make it possible to record (or state) any features of the child’s development.

The experimental method turned out to be effective, economical and has found wide application in psychology in general and in children's psychology in particular. The specificity of an experiment in child psychology is that the experimental conditions should be close to the natural living conditions of the child and should not disrupt the usual forms of his activity. Unusual laboratory conditions (for example, the use of new equipment, the presence of strange adults, etc.) can confuse the child and cause refusal of activity. Therefore, an experiment in child psychology should be close to the natural conditions of the child’s life. That’s what it’s called - a natural experiment, in contrast to a laboratory one, which can take place in any situation using the most complex equipment. It is better to conduct experiments with children in the form of an interesting game or activities familiar to the child - drawing, designing, solving riddles, etc. Children should not suspect that the games they are offered are specially organized for their study.

One type of psychological experiment is tests. The test is a system of specially selected tests that are offered to children under strictly defined conditions. For completing each task, the child receives a score. The assessment must be objective and not depend on the personal attitude of the experimenter. Preliminarily, for each age group, age standards for completing each task are determined (i.e., what score corresponds to three, four, or six years of age). Comparing the results shown by the child with the age norm allows us to determine whether the child is developed normally for his age or whether his development deviates from the norm (lags behind or advances). Using tests, you can identify the result of solving a particular problem, but it is impossible to determine the qualitative features (or method) of its solution. Since child psychology is primarily interested in the features of the child’s internal, mental life, and not its objective results, the test method in child psychology cannot be used as the main one.

The experimental strategy is called slicing strategy , since here, as it were, the level of age-related or individual development of any mental process is simultaneously removed. This strategy is very widely used in child psychology. Sometimes the cross-sectional strategy is combined with the strategy of a longitudinal study. Initially, the first cut is carried out in relation to a certain number of children; after some time, a second cut is carried out on the same children using the same methods, then a third, etc., after which the results of individual cuts are compared and the dynamics of a particular process are revealed. It is not uncommon for one study to combine experiment and observation.

However, the methods listed above (both observation and ascertaining, or cross-sectional, experiment) only allow us to record certain features of the child’s behavior or the degree of success in solving problems. But they do not make it possible to find out what is happening behind this visual, perceived picture. They do not lead to an understanding of the conditions and driving forces of child development. By observing how a child solves problems, we will not be able to understand why he solves them this way (or does not solve them), and no close observation will answer these questions.

A clear advantage in this regard is genetic modeling , or formative, experiment . Its essence is that the experimental formation of new abilities in children who previously did not possess them becomes a method for studying mental processes. This research strategy can be called the strategy of experimental genesis of mental abilities. Its implementation involves the use of various ways and means of active formation of the ability, the development of which is being studied. The researcher, depending on his theoretical ideas, formulates in advance a hypothesis about what underlies mental ability and what are the conditions for its effective development. Then, based on his hypothesis, he creates (or simulates) these conditions in his experiment and takes the child through a series of formative or developmental influences. After this, the researcher finds out whether the mental abilities whose development is being studied have changed. In this way, the hypothesis about the psychological causes and conditions of the child’s mental development is tested. For example, a psychologist puts forward a hypothesis that the thinking of a young child is built on the basis of his practical objective actions. To test this hypothesis, he specially organizes the children’s practical activities (gives them toys with a secret to explore, teaches them how to handle new objects, specially engages them in practical, research activities, etc.). After a series of such sessions, he finds out whether there have been any changes in the mental abilities of these children. If yes, then his hypothesis can be considered confirmed.

Different types of experiments, as a rule, are combined with each other in the same study. First, a regular cross-sectional experiment is carried out (in this case it is called ascertaining) to record the initial level of development of the ability being studied. This is followed by a formative (or genetic-modeling) experiment, the purpose of which is to obtain a new level of development of the ability, depending on the initial hypothesis. Finally, the same slice experiment is repeated as at the beginning to find out what shifts have occurred as a result of the formative experiment. This final experiment is usually called control.

Considering that preschool children develop quite quickly without any experimental influences, to assess the effectiveness of a formative experiment it is necessary to compare the changes that occur over the same period of time in children participating in formative experiments and children of the same age living in natural conditions. The first group of children is usually called experimental, the second - control. Comparison of the results of the experimental group shows the difference that the conditions organized in the experiment make.

A formative experiment, like a cross-sectional experiment, can be longitudinal, that is, continue for a number of years with the same children. For example, many years of experimental training of children using new programs and elucidation of the influence of these programs on the mental development of children can be considered as a longitudinal psychological and pedagogical formative experiment.

In addition to the main research methods - observation and experiment - auxiliary methods are used in child psychology. These include analysis of the results of children's activities (drawings, crafts, fairy tales composed by children, etc.) and the method of conversation (or interview).

Especially widely used analysis of children's drawings . Children's drawings reflect the child's emotional state, the peculiarities of perception of surrounding people and objects, and the nature of relationships with others. However, interpreting children's drawings requires high qualifications and extensive experience working with this material. In addition, it can never be definite and unambiguous and always presupposes some subjectivity of the researcher. Therefore, in serious research this method can only be used as an additional, auxiliary method.

Conversation method (method of questions, or interviews) can be used in working with children starting from 4 years old, when they already have a fairly good command of speech, but within very limited limits. The fact is that children of preschool age cannot yet express their thoughts and experiences in words, so their answers are usually short, formal and reproducing the words of an adult. Selecting questions to talk to children is a great art. They should be understandable and interesting for the child and in no case should contain hints. A conversation with a child can also be used only as an auxiliary, secondary method.

RESULTS

Method - this is a general strategy, a general way of obtaining facts, which is determined by the task and subject of the study, as well as the theoretical ideas of the researcher. In contrast to this, methodology - This is a private, specific way of collecting materials, depending on the research conditions and the capabilities of the researcher.

Basic research methods of child psychology - onsurveillanceAndexperiment. Observation can be continuous or selective, hidden or included, one-time or prolonged (longitudinal).

In a psychological experiment, the researcher intentionally creates the conditions in which the child’s activities take place, or sets certain tasks for him. In child psychology, an experiment should be as close as possible to the natural living conditions of children. Unusual laboratory conditions (for example, the use of new equipment, strange adults, etc.) are not applicable when working with children. They should not suspect that the games they are offered are specially organized for their study.

One type of psychological experiment is Zet - a system of specially selected tasks that are offered to children under strictly defined conditions. For completing each task, the child receives a score. The assessment must be objective and not depend on the personal attitude of the experimenter. Comparing the child’s results with the age norm allows us to determine whether the child is developed normally for his age or whether his development deviates from the norm (lags behind or advances). This experimental strategy is called the cutting strategy, since here the level of age-related or individual development of any mental process is removed.

A special type of experiment that allows us to identify the driving forces and causes of the development of mental abilities is genetic modeling , or formative, experiment, V in which the experimental formation of one or another mental ability is carried out. Considering that preschool children develop quite quickly without any experimental influences, in order to assess the effectiveness of a formative experiment, it is necessary to compare the changes that occur over the same period of time in children participating in the experiment and in children of the same age living in natural conditions. conditions.

The first group of children is called experimental, second - control. A comparison of the results of the control and experimental groups shows the “increase” that the conditions organized in the experiment provide.

A formative experiment, like a cross-sectional experiment, can be longitudinal, that is, continue for a number of years with the same children. Long-term experimental training of children using new programs and elucidation of the influence of these programs on the mental development of children can be considered as a longitudinal psychological and pedagogical formative experiment.

The experimental research strategy can be cross-sectional (one-time) and longitudinal (or long-term, longitudinal). Both strategies can be combined in the same study.

In addition to the main methods (observation and experiment), in child psychology, analysis of the results of children's activities and the conversation method are used as additional methods. These methods can only be used as auxiliary methods.

The textbook contains a systematic presentation of a course in child psychology, which presents the basic concepts and theories of child development and reveals the patterns of mental development of a child from birth to the end of preschool childhood. The development of a child is considered in the context of his communication with an adult, with special emphasis placed on the role of an adult in each age period. The information contained in the book will help the reader in creating the basic psychological knowledge necessary for understanding the child, teaching work and communicating with children.

The publication is intended primarily for students of pedagogical and psychological specialties, but can be used to improve the skills of educators by specialists in preschool institutions and anyone who is interested in issues of mental development and upbringing of children.

Contents

Part I Introduction to Child Psychology

Chapter 1. Subject and tasks of child psychology 8

Child psychology - the science of the child's soul 8

Concepts of growth and development 9

What does nature give to a child? eleven

Specifics of human child development 13

Childhood as a sociocultural phenomenon 14

The place of child psychology in the system of related sciences 16

Chapter 2. Methods of child psychology 21

Observation method 21

Experimental method 24

Auxiliary methods of child psychology 27

Chapter 3. Basic theories of child development 31

Ethological approach to the mental development of a child 32

Psychoanalytic theory 34

Development of ideas of psychoanalysis. Periodization by E. Erikson 37

Attachment theory 40

Jean Piaget's theory of cognitive development 43

Behaviorism and Social Learning Theory 46

The theory of convergence of two factors 49

Chapter 4. Driving forces and conditions for the mental development of a child 53

Consciousness as an essential characteristic of a person 53

Sign mediation of higher mental functions of a person 54

Basic law of development of higher mental functions 57

The problem of training and development 59

The concept of leading activity 61

The concept of the genesis of communication between a child and an adult 64

Periodization of mental development in ontogenesis 67

Part II Infancy (first year of life)

Chapter 1. General characteristics of infancy 77

Features of the social situation of infant development 77

The influence of communication with an adult on the development of an infant 80

Microperiods of infancy 82

Chapter 2. Characteristics of the newborn period 85

Birth Crisis 85

Congenital reflexes of a newborn 87

Sensory abilities and “competence” of the newborn 90

The emergence of a need to communicate with an adult 92

Chapter 3. The first half of life 98

"Revitalization complex" of the baby 98

Situational and personal communication with an adult and its role in the development of an infant 101

Features of cognitive activity in the first half of life 104

Formation of purposeful movements of the baby 105

Chapter 4. Second half of life 110

Situational business communication between an infant and an adult 110

Development of attitudes towards adults in the first year of life 111

Prerequisites for speech development 114

Development of baby's manipulative actions 117

Development of cognitive activity in the second half of the year 119

Formation of self-image 121

Part III Early age (from 1 year to 3 years)

Chapter 1. Subject activity of a young child 131

Situational business communication and child’s objective activity 131

Mastery of weapon actions 133

Chapter 2. Cognitive development at an early age 139

Development of perception 139

Features of thinking at an early age 142

Development of generalizations in the child’s objective actions 144

Chapter 3. Speech development at an early age 148

The role of speech in child development 148

Different views on the nature of a child’s speech ability 149

The phenomenon of autonomous child speech 152

The emergence of the child’s first active words 155

Mastering the grammatical structure of speech in the third year of life 158

The role of speech in the development of a child’s voluntary behavior 161

The relationship between the communicative and regulatory functions of speech at an early age 163

Chapter 4. Development of play at an early age 167

Process play of a child of the second year of life 167

Psychological significance of a child’s symbolic play substitutions 169

The formation of play substitutions at an early age 172

The emergence of elements of creativity in the play of young children 175

Chapter 5. Development of the need to communicate with a peer 179

Attitudes of young children towards peers 179

Specifics of communication in young children 182

The role of an adult in developing communication with peers 185

Chapter 6. Prerequisites for the formation of personality and the crisis of three years 189

Situationalism as the main characteristic of early age 189

The main phenomena of the crisis of three years 191

Personal new formations during the three-year crisis 193

Part IV Preschool age

Chapter 1. Plot-role-playing game for preschoolers 200

Neoplasms of preschool age and the role of play in their development 200

The social nature of preschooler role-play 202

Units of analysis and psychological characteristics of a preschooler’s role-playing game 204

The importance of the game for the development of arbitrariness 206

Development of role play in preschool age 207

Types of games and other forms of activity for preschoolers 209

Chapter 2. Cognitive sphere of a preschooler 214

Features of a preschooler’s ideas about the world 214

The phenomenon of egocentric speech 217

Mediation of the child’s cognitive processes 220

The relationship between various forms of child thinking 224

Chapter 3. Preschooler's imagination 230

General characteristics of children's imagination 230

Forms of manifestation of a preschooler’s imagination 233

Methods of forming imagination and stages of its development 236

Functions of the preschooler’s imagination 238

Chapter 4. Communication of preschoolers with adults and peers 243

Extra-situational forms of communication between a preschooler and adults 243

Peculiarities of communication between preschoolers and peers 247

Development of communication with peers in preschool age 249

Differentiation of children in a children's group 252

Chapter 5. Personality development in preschool age 259

Formation of personal mechanisms of behavior 259

Development of will and arbitrariness in preschool age 263

The formation of ethical authorities and social feelings 270

Development of self-awareness and self-esteem of a preschooler 277

Chapter 6. The seven-year crisis and the problem of a child’s readiness for school 284

The main symptoms of the crisis of seven years 284

Psychological neoplasms of the crisis of seven years 286

The problem of school readiness 290

The methodological instructions are addressed to students of the special psychology department, but can also be used in the training of teachers, educators, social workers - in a word, those specialists who work with children. The purpose of the manual is to provide course participants with an orientation in the literature devoted to the development and age characteristics of the child.

annotation

THEORIES OF CHILD DEVELOPMENT PERIODIZATION AND REGULARITIES OF MENTAL DEVELOPMENT OF A CHILD

Literature

NEWBORN CRISIS AND INFANTRY AGE

Literature

ONE YEAR CRISIS AND EARLY CHILDHOOD

Literature

CRISIS OF 3 YEARS OLD AND PRESCHOOL CHILDHOOD

Literature

CRISIS OF 7 YEARS OLD AND JUNIOR SCHOOL AGE

Literature

THE CRISIS OF 13 YEARS OLD AND ADOLESCENCE

Adolescence crisis

Literature

Literature for the entire course

The basic concepts and important theoretical principles of modern child psychology are revealed, the patterns of development of the child’s cognitive mental processes from birth to the end of preschool childhood, and the formation of leading types of activity at each age stage are revealed. A description is given of the problem of a child’s readiness for school, which is a kind of result of the mental development of a preschooler.
The development of a child is considered in the context of his communication with an adult, with special emphasis placed on the role of an adult in each age period. The information contained in the book will help the reader acquire the basic psychological knowledge necessary for understanding the child, teaching work and communicating with children.
For undergraduate students of pedagogical universities, schools and colleges, workers of preschool institutions improving their skills, as well as for everyone who is concerned about the problems of development and upbringing of children.

Concepts of growth and development.
A specific feature of young children is that they change quickly and are in constant development. And the younger
The older the child, the more intense the development process. The child not only grows, but also develops. Here we must distinguish between two most important concepts of child psychology - the concepts of growth and development.

Growth is a quantitative change or improvement of something that already exists in a small person - any specific function or quality. The child’s weight and height increase, he functions better with objects, speaks, walks, etc. These are all phenomena of growth, i.e. quantitative accumulation. If we consider a child as a small adult, then his entire life path will be reduced only to quantitative changes, i.e. to increase and strengthen what is initially present in it, and nothing fundamentally new is formed.

In contrast, development is characterized primarily by qualitative changes, the emergence of mental new formations. For example, a week ago the baby was not at all interested in toys and glanced at them indifferently, but today he reaches out to them and constantly demands new objects. Or before he did not pay attention to the assessments of others, but now he is offended by comments and demands praise. This means that some qualitative changes have occurred in his mental life and in his attitude towards the environment, something new has arisen, and the old has faded into the background, i.e. the structure of his mental processes has changed.

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