Browsing by Subject "Yhteisleikki"

The objective of this study was to identify what factors in the group play of preschool age children promote or inhibit collaborative learning. Additionally, the study explores what factors would promote or inhibit collaborative learning in group play when an early childhood educator is participating. The study contributes to the understanding of how early childhood educators through their actions can influence the development of collaborative learning. The study is a qualitative study and the research material has been acquired through observing and video recording children's group play in a preschool group’s story-based play mornings, from which ten play episodes have been selected for this study. The research approach is narrative and the group play of children and educators forms stories to be researched. The research material has been processed using theory directing content analysis, and the results of the analysis have been further processed into quantitative format. The study applies primarily Koivula’s (2010) research concerning factors promoting and inhibiting collaborative learning. Additionally, the behaviour of the early childhood educators as a promoter or inhibitor of collaborative learning has been analysed from the viewpoints expressed in the research of Juutinen (2018) and Storli (2013). In this study during the whole preschool year there were factors promoting collaborative learning in the large majority of play episodes and factors inhibiting collaborative learning in over one third of the play episodes. During the autumn there were factors promoting collaborative learning in almost all of the play episodes, while during the spring factors inhibiting collaborative learning were found in half of the play episodes. Factors promoting or inhibiting collaborative learning in the behaviour of the early childhood educators were both found in one third of the play episodes. The early childhood educators acted less as an inhibitor collaborative learning during the autumn than during the spring. The main result of the study is that educators didn’t guide an immigrant child to group play with the other children, but instead guided the child to play only alone with the educator. The study by Juutinen (2018) also noted situations in which educators would have through her actions promoted a sense of togetherness but didn’t make use of these opportunities. According that study as well as by Juutinen (2018) togetherness should be supported so that there would be space in group play for all kinds of members of the group.