Children's_Development_Being_Influenced_by_Play

What evidence is there that children’s development is influenced by play with siblings and peers' There are four main areas to the term “development”: personality, cognitive development, social development and biological development. Many aspects influence our development in all these areas and the relationships that we have with others are a significant factor. The relationships that we have with adults (parents and others), our peers and siblings are all involved with this. The way in which we play with others helps the development of our self too. Play is the natural, most effective and most powerful way in which a child learns. Through play children learn to concentrate, to try out ideas, to imitate grown-ups, to explore the world around them, to develop their imagination, to participate, share and socialise. Young children at play are the most fervent explorers constantly making new discoveries. Play also helps children to manage their feelings and to cope with upsetting things that may happen in their lives. Children develop intellectually through play, for example hitting a mobile and making it move, they can learn about cause and effect, about space and size and shape. Play helps build relationships as well as being relaxing and fun, and children are able to develop socially and emotionally. For many of us, the relationships that we have with siblings have a profound effect upon our lives, whether we love our brothers and sisters, or find them extremely irritating and difficult to get along with. Over 80 per cent of people have at least one sibling and our sibling relationships are extremely long lasting – often the most long lasting that we ever experience, so in terms of influence the effect is huge. Sibling relationships may involve high familiarity and can be emotionally inhibitive and intense and this can problematic and beneficial to the brothers and sisters. Theorists, such as Froebel and Piaget, and more recently Bruce, and researchers have told us that while it may appear that all children are doing is playing for fun, it is actually a much more important part of a child’s developmental process. Playing is a very natural way for children to learn because it uses all their senses. Playtime is also a cognitive learning exercise where children practice taking in information and organizing it to solve problems and understand their environment. Although it is important to allow children to play alone, there are many things that adults, peers and siblings do that help children to develop self-esteem, build confidence, focus attention and improve social and motor skills by playing together interactively. Skills such as these do not always come naturally. Siblings are often our first encounter with those other than adults, we spend a huge amount of time with them, playing together, arguing and experiencing life together. We learn how to relate to others through them. Dunn believed that the relationship we have with our siblings has a major impact upon our development. Her research in the late 1980’s comprised of observational studies of siblings playing and from these studies she asserted that the unique and distinctive feature of sibling relationships concerns the variety of roles that each sibling takes on. Siblings can be teacher, student, bully, friend and so on. This variety possibly explains why siblings have such an affect upon our development. They allow us to experiment with all these different roles in a relatively safe and secure environment. There may be a dual nature to many sibling relationships. There can be competition and rivalry, but also support, love and care, friendship and understanding. The relationships that many of us have with our brothers and sisters are usually quite unlike any others we have with our parents or friends, especially when we are growing up. Parent-child relationships are unequal, and are complementary. Friendships with our peers are more equal, and involve reciprocity. Sibling relationships come somewhere in between the two – there is usually a difference in power (because one is older than the other), but there is similarity as well because you are both within the same family. Children cannot choose their brothers or sisters, but have to just live with them whether they get along or not. The relationship begins to form as soon as another sibling is born and is fairly stable throughout childhood. They may be close or continually be arguing or fighting but however they get along there is a huge provision for interaction and opportunities for learning from and with each other, and developing emotionally and socially. Older siblings provide several useful sources of support for younger brothers or sisters – a ready source of companionship, help and learning. The older child has the chance to develop responsibility, to learn to share and to protect others. All those involved are likely to get a deep, intense initiation into the social world of neediness, intentions and feelings that purvey human life. Because interactions between siblings is frequent, uninhibited and intense, they can offer an unrivalled context in which to develop and refine social skills – from comforting, sharing and co-operating, to deceiving, manipulating and arguing. Those who have positive sibling relationships tend to display a greater moral maturity and more positive peer interactions. Siblings can also provide strong emotional support for each other, and they often grow closer in the face of difficult situations such as parental divorce or remarriage. Conflict between siblings is almost inevitable, unless the age gap between the children is large. Parents may find this stressful, but there are advantages for the children in terms of their social development. Unlike friends, your siblings are stuck with you, so children who are in conflict with their siblings have the opportunity to learn about the causes and mechanics of conflict as well as how to manage it and to negotiate solutions. Peer relationships are constant throughout our lifespan. Göncü looked at children’s play and concluded that socially interactive role play helps the children in the development of their theory of mind. It assists in their understanding and allows them, as in sibling play, to experiment and grasp a variety of roles. Vygotsky supported Göncü’s observations and noted “In play a child always behaves beyond his average age, above his daily behaviour; in play it is as though he were a head taller than himself. As in the focus of a magnifying glass, play contains all developmental tendencies in a condensed form and is itself a major source of development.” (Vygotsky, page 13, Challenging Psychological Issues, Cooper. T, Roth, I). For Vygotsly social interaction plays a fundamental role in the development of cognition, and in turn full cognitive development requires social interaction. Both Göncü’s and Vygotsky’s assertions therefore support the idea of relationship being of utmost importance. Without the opportunity the test out roles, learn together and develop social behaviours with our peers as children, we would find ourselves with a marked lack of social communication skills, which in turn may have a negative impact upon our social development and our personalities. Children spend much of their time playing and learning with similar-aged peers. Meaningful interactions between them begin in infancy - responding to and directing smiles and vocalizations to each other. As they age, these interactions become increasing complex, progressing from solitary play to being an onlooker, parallel play (alongside each other), associative play (playing with others) and co-operative play. As the children age they engage more in co-operative play – interacting and practising roles they see around them. This increased complexity of play is paralleled with an increasing complexity in social behaviour – developing as their knowledge and cognition develops. Dunn carried and a number of studies where she observed children in their everyday lives, at home with their families, and also with their friends. These, and earlier studies showed that much of the children’s interactions and play showed a growing understanding and awareness of their world. She described the play as “the ability to share a pretend framework with another person, to carry out pretend actions in co-ordination with that other; [and] enacting the part of another person or thing, with the incorporation of another person into a reciprocal role” (Dunn, 1988, p.117). The Cambridge Sibling Study (Dunn) also showed that older siblings take on specific role play to give younger siblings instructions and directions in their play – re-enacting what they see in their lives. These types of role-play were observed mostly in families that had harmonious relationships, and good attachments, where the role-play and instructional behaviour was accepted by the younger siblings. Dunn’s research showed how co-operative pretend play between siblings had a significant influence upon the development of their social competence and understanding, and Schaffer (2003) suggested that sibling and peer reciprocal interaction was a skill that could only be acquired amongst equals, involving co-operation and competition. Corsaro’s research (1986) showed that language and cognitive also develops through play – that through sharing many anxieties and fears that they may have through socio-dramatic or fantasy play, and the language they use, makes an important contribution to the development of strategies for coping later in life and interpersonal skills. Some children however, may find it hard to play, to mix and collaborate with their peers or siblings. In fact some may not have siblings. Whilst research suggests and supports that concept that siblings assist each other in becoming more socially competent and help each other learn, there is the other 20 per cent of the population that are only children. Without a sibling are they significantly at a disadvantage socially in their development' There is research that suggests that, in fact, these children are not at any disadvantage but with their intellectual development they may do better than others. In their social development the ability to join in with play may well depend upon the attachments that were formed with their primary carers and mother from birth. This can be said of any child in their interactions, co-operations, friendships and behaviour throughout their development. John Bowlby’s research, supported by that of Mary Ainsworth, considered that a strong attachment to a mother figure was necessary for an individual’s psychological well being both in infancy and later in life. Failure to form this attachment or the loss of an existing attachment was termed “maternal deprivation” and could result in emotional and mental health problems. Bowlby felt that the deprivation of this attachment could affect the formation of relationships later in life – with siblings, peers and as adults, affecting the way children interact, play and learn. Both having friends and the qualities of the friendship during childhood, and the quality of the play, will affect relationships, academic achievement, behaviour, social awareness. Children who are unable to form close friendships will lose out in all these areas leading to them becoming withdrawn, aggressive (in some case) and then rejected by their peers. There is growing evidence that the way life is lived today – and the growing use of technology and busy lives we lead – that play takes a “back step”, that the nature of relationships that are able to grow through play, with peers and siblings, may be affected, and are different in the many differing cultures around the world. (Schaffer, 2003). However, the question posed at the start of this essay was “What evidence is there that children’s development is influenced by play with siblings and peers'” – the answer is that there is a great deal of research, study and evidence supporting the point of view that interaction between peers and siblings constitutes a great deal towards the development of children in their social skills and social understanding, and towards the way in which they can learn from each other (develop cognitively). It also makes a significant contribution to the way that their identity develops and is made up. References: Children’s Personal and Social Development, Open University, Milton Keynes Cooper, T and Roth I, Challenging Psychological Issues, Open University, Milton Keynes