Parental Perceptions About the Importance of Play in the First Three Years

<p>Play is a universal and innate disposition that is believed to be one of the most significant components to holistic wellbeing and development during the foundational years of childhood. Research and literature examining the topic of play in early childhood suggests that while unstructured and child directed play is valued, its existence is under threat. Instead, it is being replaced by structured, educational, and adult directed activities which aim to accelerate young children’s learning. Due to these conflicting paradigms, and a lack of research exploring parental values in this area, this quantitative study examined parental perceptions towards structured and unstructured play for children under the age of three years. In order to investigate this topic, 255 New Zealand parents, with children not in full-time childcare and under the age of three years, participated in an anonymous online survey. The survey was designed specifically for this study due to a lack of pre-existing measures. The main finding was that parental perception influenced the way in which infants and toddlers spent their time. The majority of parents perceived unstructured play to best support early development and, consequently, offered children a large amount of daily time to become involved in freely chosen unstructured play. The study also identified that: the more weekly activities a child engaged in, the higher structured play was valued by parents; older parents did not value structured play as highly as younger parents; parents with a tertiary level qualification valued unstructured play more than those parents with a school qualification or less; screen time was perceived to be more appropriate the older the child. These findings were discussed in relation to the implications they raise for the role of the parent, early childhood education, parent education, and child development and wellbeing.</p>

Parental Perceptions About the Importance of Play in the First Three Years

<p>Play is a universal and innate disposition that is believed to be one of the most significant components to holistic wellbeing and development during the foundational years of childhood. Research and literature examining the topic of play in early childhood suggests that while unstructured and child directed play is valued, its existence is under threat. Instead, it is being replaced by structured, educational, and adult directed activities which aim to accelerate young children’s learning. Due to these conflicting paradigms, and a lack of research exploring parental values in this area, this quantitative study examined parental perceptions towards structured and unstructured play for children under the age of three years. In order to investigate this topic, 255 New Zealand parents, with children not in full-time childcare and under the age of three years, participated in an anonymous online survey. The survey was designed specifically for this study due to a lack of pre-existing measures. The main finding was that parental perception influenced the way in which infants and toddlers spent their time. The majority of parents perceived unstructured play to best support early development and, consequently, offered children a large amount of daily time to become involved in freely chosen unstructured play. The study also identified that: the more weekly activities a child engaged in, the higher structured play was valued by parents; older parents did not value structured play as highly as younger parents; parents with a tertiary level qualification valued unstructured play more than those parents with a school qualification or less; screen time was perceived to be more appropriate the older the child. These findings were discussed in relation to the implications they raise for the role of the parent, early childhood education, parent education, and child development and wellbeing.</p>

Video-feedback promotes sensitive limit-setting in parents of twin preschoolers: a randomized controlled trial

Background Primary aim of the current randomized controlled trial was to test the effectiveness of the parenting intervention ‘Video-feedback to promote Positive Parenting and Sensitive Discipline’ (VIPP-SD) in a sample of parents of preschool-aged twins, as well as differential susceptibility to intervention efforts, that is, whether more temperamentally reactive parents would profit more from the VIPP-SD than parents with lower reactivity. Methods The sample consisted of 202 families with same-sex twins [N = 404 children, mean age 45 months (SD = 6.81)]. Randomization was done at the family level in a 2:3 ratio, with 83 families (41%) randomized to the VIPP-SD group, and 119 families (59%) to the control group. After two pre-tests in year 1 and year 2 of the study, the VIPP-SD was implemented in the third year, with a post-test assessment 1 month after the five intervention sessions. Parental sensitivity was observed during structured play in which parent and child copied a drawing together in a computerized Etch-A-Sketch paradigm. Parental limit-setting was observed in a ‘don’t touch’ task in which the parent required from the child to abstain from playing with attractive toys. Parents interacted with each of their twins in separate sessions. Results The VIPP-SD intervention had a positive impact on the level of parents’ positive limit-setting in interaction with their preschool twins, and this positive effect was most pronounced when the parents completed at least five intervention sessions. However, the intervention did not enhance parental sensitivity during structured play. Parents with higher reactivity were not more open to the impact of the intervention, thus for this temperamental marker differential susceptibility in adults was not supported. Conclusions The current study is unique in targeting families with twin preschoolers, providing proof of principle that coaching parents with video-feedback promotes parental sensitive limit-setting to both children. It remains to be seen whether this finding can be replicated in families with non-twin siblings, or other parental susceptibility markers. Trial registration Trial NL5172 (NTR5312), 2015-07-20.

Communicative functions of parents’ child-directed speech across dyadic and triadic contexts

This study examined the roles of parental gender and context in the communicative functions of parents’ child-directed speech. Seventy three families with toddlers participated in the study. Dyadic and triadic parent-toddler interactions were videotaped during structured play activities. Results indicated context-dependent variability in parents’ facilitative speech and gentle guidance. Parental gender effects were observed in parents’ directive speech but no gender or contextual effects were observed in parents’ referential speech. Results suggest the need for a closer examination of parental gender and contextual factors related to parents’ speech functions.

The significance of the adversative connectives aber, mais, ma (‘but’) as indicators in young children’s argumentation

Adversative connectives have been analyzed as articulating explicit and implicit facets of argumentative moves and have been thus recognized as potential argumentative indicators. Here we examine adversative connectives Ger. aber, Fr. mais, It. ma (‘but’) in young children’s speech in the context of the ArgImp project, a research endeavor seeking to understand in which situations children aged between two and six years engage in argumentation and how their contributions are structured. Two multilingual corpora have been collected for the project: (1) everyday family conversations, (2) semi-structured play activities and problem solving in a kindergarten setting. Through the detailed analysis of a small collection of examples, we consider the indicative potential of adversative connectives for identifying argumentative episodes in interactions involving young children and for the reconstruction of the inferential configurations of children’s contributions to these argumentative discussions. The results show that fully fledged argumentative interpretations of adversatives occur as a possibility in children’s speech, and that adversative connectives can be used profitably to identify less apparent argumentative confrontations and implicit standpoints in children’s speech.

DIR/FLOORTIME UNTUK MENINGKATKAN KOMUNIKASI ANTARA ANAK DENGAN AUTISME DAN IBU DENGAN PROFIL SENSORI BERBEDA

Kesulitan menjalin komunikasi adalah salah satu fitur utama pada Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Anak dengan ASD cenderung memiliki gangguan pemrosesan sensori yang berdampak pada defisit kemampuan komunikasi. Hal tersebut membuat anak membutuhkan bantuan pengasuh untuk meregulasi diri sebelum dapat menjalin komunikasi dengan orang lain. Salah satu intervensi yang membantu meningkatkan kemampuan komunikasi adalah Developmental, Individual Differences, Relationship (DIR)/Floortime. Intervensi ini mempertimbangkan keunikan profil sensori dan perkembangan functional emotional partisipan sebagai landasan pembuatan program, serta melibatkan pengasuh secara aktif. Secara lebih lanjut, penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengevaluasi efektivitas DIR/Floortime untuk meningkatkan komunikasi antar anak usia 4 tahun 2 bulan dengan autisme dan ibu dengan profil sensori yang berbeda. Penelitian ini menggunakan single case design dan multiple baselines across situations untuk mengevaluasi penerapan DIR/Floortime pada situasi free dan semi-structured play. Lembar Observasi Circle of Communication (CoC) digunakan untuk menghitung jumlah komunikasi dua arah yang terjalin antara anak dan ibu. Skor kapasitas perkembangan functional emotional anak dan ibu juga diukur menggunakan Functional Emotional Assesment Scale untuk mengetahui kapasitas perkembangan yang melandasi kemampuan komunikasi. Hasil penelitian mengindikasikan bahwa DIR/Floortime efektif untuk meningkatkan jumlah dan kualitas komunikasi antara anak dan ibu. Setelah intervensi, anak lebih sering melakukan kontak mata, melakukan inisiasi dan respons verbal, serta tampak lebih engaged dalam berinteraksi bersama ibu. Keterlibatan aktif ibu dalam intervensi membuat ibu langsung merasakan perubahan positif pada anak saat berinteraksi. Hal tersebut memotivasi ibu yang sebelumnya cenderung pasif dalam berinteraksi untuk lebih dapat mengikuti minat dan tingkat keaktifan anak.