Children's Dramatic Play Behaviors in Same-Age and Mixed-Age Preschool Classrooms

유치원 단일연령 교실과 혼합연령 교실에서의 아동의 극놀이 행동

The purpose of this study was to examine children's dramatic play and dramatic play themes in the same-age and mixed-age kindergarten classrooms. The subjects were 45 children in three classrooms of 4-year-olds, 69 children in three classrooms of 5-year-olds, and 60 children in three mixed-age classrooms of 4-and 5-year-olds. Observations were conducted by videotape recordings. Observation periods were of five-minutes duration. There were ten observations of children's indoor free-play periods. Four-and five-year-olds in mixed-age classrooms were more likely to engage in group-dramatic play than 4-and 5-year-olds in same-age classrooms. Four-year-olds in mixed-age classrooms were more likely to engage in domestic and family, war/violence, school, animal, and vehicle play themes than 4-year-olds in same-age classrooms. However, 5-year-olds in mixed-age classrooms were more likely to engage in family and school play themes than 5-year-olds in same-age classrooms. 5-year-olds in same-age classrooms were more likely to engage in vehicle and animal play themes than 5-year-olds in mixed-age classrooms. 5-year-olds in same-age classrooms did not differ from 5-year-olds in mixed-age classrooms on the war/violence themes used during dramatic play. In terms of sex differences, boys were more likely to engage in violence, adventure fantage themes than girls. Conversely girls were more likely to engage in family/marriage static play themes than boys.