I thought this was related and could give us a concrete look at how the
ideal would fit into an early childhood setting. I included the parts that I
thought were pertinent. I can email the whole piece to those interested in
pdf, but at present it is not, but will most likely soon be published.
When I first read through the piece the whole seasons thing made no sense to
me. I looked at it this morning in the context of the ideal discussion and
the emphasis on seasons made more sense. The error may be mine, but I
assumed the practice described in these sections were influenced by the
philosophical concept of the ideal. One of the authors is Vygotsky's grand
daughter.
Nate
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PSYCHOLOGICAL BASES OF THE PROGRAM OF PRIMARY EDUCATION
THE GOLDEN KEY. G. G. Kravtsov, E. E. Berezhkovskaya, E. E. Kravtsova.
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The life of the group is based on the cycle of seasons and the years rhythm,
and the concrete content related to these events. For example, the children
meet spring before it arrives. This is reelected in the life of the group
through games, books, and in real deeds - preparation of bird houses and
seedlings. The events differ from one year to another by having the new
events appear side by side with the events of the previous year. There are
new games, books, field trps, topics, and social activity, such as preparing
a gifl or visiting someone.
The organization of the life of the group is determined by the change of
seasons. Each season has a beginning, culmination, and termination. The
culmination of the season does not always occur with the middle of the
calendar season. The culmination of fall may be experienced by children in
the calendar middle (golden fall) or its end (pre- winter). Winter and
spring culmination are attributed to the middle of the their seasons;
however, the celebration of summer occurs at its beginning. The culimation
of the season is connected with its main celebrations. The seasonal topic is
brought up in the events that children experience as before and after the
season.
Each season consists of three months. Each season has subtopics in the
limits of the seasonal topic. For example, in winter it may be a winter
tale, performance, and exhibition. A month, like the season, has its own
culmination. A month’s culiiation is not always connected with its
celebration. A month’s culimation may be a trip to the forest. The event is
realized by the children as something that points out the usual course of
life. The central event of the month happens in the middle or the end, but
not the beginning. The culmination of beginning of the month coincides with
the seasonal culimation.
A month consists of weeks. A week like other calendar periods has its logic.
It also has its weekly topic (subordinated to the month and season) and its
culmination which is more modest than the culmination of the month or
season.. The central event of a week is the reading of a tale, common
conversation etc.
A week consists of seven days. In the weekly composition, each day has its
sense and place in the working up of the topic. The structure of a day, like
the structure of a year, has its constant moments. The moments are
conditioned by permanant factors such as daily topic and rhythm, weekly
topic, and the day’s place in course of a week. Some organizational moments,
except breakfast, dinner and supper, are also a permanent part of the day’s
rountine. It is important that all the events of the group, plans for the
future, and problems are discussed regularly with both children and adults.
In order to accomplish this the group is gathered together two times a day
for a meeting. These meetings are conducted every morning and evening. There
are also other repeated moments of daily lie, such as singing, reading or
telling of tales to younger children before sleeping. For older children the
hours of instruction are relatively permanent.
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Introduction of general material and control of its mastering are conducted
in four main directions. All these directions exist in every moment of the
life of the child of any age and, at the same time, at different stages and
on different levels of cycles of mastering of one or the other educational
material these four directions are tightly connected with each other and
constructed together in a determined hierrarchy. These four components, easy
to retrace in life and activity of any person of any age, are as follows:
1) Ability to act in the space that surrounds the child. The ability to
organize his/ her own space in dependance on aims of the activity.
2) Orientation in time. The ability to expand, create the succession of
actions, and plan them.
3) Ability to act with different materials, use their properties and
peculiarities in their activity.
4) Development of ability to analize their own activity, to reflect, and to
comprehend themselves as the subject of the activity.
Each year one of above mentioned directions becomes a central focus. For the
first year it is orientation to space; including, the creation of their own
space in the group and individually. This problem is solved with the help of
special worked out methodical means. They include, in the first place,
drawing up of different plans, schemes, and models, which are organically a
part of the content of the children’s group. By the end of the first
academic year the older children are already well orientated in the space of
the building, the immediate area and adjoining locality. They are also able
to orientate to quarters ( on the sun) on a familiar locality, and know the
indications of the south slope (a side of a house, of a border of a forest)
in comparison with the north slope. They are able to depict on the scheme
graphicly in a room, familiar locality, and decorations for a performance on
a stage. They know the parts of the world on a map, and are able to show the
way to the North Pole, Africa, Japan, America on a physical map of
hemispheres.
The second year differs from the first by the fact that now ‘time’ becomes
the central focus. This time measuring of reality happens on the different
levels: from micro intervals (how many can you jump, or stand on one foot
for a specific amount of time) to the big historical time.
Toward the end of the second year the older children have a generalized
conception of historical age, and the main landmarks of the history of
humanity. All children have the ability to operate their own time, to give
themselves an account, and to fulfill plans for a period of time Children
have a conception of one, five or ten minutes, half an hour, hour, and they
know what we could do for these periods of time.
The third year is centered on concrete action with dif& rent materials, and
productive activity.. All of this happens at the same time with deepening
and extending of knowleges and skills in spatial and time orientation. At
the end of year the older children have a conception about the different
spheres of arts including the art of other cultures, and also experiences in
working with a variety of material: wood, straw, clay, bast, and pieces of
smalt.
In the fourth year the central focus is on the development of the children’s
ability to analize, reflect, and correct their own actions. This is achieved
with the help of forming methodics, that are directed to teaching the
children to point out their own activity in the course of life and activity,
to separate himself from others, and to stand in different personalitive
positions in relation to another person. All of these forming influences are
executed on contents, including the forms and modes of activity, which were
acquired by the children in the previous three years. In this process there
is a more complex focus on culture; the culture of the ancient Egypt and in
Russian culture a focus on the age of Peter the Great. Children’s knowledge
about geography is extended with more concrete knowlege about different
countries and climatic zones.
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