Abstract
Throughout this chapter the authors are going to present a didactic proposal, called “Lights, Camera, and Action” that is arranged to be carried out with three-year-old boys and girls and consists of five sessions, which will be spread over 15 days, and physical activity will be performed twice a week. In this proposal, topics like the typical in the performing arts such as circus, theater, dance, and music are explored. In this playful and motivating way, physical activity will be promoted, through our own content such as jumps, turns, and different types of balance. The didactic proposal contains objectives, competences, and contents, regulated by the Curriculum Decree 67/2007 establishing Early Childhood Education in the Autonomous Community of Castilla-La Mancha (Spain).
TopSetting The Stage
As said before, the main theme of the didactic proposal is the performing arts. It is believed that it is important to introduce students from a young age to the enjoyment and appreciation of art, such as dance, theater and circus in this case, always accompanied by music. It is considered that it is an innovative way of going through these arts simultaneously with physical education, since art is not introduced very often in the classroom, and children are unaware of the importance of this sector, and through it they learn to express their emotions and feelings in a bodily way. In general, students are motivated by physical activity in learning new concepts.
Taking into account the game and the cognitive stage of the students to whom the didactic practice is directed, the importance of Piaget cannot be overlooked, who defended and disseminated a constructivist theory where the student is able to build their knowledge from their own previous experiences or content taught by the teacher. In addition, it describes the almost spontaneous development of people based on sensory and motor action, as well as interaction with the sociocultural environment. (Saldarriaga et al., 2016)
Piaget proposed four basic stages of intellectual development: sensorimotor stage, preoperational stage, concrete operational stage, and formal operational stage. Focusing on this didactic proposal, we would work with children who are in the preoperational stage, since it begins at two years and ends at approximately seven years.
At this stage, on the one hand, children acquire a greater ability to use symbols such as gestures, words or numbers, in this way they can represent real things in the environment. On the other hand, they know the world mainly through their actions. This stage is also characterized by not having general theories, but rather forming specific knowledge based on their experiences, that is, they do not make generalizations. It should be noted that in this period of time they are egocentric, they are not able to imagine the consequences of a certain series of events and they are not prepared to use logic either. (Meece, 2000)
Symbolic play is characteristic of Piaget's preoperational stage. This type of game is based on reproducing situations from everyday life. Symbolic play is the most representative of childhood and provides many benefits for children, such as understanding the environment around them, developing verbal and gestural language, and promoting creativity, among many others.
Children establish different relationships throughout the process of symbolic play. Around the age of two the child performs an individual game; later, between the ages of two and four years old, the child plays in parallel with their peers, which is practically like playing alone, but playing close to other children, although each one has their own game and they do not participate in a common game. Finally, from the age of four years old, shared play takes place, when all the childrenplay the same game together (Herrero, López, Mozos y Pecci, 2010).
Key Terms in this Chapter
Resources: Refers to each of the means or elements necessary to carry out the proposed activities. Some examples can be: human resources, which are teachers; material resources, which in this case can be rings or balls; technological resources such as the computer or loudspeakers; and space resources such as the gym or the schoolyard.
Session: Set of planned activities that are part of a didactic unit, following a theme. Each of them is made up of a series of objectives, materials, aimed at a certain age and duration.
Psychomotricity: Set of sensory-motor, cognitive and emotional faculties that allow a person to develop successfully in a context.
Methodological Innovation: Type of methodology made up of a set of resources that are not usual in classrooms and that are interesting to students. As well as for example, it can be the introduction of literature on physical activity time.
Performing Arts: Set of works that are performed on a stage, such as dance, circus, music and theater.
Physical Activity: Set of movements carried out by the human body with which different types of muscles are worked, body scheme, balance, laterality, spatio-temporal orientation.
Meaningful Learning: It is a work methodology in which the students' previous knowledge is the base of it, and it will be used to progressively increase the content's difficulty and thus put the experience into practice so that they can spontaneously introduce them to their daily lives.
Didactic Proposal: Document made in a planned, thematic way and supported by the law that regulates it. It is formed by a series of propositions to carry out activities in the classroom and achieve the objectives set.
Motor Story: Methodological tool in which both the literary and physical fields intervene. Through the representation of the story it is intended to carry out a physical activity in relation to it. In this way, it is motivating for students and innovative in classrooms.
Infant Education: School stage that includes ages between zero and six, divided into two cycles. The first from zero to three years; and the second, (which is the one addressed in this proposal), from three to six years. It is a non-compulsory school period, but most children begin their schooling from the second cycle of Early Childhood Education. At this stage, the main issue is that children learn contents in a playful and globalized way through play.