María del Rosario Maita

El impacto de la instrucción en la comprensión temprana de un mapa como objeto simbólico

Resumen El presente trabajo estudia el impacto de la instrucción en la comprensión temprana de un objeto simbólico. Específicamente investiga si y cuándo la enseñanza del adulto afecta la comprensión y el uso de un mapa sencillo por parte de niños pequeños (30, 36, 42 y 46 meses de edad). Se empleó una tarea de búsqueda en la que los niños debían encontrar un juguete escondido valiéndose de un mapa como fuente de información. Primero exploramos a partir de qué edad los niños comprenden la función representacional del mapa sin instrucción. Los resultados muestran que antes de los 42 meses los niños no la comprenden, a esta edad la ejecución se encuentra dividida entre quienes lo logran y quienes no. Recién a partir de los 46 meses los niños comprenden espontáneamente la función representacional del mapa. Luego investigamos si es posible enseñar esa función. Encontramos que a los 36 meses los niños logran comprender y utilizar el mapa simbólicamente luego de ser explícitamente instruidos; no así a los niños de 30 meses. Los resultados encontrados, en su conjunto, aportan evidencia de que la comprensión temprana de un objeto simbólico no sólo depende de factores evolutivos ligados a la edad, sino que la enseñanza del adulto puede ser crucial en algunos puntos del desarrollo.

Intentional teaching facilitates young children's comprehension and use of a symbolic object.

ABSTRACT Children are exposed to symbolic objects that they have to learn to use very early in life. The authors’ aim was to examine whether it is possible to intentionally teach young children the symbolic function of an object. They employed a search task in which children had to use a map to find a toy. Experiment 1 revealed that with no instruction 3-year-, 10-month-old children were quite successful; 3-year-, 6-month-olds showed a divided performance; and 3-year-, 0-month-olds failed. With this baseline, Experiment 2 compared the performance of 3-year-, 0-month-olds in three different conditions: no-instruction, complete instruction (before the task begins), and teaching (complete instruction plus corrective feedback); only children in the teaching condition succeeded. However, children 6 months younger, 2-year-, 6-month-olds, failed despite teaching that was provided (Study 3). This research shows that at some points in development instruction is not enough; intentional teaching in communicative contexts is the mechanism that boosts symbolic understanding in early childhood.

Socioeconomic Differences in Parental Communication About Location

This study explored whether parental directions about location differ by socioeconomic status ( SES ) and whether children’s performance is associated with parental spatial directions. We designed a task in which parents hid a toy in one of five identical boxes in a small-scale space, and then verbally guided their children’s search. Middle- SES ( MSES ) parents employed more language in general than low- SES ( LSES ) parents. However, groups used the same amount of spatial terms, suggesting that providing effective spatial directions is probably a matter of quality than quantity. Parents differed in the use of frames of reference; with LSES parents scarcely using them, which resulted in ambiguous reference. MSES parents showed a higher rate of person frames of reference and proximity terms, and their children performed better in the task. Our results suggest that spatial communication including person frames of reference combined with proximity information might be an effective strategy to communicate location.

Maternal teaching of the symbolic function of a scale model / La enseñanza materna de la función simbólica de una maqueta

Abstract This study explores how mothers naturally guide their children in the use of a symbolic object, a scale model. Nineteen mothers, along with their two-and-a-half-year-old children, participated. The children had to find a toy hidden in a small room by using a scale model that represented it. It was found that mothers used three kinds of strategies: model-room correspondence, life experience and the names of the objects; with correspondence being the preferred strategy. The mothers were very responsive to their children, offering feedback in order to evaluate both their correct and incorrect searches. The corrective feedback affected the children’s performance when mothers had previously used strategies like correspondence and experience, but not in the case of name. In general terms, the results illustrate how mothers naturally guide the cultural knowledge of their children, structuring the interaction in a particular way and providing teaching and correction strategies in line with the responses of their children and the characteristics of the task.