Childrens Imagination

Download or read book Children's Imagination written by Paul L. Harris and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2022-06-23 with total page 134 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Children's imagination was traditionally seen as a wayward, desire-driven faculty that is eventually constrained by rationality. A more recent, Romantic view claims that young children's fertile imagination is increasingly dulled by schooling. Contrary to both perspectives, this Element argues that, paradoxically, children's imagination draws much inspiration from reality. Hence, when they engage in pretend play, envision the future, or conjure up counterfactual possibilities, children rarely generate fantastical possibilities. Their reality-guided imagination enables children to plan ahead and to engage in informative thought experiments. Nevertheless, when adults present children with less reality-based possibilities – via biblical narratives or the endorsement of special beings – children are receptive. Indeed, such imaginary possibilities can infuse their otherwise commonsensical appraisal of reality. Finally, like adults, young children enjoy being absorbed into a make-believe, fictional world but faced with real-world problems calling for creativity, they often need guidance, given their limited knowledge of prior solutions.

Download or read book Narrative Therapy in Wonderland: Connecting with Children's Imaginative Know-How written by David Epston and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2016-11-08 with total page 243 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The remarkable power of connecting with children’s voices and imagination in narrative therapy. Therapists may marvel at children’s imaginative triumphs, but how often do they recognize such talents as vital to the therapy hour? Should therapists reserve a space for make-believe only when nothing is at stake, or might it be precisely those moments when something truly matters that imagination is most urgently needed? This book offers an alternative to therapeutic perspectives that treat children as vulnerable and helpless. It invites readers to consider how the imaginative gifts and knowledge of children, when supported by the therapist and family, can bring about dramatic change. The book begins with an account of the foundations of narrative theory. It explains how such elements as language, characterization, and suspense contribute to the coherence of a story and bring young people into focus. Each subsequent chapter provides specific suggestions for the practice of narrative therapy. Examples of the difficulties children face are offered, along with narrative interventions and tips for overcoming common barriers that can arise along the way. Readers will learn a variety of ready-to-implement strategies, including how to personify problems, compose letters to affirm children’s identities, summon fairies to lend a helping hand, and many more. Sample dialogues between the authors, children, and their parents bring the application of each practice to life, illuminating how even the most stubborn problem can be outwitted, sometimes by mischievous means. With robust professional insight, Narrative Therapy in Wonderland will aid any practitioner in calling on children’s imaginative know-how. How often can a young person be spotted diving headlong into a world of fantasy? This book explores the extraordinary fact that these young people may, upon arrival in Wonderland, be far better equipped to take on even dire challenges than when they remain “up above.”

Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of the Development of Imagination written by Marjorie Taylor and published by . This book was released on 2013-05-02 with total page 608 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Oxford Handbook of the Development of Imagination provides a comprehensive overview of research on the role of imagination in cognitive and social development and its link with children's understanding of the real world.

Download or read book Children's Imaginative Play written by Shlomo Ariel and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2002-06-30 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this visit to the wonderland of children's imaginative, make-believe play, readers are be exposed to both a general, bird's-eye view of the whole of this fascinating realm, and to a closer look at its diverse regions. This volume examines the borderlines between make-believe play and akin phenomena such as dreams, drama, and rituals. Readers will become acquainted with the secret codes of make-believe play. These codes are activated in both covert and overt power struggles among children as well as in the child's internal theater of emotions. Readers will have the opportunity to examine these uses by looking at real-life sociodramatic play scenes. Also, the development of make-believe play and its interface with the child's general cognitive and socioemotional development is traced. This volume enables readers to consider children of various cultures at play, and investigates whether make-believe play and its characteristics are universal or culture-specific. Make-believe play has been investigated across fields including cognitive, clinical, developmental, and social psychology, as well as linguistics, anthropology, and sociology. In this book, a comprehensive, integrative model is proposed, in which all of these approaches are synthesized into a single, coherent whole. The unifying hypothesis behind this synthesis is that make-believe play is a semiotic system, a body of signs and symbols, a language by means of which children express themselves and communicate. This language enables children to regulate and balance both their inner emotional life and their social life. Another central hypothesis is therefore that make-believe play functions as an homeostatic feedback mechanism for controlling the level of arousal around the child's central concerns, as well as the level of interpersonal conflict around issues of social proximity and power. Therapeutic and education applications of make-believe play are derived from these hypotheses and their ramifications.

Download or read book Handbook of Imagination and Culture written by Tania Zittoun and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2018 with total page 393 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Imagination allows individuals and groups to think beyond the here-and-now, to envisage alternatives, to create parallel worlds, and to mentally travel through time. Imagination is both extremely personal (for example, people imagine unique futures for themselves) and deeply social, as our imagination is fed with media and other shared representations. As a result, imagination occupies a central position within the life of mind and society. Expanding the boundaries of disciplinary approaches, the Handbook of Imagination and Culture expertly illustrates this core role of imagination in the development of children, adolescents, adults, and older persons today. Bringing together leading scholars in sociocultural psychology and neighboring disciplines from around the world, this edited volume guides readers towards a much deeper understanding of the conditions of imagining, its resources, its constraints, and the consequences it has on different groups of people in different domains of society. Summarily, this Handbook places imagination at the center, and offers readers new ways to examine old questions regarding the possibility of change, development, and innovation in modern society.

Download or read book Constructing a Paradigm for Children’s Contextualized Learning written by Li Jilin and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-08-22 with total page 247 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book focuses on summarizing four elements from the classic Chinese literary theory: truth, beauty, emotion and imagination. Based on the latest findings from learning sciences and brain science, it elaborates on the reasons for creating contexts in language teaching. It also shows how the aesthetical theories can be used to nurture contextualized instruction and presents six major approaches for creating contexts: creating contexts with real objects, representing contexts with pictures, evoking contexts with music, experiencing contexts with acting, unfolding contexts with real life, and describing contexts with languages. The author is a practitioner with over 30 years of practical research experience and all their studies are discussed in this book.

Download or read book Handbook of Children and the Media written by Dorothy G. Singer and published by SAGE. This book was released on 2012 with total page 825 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Handbook of Children and the Media' brings together the best-known scholars from around the world to summarize the current scope of the research in this field.