Emotions are an area that usually does not receive enough attention in the process of raising and developing children. Meanwhile, the development of the emotional sphere of preschoolers is an extremely important occupation, which should never be forgotten. In order to understand how important this area is, it is enough to imagine a world inhabited by people completely deprived of the opportunity or the ability to experience and express emotions. Or try to live at least a few hours without any emotions. It is not just very difficult, but rather, almost impossible.
However, the ability to experience emotions and express them correctly is not given to people automatically at birth. Children learn this in much the same way as much else. An emotional model is laid in early childhood, when the kids are watching their own parents.
Why is it important to pay attention to the development of the ability to express emotions?
As a rule, no one has questions about the reasons for which attention should be paid to speech development, literacy, inculcation of perseverance, discipline and hygiene skills. But when it comes to the development of the emotional sphere of a preschooler’s personality, most parents simply don’t understand what this is for.
An adult should be able to correctly and intelligibly express their own feelings, otherwise it will be very difficult for him to interact with other people, to build personal relationships. The ability to correctly express joy, sadness, resentment, anger, to show another person what upsets and what delights - this is something without which it is impossible to fully live.
For example, a man is upset by the manner in which his colleagues make fun of him. He does not mind showing his emotions, but does not know how to do this, does not know how to convey his feelings to others. This leads to the fact that a man daily faces stressful circumstances for him and experiences negative emotions. Negativity builds up inside and at some point disappears, like an avalanche, burying everything underneath. As a rule, in such situations they talk about a nervous breakdown. Another outcome of events is possible - the development of severe depression or a splash of negativity in the family. Of course, skirmishes with the offender or a change of work are also possible. But no matter what the development of events, a man could well have avoided it if he could show his own emotions.
Another quite common example in life of a lack of the ability to correctly express one’s feelings is to make acquaintances and build personal relationships. Many girls sincerely do not understand why the young people who are attracted to them begin to become interested in them, get acquainted, make contact, but the relationship does not last longer than a couple of dates. The point is the wrong demonstration of emotions. That is, girls do not reflect what they really feel. They simply do not know how to correctly, simply and intelligibly express their own emotions. Young people perceive the emotional message that indicates the desire for easy short-term flirting, and behave accordingly, not even imagining that the girl may want not marriage for one night, but marriage.
There are many similar examples. Every day, almost every person faces the consequences of the fact that at his early age or in the childhood of his relatives there were no classes on the development of the emotional sphere of preschool children.
In other words, the ability to correctly and maximally intelligibly express one's own emotions makes life much easier. People who can do this are unlikely to complain that those around them do not understand, because they will not be in such circumstances. Also, the lack of skills to correctly display their own feelings is a very serious communicative obstacle, a barrier between a specific person and other people.
Why is it important to pay attention to the development of emotions themselves?
It’s not enough for children to teach clearly and correctly express the emotions that fill them. In order for children to master these skills, they must experience feelings. It is impossible to instill the ability to express joy or grief if the baby does not know what it is. Therefore, the process of developing the emotional sphere of preschoolers includes not only training in the correct expression of feelings, but also in the ability to experience them.
The importance of the fact of having emotions cannot be overestimated. Of course, every person at least once in his life came across people who can be characterized by such epithets:
- stale;
- cold;
- insensible;
- empty.
Of course, the list of epithets that can be used to characterize emotional coldness can be continued. Often, people believe that if their child does not show their feelings, then this is a sign of restraint or even some kind of aristocracy, and not at all evidence of their absence. Especially often the parents of boys think so.
Meanwhile, restraint and lack of emotions are completely different concepts. Small children are not able to restrain feelings. If a child is offended, angry, angry, upset, or, conversely, delighted, it will in any case be reflected on his face or manifest in behavior. How this manifestation will correctly reflect feelings is another question, but the very fact of expressing emotions will certainly appear.
When it comes to the development of the emotional sphere of preschoolers, parents often ask themselves what is bad in the absence of a full range of experiences. Indeed, is it really bad that the child will not be very worried, will not be able to fall in love recklessly, and will not harbor grudges? After all, the baby will not become a robot from this, nothing absolute can happen, and the basic emotional palette will still be present.
The harm of lack of one’s own emotions is that a person will not be able to show sympathy, empathy. He will never understand why for someone else an action is important. Being in a leadership position, such a person will not understand the employee’s desire to leave early or take a day off on the child’s birthday or in case of illness of the parents. If such a person becomes a doctor or teacher, then the motives of actions, as well as the experiences of children or patients, will be beyond his perception.
Moreover, other people's sentimentality over time will cause irritation. As a rule, such people are respected, but not loved, even in their own families. And in old age they become grumpy and cause hostility among others.
Thus, the lack of a full gamut of emotions is also a communicative barrier that hinders building normal relationships with other people. Therefore, paying attention to such a question as the development of the socio-emotional sphere of preschool children is necessary.
When and how do children begin to experience their first emotions?
It is often said that a person begins to experience the first emotions from the moment of birth. This is not entirely true. In the first seconds, minutes, hours and days of his life, a person does not experience emotions, sensations are mistaken for them.
The baby begins to breathe, his eyes perceive light, the skin feels air, cold, warmth, touch, hunger wakes up in the stomach. All this and much more - a set of sensations that cause a reaction from the nervous system - crying, screaming, grunting, moving arms and legs and so on.
The feelings that the newborn experiences are completely new to him, completely unfamiliar to him. While in the womb, the baby did not experience anything like what he encountered in the very first second after birth.
Of course, all these sensations cause vivid reactions. These reactions - screaming, contented grunts, crying and so on - are the emotional foundation laid in the human nervous system during the period of intrauterine development. In other words, these are not emotions, but their prototype. A newborn perceives the simplest stimulus from the environment and reacts to it. For example, light or cold can lead to crying or movement with legs and arms.
The child begins to experience the simplest emotions much later, because this requires mental activity, understanding. That is, the kid should already have some kind of life experience. As a rule, the appearance of the first emotions coincides with the moment of the emergence of curiosity, interest in what surrounds the baby. It can be argued that if a child picked up a toy and began to examine it, he was already quite able to rejoice, be upset, and experience other simple emotions.
Evidence of the presence of emotions in a baby under the age of one year is the appearance of laughter. If a child is able to laugh, it means that the emotional sphere has already formed in him.
What happens at an early age? Stages of becoming emotions
Up to a year, children begin to experience the simplest emotions - joy, grief, approval, discontent, and others. These feelings are expressed in appropriate simple and understandable ways:
- smile;
- laughter;
- sad grimace;
- cry.
You should not worry about the lack of a baby's face up to a year of complex facial expressions or the ability to be offended. At an early age, the baby does not yet know what resentment is, he feels sad. The child may be good or bad, he is happy or upset. The baby is not yet able to get angry, offended, experience other complex emotions that require the experience of comparison and the concept of his own personality.
In the age period from one to three years, the child significantly expands the range of feelings available to him. It is in this period that the main development of the emotional sphere of preschoolers takes place. Up to three years, the foundation is laid for all the feelings and emotions that a person will use in life. This age period is characterized by intuitive learning, adopting stereotypes of behavior, reactions, and character traits in adults who surround the baby.
After overcoming the three-year milestone, children begin to actively learn speech and learn something, not only through intuitive perception and adoption, copying, but also in other ways. Curiosity and the pursuit of knowledge are characteristic of this age. It is after three years that the kids begin to break toys, trying to find out how they are arranged.
After three years, the foundation of the emotional sphere that was laid earlier is actively developing, and it becomes obvious what feelings the baby lacks. It is the lack of something that determines what the development of the cognitive and emotional sphere of the preschooler will become. This period lasts on average up to six to seven years, that is, until the start of schooling.
What are the features of children's emotions?
The development of the emotional-volitional sphere of a preschooler takes place gradually, respectively, and you need to deal with this area constantly. Emotion is not a mathematical problem that can be solved once and for all. Emotional development is a complex and long process. And the development of the ability to express or, conversely, control your feelings does not at all have any age restrictions.
Kids are characterized by certain features of the development of the emotional sphere. A preschooler, passing through the stages of the formation of the skill to test and express his feelings, masters and displays emotions differently in each age period. But no matter what age the baby is and how developed the gamut of feelings is, their manifestation and expression always differs from how adults demonstrate emotions.
Features of children's emotions are considered:
- the simplest manifestations associated with the assimilation of the first vital social cause-and-effect chains, for example, home - parents - kindergarten - friends - educator;
- vivid experience and expression of the state of anticipation, this applies both to the expectation of the holidays, and to the awareness of the consequences of your words and deeds, for example: a toy is broken - mother is upset;
- gradual progress from elementary to complicated, obvious to others, because it takes the form of conjecture and reasoning.
The first emotions are a direct result of sensations. That is, they arise under the influence of natural physiological needs. This stage lasts an average of up to three years. In this age period, physiology and environmental effects dictate the development of the emotional sphere. A preschooler over three years old is already beginning to experience more complex emotions and understand the need for their control. That is, if it is impossible for a child at the age of two to explain the inadmissibility of crying in a public place, then for a child who has celebrated his fifth birthday, it is already quite possible to interpret it. Thus, a feature of the development of the emotional sphere of children aged three to six years is not only their formation and development, but also the formation of the ability to control the manifestations of feelings.
What influences the formation and development of children's emotions?
As a rule, the first thing that is remembered when it comes to factors influencing the development of the emotional-volitional sphere of a preschooler is adult behavior and family life. This is without a doubt. However, not only what the child sees and perceives as an example, has an impact on the development of his emotions.
For the formation of social, emotional and other skills, motives and factors that encourage one to learn and learn new things are extremely important. These factors are often both motives and means of developing the emotional sphere of preschoolers.
The most important factor influencing the formation of emotions and encouraging their development is the child's interest, manifested in:
- to games;
- objects and things;
- the phenomena of the world;
- relations between people.
Relations between people are not only contacts between adults, especially their reactions and behavior, which are observed by the baby. It is also the relationship between the child himself and other people, both adults and peers.
The role of communication in the development of children's emotional sphere
If in early childhood the formation of feelings is largely intuitive, then the development of the emotional sphere of older preschoolers is almost entirely dependent on communication with peers and adults.
In other words, the formation of the baby’s personality and, of course, the development of his emotions, takes place in society. If the child is isolated from society, then he will not learn anything in any of the life spheres. Children's society can be divided into two types:
- neighbor, or internal, small;
- wide, or external, large.
The close society includes the family in which the baby lives. To the outside - a kindergarten, a playground in the park, any studios, mugs and more. Even shopping can be attributed to a large society, since the child not only walks after his parents, but also gets the opportunity to experience desires, emotions, control them, learns by trial to express requests and achieve what he liked.
Shopping is not only a kind of simulator, but also a test that clearly demonstrates at what level the development of the emotional sphere of older preschoolers is.
For example, one child asks for a trinket or lollipops, chewing gum and, being refused, starts screaming, stomping, weeping. This behavior is acceptable for a baby at two years of age, but at five it indicates emotional immaturity. If the child asks for everything, this indicates not only that the parents usually do not fulfill his wishes, but also the inability to choose, set priorities, set goals and achieve them.
If the child asks for something specific, but when he is refused, he doesn’t fall into hysteria, but begins to talk with his parents and explain why he needs the specified subject, then this indicates that the development of the emotional-volitional sphere of the preschooler’s personality is at a high level. The kid demonstrates not only the ability to experience emotions, but also the ability to control them. Also, the child shows his skills in prioritizing and the ability to achieve goals. It demonstrates social and communicative adequacy.
In the process of communicating with peers and adults, the child:
- learns the norms of behavior, morality and morality;
- learns to cope with negative emotions and denials of anything;
- mastering ideas about the social roles of men, women;
- understands what value, loss, dream, gratitude is.
Only in communication is it possible to fully develop the emotional sphere and moral qualities of preschoolers. Communicating, children learn what friendship, responsibility, active play, property is. , , – .
?
– . :
, – , , , , .
?
A game for a child is not only a way of knowing the world, but also an opportunity to reproduce, remember, assimilate what he saw, try to change something in a stereotype. For example, a child sees how one person offends another. He reproduces this situation with his toys, re-experiencing and conceptualizing. At first, the game completely duplicates reality, but then a “superhero” appears in it and restores justice, or the “villain” repents himself, or “offended” gives back.
That is, games for the development of the emotional sphere of preschoolers are not just important, they are one of the main ways of cognition, assimilation and comprehension. Of course, they should be useful and interesting.
At home, pastime with toys is in first place, and in kindergarten with peers. The role of toys in the development of the emotional sphere of a preschooler is extremely great. Therefore, they should be purchased deliberately. For example, there is no need to flood the nursery with clown dolls if the child has never been to a circus. As well as it is not necessary to set up the nursery with “smart” games and workshop corners, if the baby does not have the opportunity to master them, sharing time with an adult. In other words, the toys in the nursery should be different, with their help the baby should be able to reproduce what he saw on the street or heard in a fairy tale.
In kindergartens, as well as on playgrounds in parks or in the yard, the kid does not play with objects and things, but with peers. That is, in these conditions, social-role games are paramount. For example, one child is “mother”, the other is “daughter”. At the same time, children behave according to their perceptions, that is, demonstrate what they see at home daily. During the game, the kids exchange their ideas, learn that their home lifestyle and behavior model are not the only possible options, there are others.
Are there any exercises developing emotions?
Although feelings do not apply to concepts with exact characteristics, there are exercises to develop the emotional sphere of preschoolers. The simplest is an image game.
It consists in the following:
- images of children's faces expressing different emotions are offered;
- the child should identify them and distribute them in directions;
- there should be pictures indicating the places where the kid "takes" the portraits provided.
That is, you do not need to demand from the baby only the designation of emotion. The meaning of the exercise is for the child to take a picture with the image, recognize the feeling and place the portrait in a place that corresponds to the painted experiences.
For example, a child takes a picture and claims to have pain on it. Adults can ask leading questions, for example: "What does this boy feel?" Designating the depicted experience as pain, the child must move the portrait to the picture with the hospital. An adult in case of difficulty can help with the question: “And where will this boy go?”
Thus, two main tasks of developing the emotional-volitional sphere of a preschooler are solved - the child learns to recognize the emotions of others and understand their consequences.
What should adults not do when doing game exercises?
Parents often make mistakes by working with their children on their own. The most common of these is the way of thinking for the child. In practice, when performing exercises on the development of the emotional sphere, this is often expressed in phrases: “Look, the girl is smiling. So she has fun. Where will she go? To the park on the carousel. ” Or: “Oh, what a sad boy. Why do you think he is sad? Maybe he needs to go to kindergarten with friends? ”
The list can be continued, because there are so many parents, so many variants of pronunciation of erroneous phrases. This approach to classes completely depreciates them. In this case, it is not the child who plays, but the adult. The kid does not think, does not build a causal relationship. That is, methodological tools for the development of the emotional sphere of preschool children, in this case, pictures depicting experiences, are not used correctly. Classes do not give results, although nominally they are present in the schedule of the child.
Accordingly, the first thing parents should not do in homework is to think and decide for their child.
Another common mistake is to deny the option proposed by the baby. For example, a child takes a picture in which, according to the annotation to the game, resentment is depicted. Declares that boredom is drawn, and puts the image in an amusement park or in a kindergarten. Adults often tell the baby that he was mistaken, and shift the picture to the desired, according to the annotation, stack.
You can’t do this. Any drawing conveys emotions very abstractly, their perception always occurs through a personal prism. A mistake can be considered only if the child recognizes the picture with laughter as an image of pain. In similar emotions, the concept of “error” does not apply. If an adult does not agree with the version of the baby, you need not correct the child, but ask why he came to the voiced conclusions.
The role of work and creativity in the development of emotions
The full development of the emotional-volitional sphere in older preschoolers is impossible without the presence of real responsibilities in children, without work.
Of course, we are talking about simple domestic work, affordable and understandable to the baby. Often, parents believe that the work of the child is the arrangement of toys in places and developing activities with them. This is not true. By labor is meant the action demanded by other family members, the result of which can be felt "here and now", touch, see or even eat.
The child is not able to realize that the fact that he sat quietly and shifted pictures is a useful action. In his understanding, demanded labor is washed dishes, cooked dinner. Something simple that everyone uses. Accordingly, the baby should be able to benefit. He needs to determine the occupation and not interfere in it. For example, the child was instructed to wash the dishes for dinner. If he is unfinished or poorly washed, it is impossible to correct. This is the area of ​​responsibility of the baby, indicated by the parents. The child must understand that no one else will do this work. If the kid washed three out of five plates, then someone will have to eat from the dirty ones.
This simple technique will allow the child to master such emotions as shame and responsibility, to understand the importance of completing a case. Not a single theoretical lesson can be compared with labor practice. Many teachers wrote about this, including Makarenko. Of course, the baby can be helped, especially if he asks for it.
Creativity also affects emotions, but in a slightly different way than labor. For example, a child molded a plasticine figurine or drew something. Placing a picture in a frame and figures on a shelf allows him to experience emotions such as pride, satisfaction, inspiration or even inspiration.
Therefore, children's creativity should not be neglected. Drawings and crafts must be considered, commented, discussed. This is extremely important not only for the formation and development of emotions, but also for gaining confidence in the baby.