A body of research that investigates the social, cognitive and emotional effects of digital technologies on the development of children reports that digital technologies are limiting activities that connect children with people. On the other hand, there is a great amount of research on the positive role of digital play. However, digital games per se and their influence on young children’s development remain less researched. The role of digital play and digital games in the development of young children is discussed within the framework of Vygotsky’s cultural-historical conception. This article proposes a distinction between digital play (DP) and digital game (DG) as a cultural tool connected to the main components of play – imaginary situations, play rules and play actions. A ‘normative situation’, an important component of play that links play rules, roles and play actions, is introduced as a reliable criterion for assessing the developing potential of DGs.

Child-centred and teacher-directed curricula have long been presented as mutually exclusive approaches to early education. Interestingly, recent research suggests a ‘balance’ of the two yields the best child outcomes, yet how this balance is struck varies considerably across contexts and even studies. In this paper, we use the writings of Russian cultural-historical scholars to examine the orientations of adult and child perspectives. We propose a unifying theoretical model to describe the hypothetical extremities of child-centred and teacher-directed activities as a way that educational leaders may chart children’s activities across this spectrum. Given the moral imperative to provide balance, the model is proposed as a way to approximate it across the child’s day. We also offer two central classroom techniques as pedagogical moves to redress the tension between child-centred and teacher-directed approaches and ensure the morally imperative inclusion of children’s perspectives.

There are two ways of comprehending child development. The first one stresses the cultural essence of man. It regards the child as a human being that has not yet acquired culture and is faced with the task of its acquisition. The important part of culture is the system of norms, including various means and patterns, the so-called ‘ideal forms’. The bearer of these ideal forms and culture is the adult. The zone of proximal development is not for inventing new forms of culture, but for mastering the norms that already exist. Another approach sees the child as an individual with endless, limitless abilities. Thus the task that arises before the adult is to ensure that the child’s potential is fulfilled. This implies reaching out beyond the limits of the zone of proximal development as the abilities are limitless. And that, in turn, implies another space, aimed at new forms of culture which have not yet existed. We have called this the space of child actualization. In this space, the child’s role is the leading one. In its very sense this space is the opposite of the zone of proximal development where the acquisition of the old norms occurs (i.e. the assimilation of the child into culture); on the contrary, the space of actualization is a place where new norms are created, where the adult helps the child to implement the latter’s intentions, and where culture is assimilated into the child.

The purpose of this article is to analyze the state of modern research on children’s play, approaches to its study, as well as existing methods of its evaluation. The relevance of the topic is due to the leading role of the play in preschool childhood and the complexity of this phenomenon. Play is actively studied, and play interventions are often used. However, the analysis of the literature shows confusion and uncertainty of terminology due to a large spread of theoretical positions and methodological approaches to the study of play. This creates great difficulties in planning and conducting research, and affects their results. The article deals with the issues of defining and classifying play, understanding its structure and development. The main trends of modern research and their connection with classical game theories, the role of cultural-historical approach and the contribution of E.O. Smirnova to the study of play are shown.

For the authors, the way from a modern to a post-modern psychology requires dialectical thinking. Dialectical thinking recognizes the importance of contradiction, change, and synthesis; it also includes recognition of the value as well as limits of modern epistemological approaches. The article describes foundations for both ongoing efforts to understand and research the ontogeny of dialectical thinking and for appreciating the scope of dialectical thinking and its relevance for establishing a bridge from modern to post-modern psychology.