Kindergarten social skills lessons
8 Skills for Kindergarten Success
Kindergarten is a big transition for kids! The expectations are new, and some of the social interactions are new, especially for students who didn’t attend pre-Kindergarten programs. We want kids to share, take turns, make transitions, and so much more (all while learning new academic concepts as well). To help kids make the transition, we practice these 8 Kindergarten social skills that contribute to school and social success!
1 – Sharing
This Kindergarten social skill probably seems like a given, but it’s so important for Kindergarten success! Students spend a lot of time in free play with their peers and working alongside one another. Sharing toys and sharing materials is a must. Click here to read more about a sharing activity I do in my social skills group.
2 – Taking Turns
Taking turns goes hand in hand with sharing, but there’s a distinct difference that many incoming Kindergarteners don’t know just yet. When we’re sharing, we have common materials that are available to everyone at the same time. For example, students might be sharing a box of Legos while they all build independently or together.
When we’re taking turns, one person is using an item or items while another person waits. For example, students might take turns using the swing. Or they might take turns reading a particular book. This is when students might need specific instruction on waiting strategies while they wait for their turn!
3 – Accepting No
Newsflash: sometimes kids will hear no, especially at school. Sometimes, they might ask for a turn with something and someone might say no. Or they may want to do something in the classroom and hear a no from a teacher. Accepting no is another important Kindergarten social skill! We can teach kids calming strategies to use in the moment when they experience disappointment, frustration, or anger over a no answer.
4 – Listening & Following Directions
Listening and following directions are huge skills for not just Kindergarten success, but school success as a whole – and we end up teaching this way beyond Kindergarten sometimes! First, we teach kids what listening actually looks and feels like in their bodies. Eyes on the speaker, body still, mouth closed, hands empty, and ears ready to listen. Our bodies feel calm, open, and in anticipation!
Of course, listening has to come before following directions! And lots of directions will be coming to them. Some of our students may need a little extra instruction & practice following one-, two- and multi-step directions that they will undoubtedly receive in the classroom.
5 – Following Rules
Following rules probably also seems like a given, but this doesn’t just apply to school rules. Kids will have the freedom to play with one another during recess. Following game and social rules will be a learning experience for many Kindergarteners, and they may need explicit instruction in social rules. We practice this by playing games, changing rules to familiar games, and talking about how we feel when others don’t follow the rules.
6 – Stating Needs
Need some personal space? Ask for it with words. Need help? Let an adult know. That phrase “use your words,” comes up a lot in Kindergarten, but sometimes our newest students need explicit instruction in this because they don’t have the words yet. Practicing asking for a break, some space, or help is big for Kindergarten success!
7 – Transitioning Activities
It’s hard to stop doing something we enjoy and move on to something else – even for some adults! We can help students tune in to transition signals like teacher reminders, visual calendars, and timers so that they aren’t surprised by transitions. And when it is hard to move on, we can use some of those calming strategies we use to deal with no responses too.
8 – Being Flexible
Not getting what we want is hard. But being able to accept alternatives, roll with changes, and accept mistakes are all important Kindergarten social skills! Setting up an accepting and safe classroom environment where upcoming changes are communicated and mistakes are welcomed is key!
What other Kindergarten social skills do you focus on during the first semester? What are your favorite games to teach these skills? Get my Kindergarten Social Skills Curriculum here.
Social Skills Activities For Kindergarteners
By Ashley Wehrli
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Social skills help kids socialize and interact with others in a respectful way.two young girls playing together
When a child is ready for kindergarten, it is a big adjustment for both the child and the mom. It is a whole new world, and they are about to start their journey into school and learning, and while this can be overwhelming, it is important. It may seem like children go into school with little knowledge, but they do have some skills that they have developed naturally, or learned at home, but there is nothing wrong with wanting to improve on them. School is also about a lot more than just academic learning; children learn crucial social skills while they are in school.
According to APA, when children are entering kindergarten, they have the basis of their social skills, and they are starting to understand the emotions of others and can likely tell when someone is happy, mad or sad. They are also exploring how to express themselves in a social setting, and they will start to develop their first experience with true friendships. If mom wants to build on the foundation of social skills her kindergartner has already made, she can do so with these 7 activities that are fun and engaging.
RELATED: Do Video Games Actually Help Kids With Social Skills?
7/7 Staring ContestA Child Looking Off In The Distance
Staring contests are something that we have all done once or twice as a fun game, but it can help children develop their social skills. According to Positive Action, children can struggle with maintaining eye contact, and a staring contest can help children learn this communication skill. If they still have a problem, mom can place a sticker on her forehead, and have them look at the sticker while they talk to each other.
6/7 “Roll The Ball”A Small Child Holding A Ball
Children at this age are just learning how to play together, and this is something that needs to be fostered because it plays a large role in social skills. Sitting across from someone and rolling a ball back and forth, even if it starts in silence, is a great way to show a child how to play with someone else. As the game goes on, conversations can evolve.
5/7 Emotion CharadesEggs With Different Emotions On Them
Everyone loves a good game of charades, and emotion charades can be a great way to teach social skills to kindergarten-aged children. The whole family can join in and pick an emotion out of a hat, and then they have to act it out for everyone else to guess. This is simple, and something that every child can do.
4/7 Mimic MeA Child Copying What Mom Is Doing
Speaking on emotions, a fun activity could be to mimic, or copy, the emotions that someone else is doing with their face. This can be done anywhere, and it is a great way to help teach them how to recognize emotions, which will help them when they are having real conversations. They will be better at reading the other person and determine how they are feeling.
3/7 StorytellingA Child Reading A Book
A large part of social skills is communicating with another person, and storytelling can be a great way to practice this. According to Friendship Circle, if you want to get your child used to having conversations with other people, do some improve storytelling. You can do this with your child, or involve other members of the family. You start off the story, and then stop and your child has to pick up where you left. It goes on until the story comes to a natural end.
2/7 Topic GameA Group Of Kids In A Circle
When a conversation happens, there is usually a topic that is being talked about and the topic game can be a great way to introduce your child to this concept. You can either sit with your child, or have a group of people sitting in a circle and you are going to go through the alphabet and everyone has to think of something that starts with the letter they have landed on. For A, someone can say alligator, and then it goes to B for balloon and so forth.
1/7 Simon SaysKid With Arms Up Playing Simon Says
Simon Says seems like a simple and classic childhood game, but it is teaching a lot about listening and social skills. When a child plays simon says, they have to listen very closely to what is being said to them, and this is a skill they will need when trying to communicate with friends. They also need to take charge and communicate effectively when it is their turn to call out the moves.
A lot of classic childhood games teach our children much more than we think, and any game that involves listening and giving instructions is a great way to introduce the concept of conversing with others.
Sources: APA, Positive Action, Friendship Circle
Social skills of preschoolers - the development of social skills in children
The development of social skills is a necessary point of education. A child with a high degree of socialization will quickly get used to kindergarten, school, any new team; in the future will easily find a job. Social skills have a positive effect on interpersonal relationships - friendship, the ability to cooperate.
Let's figure out what social skills are.
What are social skills and why develop them?
Social skills - a group of skills, abilities that are formed during the interaction of a person with society and affect the quality of communication with people.
Man is a social being: all our talents and aspirations are realized thanks to other members of the group. Others evaluate our actions, approve or condemn our behavior. It is difficult to reach the pinnacle of self-actualization alone.
That is why social skills are important. They should be developed from early childhood and honed throughout life.
Social skills are a reflection of the child's emotional intelligence, to which educators and teachers assign an important role in the process of personality development. Without this group of skills, a smart child will not be able to apply the acquired knowledge in practice: it is not enough to create something outstanding, you need to be able to correctly convey thoughts to the public.
Sometimes people mistakenly believe that social skills relate exclusively to the topic of communication, communication. In fact, skills include many multidirectional aspects: an adequate perception of one's own individuality, the ability to empathize, work in a team, etc.
Why do we need social skills?
- Regulate the area of interpersonal relationships: the child easily makes new friends, finds like-minded people.
- Minimize psychological stress: children with developed social skills quickly adapt, do not feel sad due to changes in external circumstances.
- They form an adequate self-esteem from childhood, which positively affects life achievements and development in adulthood.
- Social skills cannot be separated from building a successful career: the best specialists must not only understand the profession, but also have high emotional intelligence.
Development of social skills in a child
Social skills need to be developed from preschool age, but older children and even teenagers may well learn to interact with the world.
It is recommended to pay attention to areas of life that bring discomfort to the child, significantly complicate everyday life.
- Friends, interesting interlocutors: the kid does not know how to join the team, he prefers to sit in the corner while the others play.
- Verbal difficulties. The child does not understand the rules of conversation, is poorly versed in the formulas of etiquette (when you need to say hello, say goodbye, offer help).
- Problems with the non-verbal side of communication. Such a baby does not recognize the shades of emotions, it is difficult to understand how others relate to him. Cannot "read" faces and gestures.
- Does not know the measure in expressing a point of view: too passive or, conversely, aggressive.
- The child bullies classmates (participates in bullying) or is a victim.
In case of severe moral trauma, one should consult a psychologist: for example, school bullying is a complex problem that children are not able to cope with on their own. The involvement of parents and teachers is required.
In other cases, family members may well be able to help the child develop social skills.
What are the general recommendations?
1. Be patient
Don't push your child to get the job done. Let them take the initiative: for example, do not rush to help during school gatherings, let the baby work on the problem on his own. The same goes for lessons and other activities.
2. Support undertakings
Children's dreams seem trifling to adults, but the initiative turns into a habit over the years and helps to discover new projects, meet people, and experiment.
3. Criticize the right way
When making negative comments, remember the golden rule of criticism: analyze the work, highlighting both positive and negative sides in a polite way. Commenting on the specific actions of the child, and not his personality or appearance - this will lead to problems with self-esteem.
4. The right to choose
It is important for children to feel that their voice is taken into account and influences the course of events. Invite your child to personally choose clothes, books, cartoons. Ask about ideas, plans: “We are going to have a rest together at the weekend. What are your suggestions?
5. Personal space
Make sure that the baby has a place where he can be alone and take a break from talking. Personal things should not be touched: rearrange without prior discussion, read correspondence with friends, check pockets, etc.
Children, noticing the respectful attitude of adults, quickly begin to pay in the same coin; the atmosphere in the family becomes warm and trusting.
What social skills should be developed in a child?
Let's dwell on the main qualities and skills, the development of which is worth paying attention to.
1. The ability to ask, accept and provide help
Without the ability to ask for help, the child will deprive himself of valuable advice; the lack of the ability to accept help will lead to losses, and the inability to provide help will make the baby self-centered.
- Let the child help those in need: for example, a lagging classmate.
- Explain to your child that getting help from friends and teachers is not a shame.
- Show by personal example that mutual help enriches experience: tell how you exchange advice with colleagues, friends.
2. The ability to conduct a conversation and get the right information
Being a good conversationalist is difficult, but the skill is honed over time and brings a lot of benefits.
- Prompt your child for dialogue development options: for example, you can start a conversation with a relevant question, a request for help.
- Do not leave the child in the role of a silent listener: when discussing pressing issues at home, ask the opinion of the baby.
- Support children's public speaking: presentations at school, performances, funny stories surrounded by loved ones will add confidence.
Empathy is the ability to recognize the emotions of others, put yourself in the place of another person, empathize.
This ability will make the child humane, prudent. How can it be developed?
- Start by recognizing the child's feelings - it is useless to listen to people if the person does not feel personal experiences. Ask your baby: “How do you feel after a quarrel with friends?”, “Do you want to relax today?”
- After conflicts with classmates, ask your child how the children with whom the quarrel may feel now.
- While watching cartoons, reading books, pay your child's attention to the emotional state of the characters.
4. Ability to work in a team
Many children can easily cope with tasks alone, but this is not a reason to refuse to work in a team. It gives the opportunity to exchange ideas and experience, delegate tasks, achieve goals faster and more efficiently.
- If the child does not communicate with members of the team, try to introduce him to another social group: for example, the lack of communication with classmates can be compensated by a circle of interests, where the child will feel calmer.
- Make the family a friendly team in which the child has his own "duties": for example, do housework, remind parents of upcoming events. Any activity related to the well-being of other family members will do.
5. Respect for personal boundaries
The absence of an obsessive desire to interfere in other people's lives is a valuable skill that helps to win people's sympathy.
- Respect the child's personal boundaries: do not enter the nursery unannounced, do not rummage through personal belongings and correspondence, if the matter does not concern the life and safety of the baby.
- If the child violates other people's boundaries (takes toys without permission, asks uncomfortable questions), talk about it in private.
6. Ability to overcome conflict situations
It is difficult to imagine our life without conflicts. The task of the child is to learn how to culturally enter into a discussion, defend his point of view, and not be led by the provocations of his interlocutors.
- Discuss problems that arise calmly, without raising your voice. Do not put pressure on the child with parental authority unnecessarily: the child is a separate person who has the right to an opinion.
- Do not judge people for views that differ from those of your family but do not affect your well-being. Show your child that the world is very different.
- You can demonstrate to children the basics of a civilized dispute, explain what arguments are, etc. It is advisable to teach this child in kindergarten.
Stable and adequate self-esteem is a quality that not all adults possess.
It is formed under the influence of many factors: relationships between parents, the role of the child in the family circle, the characteristics of the environment that surrounded the child in early childhood.
It is important that the child does not grow up to be either a narcissistic narcissist with fragile self-esteem, or an overly shy person. How can you help your child find balance?
- Praise your child for personal progress: to receive a compliment from parents, it is not necessary to win prizes in school competitions. The zeal of the baby, the interest shown and the stamina also deserve praise.
- Explain, remind the children that initially they are worthy of respect and love, like all people around.
Social skills will help in many areas of life: in studies, hobbies, friendships, building a reputation in a team. The main thing is to encourage and support children at all stages.
Emotional intelligence for children
We introduce children to the types of emotions, how to manage them and how to show themselves in teamwork, through situational games
Formation of social skills of children of senior preschool age in social and personal development in preschool
For a number of years we have been living in a situation of reforming the domestic formation, which occurs rather chaotically, since it is difficult to distinguish it fundamental idea. For many years, preschool education in Russia has been focused on ensuring the cognitive development of children. Development at the same time identified with the formation of knowledge, skills and abilities, which led to its explicit simplification (simplification). However, the very purpose of preschool age is not so much in the acquisition of knowledge by the child, but in the formation of the basic properties of his personality: self-esteem and the image of "I", emotional needs sphere, moral values, meanings and attitudes, and also socio-psychological characteristics in the system of relations with others people.
The modern picture of childhood has also undergone various changes over the last two decades: there has been a noticeable change in toys, children's play, psychological and physical status of the child; a new children's literature and “dense” information space. There have been changes in the social environment of the child, which today consists mainly of adults: small families and the absence of yard children's communities leads to a failure in the transfer from one child to another of the components of the children's subculture. Important also the ever-accelerating pace of life for both children and parents. Here are the main characteristics of the new conditions of childhood.
Unfortunately, early childhood education professionals and often parents are not fully aware of the scale of change, are at a loss or in denial the right to the existence of new phenomena of childhood.
Teachers of preschool institutions are not yet fully aware of the importance of successful socialization of children to preserve their mental and social health. Although adults are increasingly concerned about such problems of socialization of children as non-constructive behavior, problems of their communication with adults and with each other.
There are various opportunities for the child's socialization: media, family, children's garden. The family today is losing its potential, losing culture in maintaining the game, communication with peers and so on. The system of preschool education is an institution that responds to the challenge of destroying the socio-cultural situation of development child, holding game forms of activity, which are very important for his development. Therefore, a modern preschool educational institution should become a place where the child will have the opportunity of a wide socio-practical independent contact with the most significant and close ones for its development areas of life.
Accumulation by a child under the guidance of an adult of valuable social experience and the development of his social skills is the way that contributes, firstly, revealing the age potential of a preschooler and, secondly, the successful entry into adulthood. The modern world is so arranged that one of the conditions for success is the ability to work productively in a team, to find ways interaction and understanding with people. From which it follows that the age potential cannot be realized in the absence of social maturity (competence) of the child at a certain stage of his development.
In its most general form, social competence can be represented as understanding of the relations I” - “society, the ability to choose the right social guidelines and organize your activities in accordance with these guidelines or as social skills that allow a person to adequately fulfill the norms and rules of life in society.
And our task is to correctly and skillfully help him acquire social competence, the essence of which is the formation of social skills .
But there is a contradiction between the social need to form social competence in a child, starting from early childhood and insufficient development of organizational, content and methodological aspects successful solution of this issue in preschool institutions, which led to search for ways to solve the problem under study within the framework of the project. Essence of the project was to identify pedagogical means and forms of organization of activities preschool educational institution for the formation of social child competence - preschooler.
It is appropriate to quote here the words of the director of the Federal Development Institute education, head of the working group on the development of new standards Alexandra Asmolova: “What should kindergarten give first of all? Allow normal culturally appropriate and knowledge-intensive organization of the process of socialization of the child on different stages of preschool age.
At the stage of preschool childhood, the effectiveness of social and personal development during largely determined by the formation of preschool children's social skills that enable them to succeed in children's daily activities and gain recognition in the community of peers. That is why the subject of special the concern of preschool teachers is the organization of the educational process, providing for the mastery of preschool children with elementary social skills through a variety of play activities, contributing to the development in preschoolers of the value qualities of the personality and focused on establishing harmonious relationships between peers.
The theme of the project is “Formation of social skills of preschool children in the process of social and personal development in a preschool educational institution” fully reflects current trends in the modern system of preschool education and orients teachers to develop new content and implement it in educational activity for preschool children game activity resources as optimal conditions for effective social and personal development of preschoolers.
Theoretical substantiation of the project “Formation of children's social skills senior preschool age in the process of social and personal development”.
Social skills is a broad concept that is usually covers any skill or behavior that affects other people or influencing other people. Considering social skills such a point of view, it becomes clear how great a value can to have their inferior development.
Already at the stage of preschool age, children begin to realize that “it is good and what is bad. Children understand that society has rules and regulations regulating the behavior of others. Gradually they develop the ability observe simple rules and regulations and demonstrate mastery of elementary social skills in specific children's activities, such as through adults as well as on their own. Organization of the educational process the formation of social skills in children is carried out successfully if the resources of children's activities available to the age of preschoolers are used, and, primarily gaming .
It is well known that the game is the leading activity of the child preschool age. It is in the process of playing activity that preschoolers gain initial experience in performing elementary game actions accepting and fulfilling a socially oriented game role, demonstrate developed social skills.
As elementary social skills of preschool children, we viewed:
- the skill of establishing contacts with peers and the ability to maintain them;
- the ability to take part in collective affairs, to accept and provide assistance;
- the ability to coordinate and coordinate their actions and opinions with the actions and opinions of peers.
- the ability to negotiate with peers in a conflict situation.
The role of play in the formation of social skills in preschool children.
The socio-cultural situation reflected in the game creates favorable conditions for the formation of elementary social skills in preschool children defining a common goal, planning a sequence of actions, selecting the necessary means and the choice of ways to achieve the result. Thanks to gaming situations that arise in the game, the child gradually under favorable conditions skills of obedience to game settings and rules are formed, he is accustomed understand and accept the opinions and actions of other participants in the game, show them skills of benevolent and tolerant behavior. Children gradually begin demonstrate elements and models of social behavior in the game, jointly experience various emotional states, learn to achieve a common result, evaluate yourself and others.
Conditions for the development of cooperation between children are created in various ways children's activity, but the priority of play activity is unconditional, because a variety of game content, the integration of various activities in the game, bright the manifestation of emotions by children allows them to successfully accumulate the experience of cooperation. The nature of the game situation puts the child in a position that requires high the level of formation of his social skills in the choice of methods and forms interaction, coordination of goals, joint planning, distribution roles, achieving a common result.
II. Practical part.
The aim of the project was to create socio-pedagogical, psychological conditions for the formation of social skills in children of senior preschool age in the process of playing activities.
An important condition for the formation of social skills of older preschoolers we saw the development of social partnership between teachers and parents in social and personal direction of work, as well as the integration of the activities of all kindergarten professionals and educators. This is explained by The effectiveness of the acquisition of skills by children depends on the possibility of their transfer to everyday life.
The project was designed to help children through the difficult process of getting into the world of people, to develop the ability to adequately navigate in the social environment, realize the inherent value of one's own personality and other people.
The objectives of the project were:
1. Study and analysis of scientific and methodological literature on the subject of the project.
2. Creation of socio-pedagogical conditions for social development preschoolers.
3. Development of social and personal skills in gaming activities.
4. Interaction with adults on the topic of the project.
2.2. Stages of the project
1. Organizational (May - August 2012).
2. Main - (September - April 2012-2013).
3. Final - (May 2013).
2.3. The content of the project
1. Creation of socio-pedagogical, psychological conditions for the formation of social skills in children of senior preschool age in the process social and personal development.
2. Development of a system of classes for the social and personal development of preschoolers.
3. Selection of psychological games, exercises for children in this area work.
4. Organization of preliminary work with parents and educators.
5. Diagnosis of social skills using the methodology of Dybina O.V., Anfisova S.E., Kuzina A.Yu., presented in the manual “Pedagogical diagnostics competencies of preschoolers” (specifically used the method of diagnosing social and personal competence).
Purpose: the process of forming social and personal skills through
- conducting game trainings with children of the senior group according to the programs: S. Kryukova “Let's live together!” and Kryukova S.V., Slobodyanik N.P. “I am surprised, angry, afraid, boasting and rejoicing.”
- Psychological games and exercises for the development of social skills.
- Consultations for teachers on the topic: “Diagnostics of the formation personal qualities of a preschooler”.
- Conducting the training “Methods of resolving children's conflicts”.
Tasks of the main stage.
- The ability to understand the emotional state of a peer, adult and tell about it.
- The ability to obtain the necessary information in communication.
- The ability to listen to another person, respect his opinion, interests.
- Ability to conduct a simple dialogue with adults and peers.
- The ability to calmly defend one's opinion.
- The ability to correlate one's desires, aspirations with the interests of other people.
- Ability to take part in collective affairs.
- The ability to treat other people with respect.
- Ability to accept and provide assistance.
- The ability not to quarrel, to react calmly in conflict situations.
The above tasks were implemented through play complex activity , which provides for the integration of content, forms and methods in educational process of formation in preschool children of social skills.
Implementation of the educational activities of a teacher-psychologist with children in the formation of social skills in preschoolers was carried out through game trainings with children of the senior group according to the programs: S. Kryukova “Let's live together!” and Kryukova S.V., Slobodyanik N.P. “I am surprised, angry, afraid, I brag and rejoice."
The following main methods were used: simulation, communication and role-playing games, psycho-gymnastics, creating problem situations with their playing out, elements of group discussion, methods of self-regulation.
The method of mini-projects was also used, representing a set of actions, culminating in the creation of a creative product. Seemed appropriate associate a mini-project at preschool age with play activities, because in At this age, it is play activity that dominates, and learning takes place in the process of the game. A game situation was proposed as a “problem”, a solution which assumed research creative searches, some kind of interaction. Children needed to be included in the discussion of the project, to distribute efforts for performance, each to coordinate part of his work with the general. The children were learning use the material and equipment, observing the sequence, skill coordinate their interests with the interests of partners, support partners, yield to their desires or prove the validity of your remark.
In addition, some psychotherapeutic techniques were used: emotional reaction of negative experiences, withdrawal and reduction social fears, search and playing out a way out of difficult situations.
The development of social skills took place in three stages: acquisition of knowledge, trial applying this knowledge, acquiring stable skills.
Work with educators was structured as follows: in the morning and evening periods of time, complexes of various didactic exercises, entertaining games, story-didactic games and story-role-playing games, walks of a social orientation, which created the conditions for a successful consolidating and improving children's initial social skills in the process of social - personal development. Entertaining game situations round dance games, ecstatic games (from the Greek “admiration”), various artistic activities, expeditions were also used in work with children. When organizing independent activities of preschoolers, teachers provide preschoolers the opportunity to demonstrate the formed social skills in the game, artistic and creative, musical and labor activity, in communication and etc.
Educators in their work used the following techniques in the game :
- a certain common task, game or connection of one's role with the roles of others participants (its significance for the development of the game). Cultivating the position of a partner in common activities, understanding of their responsibility to a group of participants for the quality of their work, as well as their role in obtaining the overall result.
- Pre-acting by the teacher during the activity anticipated possible situations leading to disruption of the transformation process (“and if…”), with a discussion of appropriate ways of mutual regulation, corresponding social norms .
- Differentiated approach to children, taking into account the degree of their activity in situations of interaction and focus on achieving a common positive result.
To solve the problems raised, a number of conditions were created:
- requiring interaction, joint decisions).
- Systematic organization of activities that objectively require associations of participants; distributing it into a number of component operations, each of which can be evaluated; union of all partial results to the grand total.
- All-round support for the activity of each child in situations interactions between partners, correction of negative manifestations, treatment attention to the importance of each participant's proposals in obtaining quality overall results.
Four blocks of interactive games were used:
- Block of interactive games for cohesion;
- Block of interactive games for teaching effective ways of communication;
- Block of interactive games reflecting the claim to social recognition;
- A block of interactive games aimed at removing conflict.
Consultations were organized for parents “Communicate with the child. How?" and “How to play with a child” in the club “School of a young family”, acquaintance with novelties pedagogical process, parents were invited to a common parent meeting, which emphasized the importance of the formation of social skills as conditions of social and personal readiness for school, a presentation was held programs to develop social skills in group meetings.
Work on the formation of social behavioral skills in preschool children age is impossible without active cooperation with the music director, head of the art studio, physical education instructor.
Mutual visits with children's garden No. 2 Iskorka, an interactive game and a joint children's activities in making work Autumn bouquet, as well as joint physical education leisure. There was also an expedition to the forest “Let's help the forest be clean!”
At the end of the year, the results of the work done were summed up:
1. Children became more sociable, friendly, they learned to set and maintain contacts, avoid conflict situations.
2. Children learned to listen to each other in the classroom, became more organized, disciplined, attentive, observant.
3. Improved communication skills and abilities.
4. The number of negative emotions and conflict situations has decreased.
5. Children learned the ability to negotiate, take turns, listen to the opinion of comrades.
6. Children have become more united.
The problem of the formation of social and personal skills is relevant and can be successfully be decided in the play activities of children while integrating the interaction of all kindergarten professionals.
- Order of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation (Ministry of Education and Science Russia) dated October 17, 2013 N 1155 Moscow On approval of the federal state educational standard of preschool education”..
2. “The formation of social skills in preschool children in the process social and personal development” [Text] / teaching aid under ed. N. Yu. Maidankina . - Ulyanovsk, 2012.
- “Pedagogical diagnostics of competencies of preschoolers” [Text] / teaching aid, ed. O. V. Dybina - M., 2010.
- “Pedagogical interaction with kindergarten” [Text] / methodological allowance ed.


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Unlike other cultures with a high degree of technological skill, the second–millennium BCE Indus- Sarasvati civilization in South Asia has left no evidence of monumental sculpture and architecture. Such large-scale grandeur, however, would later characterize the area—from great Buddhist stupas to the Taj Mahal. Architecture and painting embodied religious influences throughout history, especially Hindu and Islamic, and today exhibit contemporary secular expressions as well.
The cultural beliefs, ideas, and practices that find visual expression in the art of South Asia—which includes the present-day nations of India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka— have had a formative influence on the rest of Asia and continue to provide important paradigms of being and becoming in modern world culture.
The beginnings of South Asian sculpture may be found in the early Indus-Sarasvati civilization (present-day northwestern India and eastern Pakistan) of the second millennium BCE. The mature phase of this civilization (2500–1700 BCE) carries evidence of a high level of technical knowledge and skill but, curiously, a lack of monumental sculpture or large structures such as temples or palaces. From its ruins, archaeologists have recovered small figurines in stone or cast bronze or copper, as well as terracotta animals and female figurines, the last presumed to be cultic objects. Archaeologists have also found a large number of steatite seals with impressions of bovine unicorns, buffaloes, bulls, tigers, rhinoceros, and other composite animal figures, as well as some enigmatic human forms, surmised to have had either commercial or ritual uses (or both).
Mauryan Sculpture, c. 324–c. 200 BCE
Little material evidence has been found between the Indus-Sarasvati period and the imperial Mauryan remains of the third century BCE. The reasons for this absence are unclear, but perhaps attributable to the use of perishable construction materials and prohibitions against material representations or portrayals of deities and/or their alternatives. Vedic ritual culture is presumed to have established itself around 1500 BCE, followed by the contemplative esotericism of the Upanishads around 800 BCE and the birth of Buddhism and Jainism in the sixth century BCE.
In 326 BCE, the incursion of Alexander of Macedon (Alexander the Great) into the northwest border of the South Asian subcontinent, as part of his conquest in 330 BCE of the extensive Persian Achaemenid Empire of Darius III, created a political vacuum that was swiftly filled by the first Mauryan king, Candragupta (reigned c. 321–297 BCE). Candragupta’s imperial ambitions were styled after Darius and Alexander, and scholars attribute his successor Asoka (reigned c. 273–232 BCE) with the Persian practice of building stone monuments, as well as with incorporating Achaemenid and Hellenistic motifs and devices in structures. In 265 BCE Asoka embraced Buddhism and proceeded to mark numerous prominent pilgrimage routes and Buddhist centers through his vast empire with tall polished stone pillars inscribed with edicts expounding the Buddhist law. Though this practice and the literary style of the inscribed proclamations are reminiscent of an Achaemenid method used to establish the law of the emperor, they also extend to an ancient indigenous Vedic tradition, the cosmic pillar. Achaemenid and Hellenistic decorative motifs, such as rosettes, palmettes, spirals, and reel-and-bead patterns appear on these pillars and on other structural remains from Asoka’s time, attesting to the cosmopolitan nature of his court and its culture.
Other monuments attributed to Asoka’s patronage include Buddhist stupas (relic-mounds) and rockcut caves, both of which became important settings for sculpture for a thousand or more years. Asokan monuments were created in sandstone and finished to a high polish, a technique that was lost to South Asia after Mauryan times.
A number of massive, frontal stone sculptures depicting male and female figures also remain from Mauryan times. These are representations of yakshas and yakshinis, supernatural elementals that had been popular in propitiatory worship for protection, fertility, or wealth. These beings and the gods of the Vedic pantheon became assimilated into early Buddhism and soon reappeared iconically as Buddhist threshold deities, protectors of devotees, bestowers of auspiciousness, and servants of the Buddha.
Sculpture during the Shunga Dynasty, c. 185–73 BCE
The Mauryan dynasty lasted for barely fifty years after the death of Asoka and was followed by the Brahminical Shunga dynasty in northern South Asia. Buddhist lay patronage, however, had developed a strong foundation, and monastic monuments continued to flourish during the second century BCE. Typical examples of the sculpture of this period are found among the remains of the stupa of Bharhut. The circular stone railing (vedika) enclosing the stupa has carved roundels on its horizontal and vertical components, often elaborated into ornate lotuses. Some of these roundels have carvings of human heads or animals at their center and some are filled in with narrative scenes from the life of the Buddha or episodes from tales of his past lives. At this stage, Buddha’s figure is never depicted; instead we see symbols such as the Bodhi tree (under which the Buddha attained enlightenment), the Wheel of the Law, or a stupa, according to narrative context. The relief carving is shallow and frontal and harks back to a tradition in wood. On the vertical entrance-posts of the vedika are chiseled large figures of yakshas and yakshinis, standing on animal or dwarf mounts.
This post-Mauryan Buddhist relief tradition reached its full maturity around the first century BCE, as evidenced in the gateways (torana) of the Great Stupa at Sanchi. This stupa, at the center of a monastic complex, was established by Asoka and further enlarged during Shunga times. Around 100 BCE, during the reign of the Satavahanas, four great gateways were erected at the cardinal entrances to this stupa. The horizontal and vertical elements of these gateways carry carvings thematically similar to those at Bharhut. These carvings demonstrate much greater technical assurance, however; the narrative arrangements, particularly on the extended horizontal architraves, show a refined clarity of form, a varied mobility of posture, and a judicious use of devices to enhance sense of depth where necessary. Large and powerful figures of elephants, lions, or dwarfs are carved out deeply on the vertical pillars and seem to support the upper portions. But perhaps the most perfect realizations on these gates are the shalabhanjikas, fertility symbols in the form of voluptuous women posed seductively, the rhythmic swing of their forms clinging to fruiting tree branches. The perfect combination of ecstatic sensuousness and contemplative repose in these figures became one of the aesthetic ideals of South Asian sculpture, seeking fulfillment in different forms through history.
Sculpture during the Kushan Dynasty, 78–200 CE
Around the beginning of the Christian era, the Kushan dynasty, originating in the borderlands of Central Asia and China, established itself as the imperial power in northern South Asia. The most famous king of this dynasty was Kanishka (reigned 78–101 CE). Around this time the first figural depictions of the Buddha make their appearance, almost simultaneously in the northwest province of Gandhara and the Gangetic metropolis of Mathura. Reasons for this iconic appearance are unknown, but may be related to doctrinal shifts in Buddhism from the more austere Theravada Buddhism toward the devotionalism of Mahayana Buddhism. Both the Gandhara and Mathura Buddha images express a consistent iconography, though they are stylistically divergent. The Gandhara Buddha is modeled after a Greco-Roman Apollonian prototype, while the Mathura figure derives from indigenous yaksha traditions. In both cases, the Buddha is draped in monastic robes, has a halo behind his head and a whorl of hair between the eyebrows (urna), and is shown with a cranial protuberance (ushnisha) symbolizing transcendental knowledge. He is either seated in meditation or standing erect with his right hand raised in a gesture of bestowing fearlessness.
Whereas predominant naturalism marks the features and costuming of the Gandhara figure, simplified rounded features, see-through draping, monumentality, and physical tension projecting power distinguish the Mathura image. Bodhisattva figures in the characteristic styles of Gandhara and Mathura also appeared at this time, wearing regal accoutrements and, in the case of named and worshipped bodhisattvas, carrying their distinctive attributes. The Kushan period also yields the earliest Brahmanical images in stone, representing the three major cults of Hindu worship—those devoted to Siva, Vishnu, and the Mother Goddess, particularly in her form as Durga, the destroyer of evil. Other prominent Brahmanical deities represented include Surya and Skanda.
Sculpture under the Guptas, (c. 320–c. 500)
During the fourth century, a new Hindu imperial dynasty established itself in northern South Asia, whose reign, patronage, and courtly culture are credited with the development of the classical style in South Asian art. This was the Gupta dynasty, whose most famous king was Candra Gupta II (reigned 375–415 CE). During this period, the major center for the production of Buddha images in the east shifted from Mathura to Sarnath. Idealized soft modeling and self-absorbed, tranquil features characterize the style of this period, which replaced the Kushan Buddhas. Standardized and compacted iconic elements and a vocabulary of distinctive hand gestures (mudras), meant to mark special occasions, accompanies these images. Others figures in the Buddhist pantheon undergo a similar elaboration and stylistic change, and the Buddha and several bodhisattvas also appear in bronze casts.
During this period relief sculptures draw upon a proliferation of Hindu deities, organized spatially in integrated contexts of ritual worship. Initially, these works were sited in niches inside cave-temples, but the stand-alone Hindu temple in stone also evolved at this time and henceforth became the setting for sculpture. Because the Guptas were followers of Vishnu, images of this deity and his incarnations (avatars), were frequently represented, and an increased emphasis on goddesses and other female images is apparent in the works.
A developed Saivite iconography, depicting mythical episodes connected with Siva and his consort, Parvati, also found expression at sites of cultic worship. Saivite cultic placement consigns the abstract phallic icon of Siva (the lingam) to the sanctum, faced from the entrance of the temple by Siva’s mount, the bull Nandi, and surrounded along a clockwise circumambulatory path by niches carrying other gods and goddesses and scenes showing the pastimes of Siva.
By the end of the fifth century, all these figures evolved into an aesthetic that shared the monumental repose of the Gupta Buddha but integrated it with a power of massiveness and restrained ecstatic delight. Contemporaneously, in the Deccan (central India), a related but more voluptuous aesthetic developed in Buddhist and Hindu figural expression, under the patronage of the powerful Vakatakas, related by marriage to the Guptas. Examples of the full fruition of the Vakataka Buddhist style are visible at the cave excavations at Ajanta in southern central India, while the early excavations at nearby Ellora or at the island of Elephanta, dateable to the early sixth century, show examples of Deccan Saivite sculpture of this period at its ripeness.
Developments in Sculpture, Sixth to Twelfth Centuries
Though the stand-alone Hindu stone temple first appeared in South Asia under the Guptas, it evolved into maturity in the sixth century under the Western Calukya dynasty (543–757; c. 975–c. 1189) in the southern Deccan, and through the seventh century in southern India under the Pallavas (c. 550–728 CE). Sculpture during this period continued to develop local variants of the Gupta iconography and style, but in these southern centers so did a marked tendency toward a greater plastic dynamism in the figures. A fine example of this may be observed in a panel from seventh-century Pallava Mamallapuram depicting Durga battling the buffalo demon. Here the dramatic interest and the portrayal of power in motion replaces the iconic stillness and massiveness of Gupta deities. Subsequent sculpture in southern India continues to develop in fluidity, reaching perhaps the zenith of integrating stillness and movement in the tenth-century image of the dancing Siva, Nataraja, which was developed in South India under Cola patronage.
From the tenth to the twelfth century, South Asian sculptors evolved such a consummate skill and facility in carving that sculpture during this period spills out of the measured enclosure of niches and dominates the temple surface. The temple as an integral whole projects the impression of the mighty, immobile, cosmic Mount Meru, which contains the multitudinous, varied activity of the world at its base. The sculpted forms of deities and celestial denizens stand or interact in various fluid postures, expressing the ecstatic repose of transcendental action. In the case of the temples at Orissa and Khajuraho in eastern and central India, respectively, a strong erotic element also found expression, indicating the prominent presence of Tantric cults. This high achievement of the successful marriage of static soaring temple forms and teeming mobile surfaces marked the final creative outburst of the South Asian tradition in sculpture.
Buddhism disappeared from India by the thirteenth century and gradual Islamic dominance of northern South Asia from the twelfth century inhibited the production of large-scale Hindu temple complexes. The Vijayanagara kingdom of the south and other pockets that offered resistance to Muslim conquest managed to continue the tradition until the sixteenth and seventeenth century, but with a progressive diminution of creativity.
Islamic architecture brought a new visual language of domes, arches, and minarets to the South Asian building environment and found expression in mosques, tombs, and forts. Marrying Afghan and Turkish styles with the Indic skill in stone carving, it left its most prominent marks in the cities of north central India and to some extent in the Deccan region, from the twelfth to the nineteenth century. Eschewing figurative sculpture due to religious prohibition, this architecture nevertheless gives us the most exquisite carved, inlaid, and latticed surfaces with calligraphy, foliate patters, and intricate geometric designs.
Under Mughal rule (1526–1857 CE), Islamic architecture reached its greatest heights in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The gates, halls, pavilions, mosques, and tombs commissioned by the third Mughal emperor, Akbar (1543–1605), at Agra and Fatehpur Skiri can be seen as precursors to the legendary beauty of the Taj Mahal, built by Shah Jehan (1592– 1666) in Agra as a tomb for one of his wives, Mumtaz. Placed at the far end of a garden, the Taj’s soaring dome and minarets in white marble, combined with the majestic simplicity of its design and the perfection of its proportions, evoke a supernatural archetype. Close up, its massive white marble surface reveals colorful borders with flowers, leaves, and Qur’anic calligraphy inlaid using a pietra dura (relief mosaic with semiprecious stones) technique.
After 1857, most of South Asia was brought under the British crown as a colony of Great Britain. The colonial period, leading up to the division and political independence of India and Pakistan in 1947, was known for its imperial Victorian architecture, particularly in the major colonial centers of Calcutta (Kolkata), Bombay (Mumbai), Madras, and Delhi. Following independence, both India and Pakistan have entered into the mainstream of a global modernity, where international functional concerns mix with national and regional identity issues in fashioning a contemporary South Asian architecture.
The earliest remaining examples of painting in South Asia are Buddhist cave murals such as those in the monasteries at Ajanta. Here, two phases of painting, corresponding to two phases of excavation, may be distinguished, the earlier being from the first century BCE and the later from the fifth century CE. The themes depict stories and scenes, mainly from the life of the Buddha. The murals are made with mineral colors on a specially plastered surface and, particularly in the later phase, are characterized by hieratic scaling (more important figures are bigger), Buddha and bodhisattvas shown in formal poses and with stylized physiognomy, and others depicted more realistically. Elements of three-dimensional modeling and perspective are mixed in with two-dimensional “flat” figuring, to introduce a semblance of realism in representations where narrative interest clearly takes precedence over natural illusion.
In painting, following Ajanta of the Vakataka period, few other fragmentary murals in cave or temple settings remain. The earliest surviving manuscript paintings are eleventh-century illustrated Buddhist and Jaina palm-leaf manuscripts of religious texts. These texts were venerated as sacred objects and offered as religious donations by patrons.
Extant eleventh- and twelfth-century Buddhist palm-leaf manuscripts come largely from regions in eastern India and often have generic scenes from the life of the Buddha painted on the inner surfaces of the wooden boards that bind the palm leaves; such scenes also serve as dividing elements between segments of text. The images are iconic and seldom directly related to the text. Hieratic scaling and static figural postures executed using a rhythmic outline and filled in with flat opaque mineral colors characterize the painting style.
The Jaina manuscripts were mostly produced in the Gujarat region of western India. By the last quarter of the fourteenth century, paper had become the preferred medium for Jaina manuscripts, and a rectangular form more suited to larger illustrations gradually replaced the elongated palm-leaf format. Jaina manuscripts make use of a restricted and bold color scheme and rhythmically outlined, flattened figures, as in the Buddhist tradition. There is no attempt to depict spatial depth. A characteristic of the figures is their invariable presentation in profile with the eye on the invisible side of the face protruded into visibility.
The oldest extant illustrated Hindu manuscripts date to the second half of the fifteenth century and follow the conventions of Jaina painting. Hindu myths and epics had by this time become standardized and pervasive in popular South Asian culture, and episodic representations of these themes found expression in these illustrations. From the early sixteenth century, a bold shift appears in this tradition, prioritizing the image over the text. The by-then standard rectangular form of the page was mostly occupied by the pictorial representation, with an abbreviated textual description in the upper margin and the extended text on the obverse of the page. This tradition made its appearance in Rajasthan and the western Gangetic kingdoms of northern India and is presumed to have originated in royal and other wealthy patronage. The contemporaneous rising popularity of medieval Vaishnavism (worship of Vishnu), with its use of an erotic symbology to describe the mystical pastimes of Krishna (Vishnu’s most famous incarnation) must have played its part in fueling this production. The incorporation of a Vaishnav mystical context into literary and courtly amorous narratives characterizes this painting tradition and initiated a thematic stream that continued through the history of South Asian painting. Though these paintings attempt to convey spatial depth, they are essentially flat, with stylized figures shown in static profile, making hieratic gestures in starkly simplified color planes. This painterly aesthetic, commonly known as the “Rajput style,” remained a viable South Asian idiom of painting throughout subsequent centuries, resurfacing in various times and places.
Mughal Painting, 1526–1857
The sixteenth century also witnessed the hegemonic rule of the Mughals in northern South Asia, resulting in a new school of painting, unsurprisingly and commonly known as Mughal painting. The initiation of this school occurred in the mid-sixteenth century during the rule of the second Mughal emperor, Humayun (reigned 1530–1540 and 1555–1556). Humayan brought two master painters from the court of Tabriz—Abdus Samad and Mir Sayyid Ali—to found his atelier at Delhi in 1555. Within a year, Humayun died and was succeeded by his son, Akbar (reigned 1556–1605). Akbar had an abiding passion for the arts of painting and storytelling and quickly built up his father’s atelier to illustrate a large number of Persian and Hindu secular and religious texts. Akbar’s earliest commission was the illustration of the Tutinama (Tales of the Parrot). A large number of artists recruited from existing South Asian painting traditions worked under the direction of the Persian masters, resulting in a hybrid style and aesthetic which, by the time of Akbar’s second commission, had developed a distinctive identity. Mixed perspective, structured visibility of interiors, and natural elements such as mountains and trees are taken from Persian prototypes; hieratic patterning, bold coloring, and narrative arrangements are reminiscent of indigenous traditions; uniquely new with the early Mughal painting style were a patterned variety of coloring, a judicious introduction of three-dimensional modeling, and a crowded swirl of highly individualized figure-types laid out in a space divided by forms from nature (such as trees or rocks) to give an added sense of depth.
From the mid-sixteenth century, the influence of Renaissance naturalism, introduced into Akbar’s court by Jesuits, began to gain prominence in the works produced in his atelier. Space and volume were defined by light and shade. Aerial perspective was introduced, as were atmospheric effects to depict spatial recession.
These techniques continued to gain prominence in paintings from the courts of Akbar’s successors. The Mughal atelier remained as prolific under Akbar’s son, Jahangir (reigned 1605–1627), though the thematic interest shifted from dynamic narrative episodes to carefully attentive portraiture, scenes of psychological interest, and detailed though stylized studies of flowers and animals. A number of superb allegorical portraits of the emperor come to us from this court. Though the Mughal atelier continued during the reign of Jahangir’s son and successor, Shah Jahan (reigned 1628–1658), it seemed to have lost its vitality and inventiveness. The paintings of this period are marked by a courtly stiffness and formalism and lack the boldness of color or composition of either Rajput paintings or earlier Mughal work. The Mughal atelier largely dispersed during the reign of the Islamic puritan Aurangzeb (reigned 1658–1707), son and successor of Shah Jahan.
Seventeenth- and Eighteenth- Century Developments
In the Deccan kingdoms of central India, small Islamic states had established themselves since the fourteenth century and developed independent cultural traditions. Among these, the most important were the kingdoms of Golconda and Bijapur, which remained independent until late in the Aurangzeb’s reign. With cultural roots in Persia and Turkey, these kingdoms developed their own painting traditions, known as the Deccani style, marked by a rich coloration dominated by lavender, gold, and green, a jeweler’s eye for decorative pattern, and mystical or fantastic stylizations.
From Akbar’s time, a number of the Rajput courts came under the suzerainty of the Mughals, developing close courtly liaisons. Mughal stylistic influences began appearing in the paintings of a number of these courts. In the late seventeenth century, after the dispersal of artists from Aurangzeb’s court, further assimilation of Mughal thematic and stylistic idioms continued in the Hindu Rajput states. Here, the earlier predominance of Hindu religious themes was complemented by formalized portraiture of the maharaja seen in court or in gardens or terraces with attendants, or in equestrian or hunting scenes. But these scenes, and some Mughal stylistic elements, were mostly incorporated into flat decorative “Rajput” compositions in courts of this period, such as those of Kota and Mewar. The Bikaner paintings of the same period, on the other hand, show a much closer affinity to the naturalism of Mughal style combined with the decorative patterning and mystical palette of the Deccan courts.
The Mughal court saw a brief and brilliant revival during the reign of Aurangzeb’s grandson, Muhammad Shah (reigned 1719–1748). The idealized moody romanticism of the paintings produced under him, thematically focused on courtly love and characterized by naturalistic atmospheric effects, carried over once more to inspire two of the finest and most charismatic schools of late Rajput and Pahari painting respectively, those of Kishangarh and Kangra.
In the mid-eighteenth century, a fruitful collaboration between Raja Savant Singh (reigned 1748–1764) of the Rajput state of Kishangarh and the two master artists of his court, Bhavani Das and Nihal Chand, both originally from Delhi, led to the formation of a unique and distinctive style of painting. Extending the moody romanticism of the late Mughal court, Kishangarh painting of this period produced a large corpus of highly stylized depictions of its patron raja and the object of the raja’s affection, the court singer Bani Thani, with the two portrayed as Krishna and Krishna’s beloved Radha, respectively.
A similar effect, using different means and developing a different and more refined aesthetic, also appeared around the mid-eighteenth century in the hill states of Guler, Jasrota, and Kangra, and is attributed to the efforts of two artist brothers, Manaku and Nainsukh (1710–1778), and their students. Nainsukh’s work in the court of Raja Balwant Singh of Jasrota (1724–1763) in particular can be said to originate the highly prized late Kangra School. The thematic mainstay of this school, like the school in Kishangarh, drew upon the dalliances of Radha and Krishna. Here the late Mughal romantic figures and style are transformed by a dream-laden, tranquil, naturalistic backdrop into a languorous intimate amorous moment in the secret wood, where time stands still and the divine couple, stylized using an aesthetic of balanced refinement, savor eternal delight in time-born bodies.
From the mid-eighteenth century, the British presence in South Asia exerted a powerful influence on courtly taste, moving it toward photorealism. The advent of photography itself contributed in no small measure to this change. Indigenous artists trained in earlier courtly styles now adapted their work to imitate the camera. Whereas some of these artists continued serving native patrons, particularly through portraiture, the British employed several artists to record scenes of South Asian life, its landscapes, and its flora and fauna. The work of these artists forms a body known as the Company School.
Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries
At the beginning of the twentieth century, as part of a nationalistic rethinking of identity, the Calcutta artist Rabindranath Tagore and his students deliberately moved away from Western-influenced styles. Known today as the Bengal School, these artists fashioned a distinctive style affiliated with an international antimaterialist movement and Pan- Asianism by integrating elements of Rajput, Mughal, Japanese, and Pre-Raphaelite style. From the second quarter of the twentieth century, international Modernism began increasingly to influence South Asian art, opening up a variety of creative adaptations. Today, the contemporary art scene in South Asia is among the most vibrant and prolific in the world, with increasing numbers of artists making bold forays into individualized modes of expression suited to the social, cultural, and local contexts of the subcontinent.
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If you said poetry doesn’t matter, you would be wrong. Poems praise, preserve languages, name injustices, mock tyrants, and give voice. At this moment, we live surrounded by powerful short poetic forms doing just this kind of work: protest signs (“Science not silence”), posters (“Black Lives Matter”), T-shirts (Trans-national), song lyrics (“The Blacker the Berry”), spoken word, and Twitter wit (Lamar 1993). Beginning with the force of these everyday, everywhere forms, and moving out to other kinds of poetry, young people could learn to “do language” as Toni Morrison once said: using their words to call down injustice, raise questions, and conjure a different future (1993).
But not as poetry is usually taught. Open a language arts textbook or look at online worksheets and see how young people are introduced to forms like haiku and renga. There you will find poetry taught as algorithm:
Renga is an ancient Japanese style of poetry made up of stanzas. It is usually created by several people, each one taking a turn coming up with a stanza that relates to a single theme for the whole poem. The first stanza is three lines long. The first line is 5 syllables, the second is 7, and the third is 5. The second stanza is two lines long, both are 7 syllables each. The poem goes back and forth between the three- and two-line stanzas and ends with a two-line stanza. (Education.com n.d.)
This is renga as pattern, lifted out of its history and use. It is not the centuries-old contest, played out in front of scribes and panels of poet-judges. Gone are the crowds of thousands who traveled miles to watch contestants battling within the confines of form and theme as the stanzas mounted up. There is none of the suspense or legend of the famous poet Bashō and friends delivering hundred-stanza renga. Nor is there any sense of the trans-subjective links to a subject and mood that guide the collaborating poets who create the “rolling” of a renga (Ogawa 2009).
Or consider what happens to the song lyrics of “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot.” They become the hunting ground for identifying figurative language (“What does the River Jordan stand for?” “What are the many meanings of home?”). In this format, metaphor and allusion are vocabulary words, not strategies for double-coding resistance silenced by enslavement, then sharecropping, and now the persisting structures of racism. Taught this way, poetry lessons reveal how poetry works, but not what poetry does. By teaching the cogs and wheels of poetry, we cut young people off from understanding a poem as an opportunity to notice, speak out, and choose words in ways that will make them heard. Thus, we narrow and blanch what could be a major route to learning to do language.
However, the work of City Lore, a center for urban folk culture in New York City, suggests that we have options for teaching poetry that come from outside conventional definitions of literature and literacy. For the last five years, City Lore has brought extended poetry residencies to classrooms throughout Queens, one of the most culturally and linguistically diverse regions of the city. These residencies, Roots, Routes, and Rhythms and Homer 2 Hip Hop, have been carried out by a corps of teaching artists who are rooted in oral traditions ranging from the duels of Lebanese zajal and the extempo traditions of Trinidad and Tobago, to contemporary hip hop battles (City Lore 2021). In long-term residencies, these artists do their work in ways that are deeply informed by core folklore tenets: the power of context; the beauty of everyday use; the anchor of candor, public imagination, and love.
The Power of Context
In folklore, objects or performances get their meaning from context. Place the lyrics of “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” in the context of 19th-century chattel enslavement, and it is no longer a hunting ground for figurative language. It is the work of unnamed musicians, passed along orally in a world where it was a crime to teach enslaved people to read or write. In that context, it carries the legend of being one of Harriet Tubman’s favorites, whispered or sung softly, but expectantly, to announce the coming of “a conductor” who would lead enslaved people North. It uses the imagery of a Christian journey to heaven to project their fierce determination to reach the free territories.
Baba Israel and Grace Galu teach hip hop poetry in this context, tracing its roots from spirituals, through the blues, into Northern cities where jazz and popular music became the spoken word of hip hop, continuing the tradition of people using their words to resist given conditions and frame alternate worlds. Together and independently, they teach hip hop in that context. As Baba insists, “People took what they had—their bodies, their voices, the light poles in the streets—and created a music and an oral tradition that we are still listening to.” They reference and honor this tradition of oral improvisation by teaching beat boxing and insisting that everyone does it as entry and interlude to reading their own and each other’s work. Moreover, they insist on the generational and communitarian values that grow out of this tradition. When two groups of girls started dueling over their team names, each accusing the other of stealing their ideas, Baba intervened, “There’s no stealing here. You got it from me, and I got it from my teachers, and they got it from the ones that came before. You are part of a tradition. Honor it. Think about how we begin with a cipher, taking turns with what we’ve brought that day. Find names that say what your group is going to bring to that tradition.” And they do.
The Beauty of Everyday Use
In folklore you can’t understand a ukulele, a falconer’s glove, or a kimono until you see how people use those objects to claim an identity or sustain the meaning of a tradition. You have to witness the musical evening, watch the hunt, or see women enrobing one another. An essential part of the beauty of everyday use is that it is live, daily, and constantly evolving. Poetry is no different. Renga poems may have begun centuries ago, scribed in ink on unfurling scrolls, but during the pandemic they returned on the back of cellphone technology, with writers linking their experiences of isolation via emailed stanzas that roll forward using the shared imagery of birds:
Jealous of two birds
perching (not even) one wing’s
full distance apart?
Birds fly by in the shape of a hand.
All I remember is missing this.
Come here, little sinking heart. Yes, I used that word.
Look, the finches have turned from olive-drab
to lemon-yellow overnight. This is not nothing. (Smith College 2020)
Poet Sergio Jimenez translated this commitment to the beauty of everyday use into his sessions. To write a poem about where they are from, he asked his students to make a map of their homes, recording the dinner smells trapped in the hallway, the dip in the couch where they watched weekend cartoons, and their 1st-grade stickers that won’t wash off. He shared his own tour, recalling the door through which his mother tried to talk to him and the hole in a wall where, once, he punched it. In a culminating event, Jimenez asked students to invent a poetry form of their own, naming it, outlining its structure, and explaining how and when it is used. As one student wrote:
The Mexico Firework Pop can only be done during fireworks are going off when you write it and go to sleep you will dream about a man in a bright suit he will grant you 3 wishes that will come true.
The Anchor of Candor
Folklore embraces all of living: births, weddings, and funerals; holiday noisemakers and winding sheets. The words of spirituals and especially the blues speak candidly to all aspects of living. Think of Billie Holliday singing “I Can’t Face the Music”:
Breeze, stop moanin’ those weird melodies
My man has left me
And I can’t face the music
Without singin’ the blues
Rain, your rhythm on my window pane
Drives me insane because
I can’t face the music
Without singin’ the blues (Koehler and Bloom 1938)
In that same spirit, City Lore teaching artists do not shy away from life in all its joy and sadness. Artists ask students to be open to poems that speak candidly to family fights, grief, and fears. With 3rd-grade students, poet Amira El-Behiri wrote a collaborative poem using the image of a house to speak to the need for hope while living in Queens, an epicenter of the Covid-19 virus:
We can build a house called tomorrow
A house that we can survive in
A house that can protect us
A house filled with happiness smiles and laughter
We can make a house called tomorrow together
A house that always has color
A house that gets hit by rainbows
With a similar frankness, teaching artist Kate Bell introduced classes of 7th graders to witness poems, using Langston Hughes’ “Let America Be America Again,” inviting them to take a turn speaking to their experiences of promise and reality with startling results:
Opportunity, chance, possibility
A place to be who you want to be
At least that’s what they say
And want to believe…
Nationality, status, inequality
This is what matters
And what they don’t want to believe…
We are living in denial
Implanted in a society
Where racism roams mighty
The land of the free?
More like the land of the greed
The home of the brave?
More like the home of the misled
People with skin like dark, creamy chocolate
And eyes like black-gray coal
People with light, beige skin
With eyes that can slice your conscience open
Bodies are a range of fruits
With various different sizes
And countless different attributes
Do you want a change?
Exchange the negativity
For the positivity?
From bloody slavery
To written history
Small changes work together
To let harm surrender.
The Public Face of Imagination
David Drake was poet, potter, and an enslaved Black man who made some of the most impressive ceramic jars to come out of 19th-century North America. In defiance of laws forbidding literacy to enslaved people, Drake not only signed his jars, he often inscribed them with poetry, declaring himself as an artist and author:
I wonder where is all my relations
Friendship to all—and every nation (qtd. in Noyes 2020)
This speaks to a deep belief in folklore that imagination and invention are not rare, but universal—they belong to cooks, day workers, and aunts who whittle, play trumpet, and sew wedding dresses. In that spirit, all kinds of word work—lullabies, jokes, proverbs, and prayers—are worth rapt attention. Folklorists extend this encompassing view of imagination to children—hand clap and jump rope games, the rules for stickball, riddles, and taunts are taken seriously as examples of traditions passed down as ways of holding and evolving the values and energy of a given community (Dargan, Zeitlin, and Kirshenblatt-Gimblett 1990).
Along with this belief in the pervasiveness of imagination comes a second value: Imagination is not a private good, but a public activity in which people offer, learn, borrow, and add–exactly as in the renga tradition. In many City Lore residencies, this commitment shows up as collaborative poems. With primary school students, Libby Mislan and Samira Sadeque asked children to contribute to a list of wishes. Once harvested, the wishes yielded a giant, jointly built catalogue of what children long for (of which the following is only a slice):
I wish I was a scary box.
I wish I was a golden fox.
I wish I can spill like ice tea.
I wish I was a purple bat,
I would have a nose that was flat.
I wish I was the fire you seek and fear.
I wish Wendy’s would bring back chicken nuggets.
I wish I could be a medicine that makes people feel better.
I wish I was a green box of chocolate foxes.
Throughout Baba Israel’s residencies with older students, which ran online during the lockdown months of 2020 and 2021, they worked on collaborative spoken-word poems, with each student adding a final line to a common chant:
Gratitude is in my blood and veins
Gratitude is in my blood and veins
Gratitude is in my blood and veins
ESCAPING SOLITUDE LIKE GETTING OUT OF A STORM
Gratitude is in my blood and veins
Gratitude is in my blood and veins
Gratitude is in my blood and veins
APPRECIATE THIS LIFE I WAS BORN TO FEEL WARM
Love runs through folklore—it is about a deep affection and curiosity for what people make, do, and speak. As Baba Israel taught during the pandemic months, he regularly asked students to read their work aloud. Sometimes he listened closely, making short but specific responses to their work, acknowledging the courage and originality of their contributions (“Got the rhythm going there and words on top.”). In every session, he urged students to respond to one another with claps and praise, “Show them some love.”
Building on this exercise in mutuality and gratitude, Baba introduced young people to praise poems dedicated to someone close to them, asking them to write the story of their name, offer a telling incident, and compare the person to something in nature, an animal, and an object. Many students praised their mothers:
In praise of Elsida
She is smart like Wonder Woman
Wise like an owl
Strong roots like a tree
Is it just an exercise to see poetry in the light of folklore? Again, Morrison’s words help. She writes of an old woman trying to teach the children of her village that language is a living thing that will let them act in and on the world–if they care for it:
Being a writer, she thinks of language partly as a system, partly as a living thing over which one has control, but mostly as agency—as an act with consequences. (Morrison 1993)
Or, in the words of one student in a City Lore poetry residency:
I will remember that writing poems can affect people by their emotions or feelings and also that writing a poem you can tell people what to do and what not to do.
To confirm this, I asked an 11-year-old writer, “If a poem could be a tool for doing things, what tool would it be?” He was not at all confused by the request. Straightaway, he drew his ideas to help him as he talked:
An anvil. You can forge words and ideas on it. All the time, you have these thoughts floating around in your head, sort of soft and messy and not real. When you try to put them into a poem, you have to forge them out. The hammer and the heat of it gets the shape you really want—you get more world-like ideas.
Taught in the light of folklore’s values—context, use, candor, imagination, and love, writing poems that notice, praise, and witness, young people could forge language as an act. They could do language, as Morrison urges. They could author “an act with consequences” (Wolf, Holochwost, Bar-Zemir, Dargan, and Selhorst 2014). But not unless we:
• Teach poetry as regularly as mathematics.
• Teach its composition as if it were bread. Reading poems is only half a slice.
• Convince living poets to do the teaching, remembering: “the poet in the time of the world’s night utters the holy” (Heidegger 2013).
• Draw on the oral traditions of the world, the ear’s the deepest well where close listening begins.
• Insist that words are deeds.
In short, make the anvil theirs.
Dennie Palmer Wolf is a researcher and author committed to exploring how opportunities to imagine and create are distributed in our contemporary world–to whom, for how long, and how deeply. She questions and writes about the stubborn inequalities in who gets to write, make art, or create and perform music. Together with colleagues she investigates how we can challenge this hoarding of creativity and its recognition. For more visit www.wolfbrown.com. ORCID 0000-0003-0134-4537
Dargan, Amanda and Steve Zeitlin. 2021. In the Moment: Poetry Duels and Improvisations. (Film available at citylore.org as of September, 2021).
Dargan, Amanda, Steve Zeitlin, and Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett. 1990. City Play. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 121.
Education.com. Renga. Fifth Grade Worksheet. Accessed at: https://www.education.com/worksheet/article/renga.
Heidegger, Martin. 2013. Poetry, Language, Thought. New York: Harper Perennial Modern Classics.
Koehler, Ted and Rube Bloom. 1938. “I Can’t Face the Music.” Accessed at https://genius.com/artists/Billie-holiday.
Lamar, Kendrick. 1993. “The Blacker the Berry.” To Pimp a Butterfly. Accessed at https://genius.com/Kendrick-lamar-i-album-version-lyrics.
Morrison, Toni. 1993. Nobel Lecture. Accessed at https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1993/morrison/speech.
Noyes, Chandra. 2020. David Drake: Poet, Potter, Slave. Art & Object. February 11. Accessed at https://www.artandobject.com/news/david-drake-poet-potter-slave.
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Palmer Wolf, Dennie, Steven J. Holochwost, Tal Bar-Zemer, Amanda Dargan, and Anika Selhorst. 2014. “Some Things in My House Have a Pulse and a Downbeat”: The Role of Folk and Traditional Arts Instruction in Supporting Student Learning. Journal for Learning through the Arts. 10.1.
Smith College Poetry Club. Accessed at https://www.smith.edu/news/2020-renga-poem.
Zeitlin, Steve. 2016. The Poetry of Everyday Life: Storytelling and the Art of Awareness. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.