The Development Of Structural Characterization Of 3-6 Years Old Children

The present study examined block construction activities to develop structural representation in 3-6 year-old preschoolers using an experimental design.180 preschool children (90 females) from Nanjing Liuyi Kindergarten participated in the experiment were drawn from a pool of 331 participants. The variables were listed as follows:building reference (model of material object vs. picture of material object); building setting (individual vs. group); grade (the bottom vs. middle vs. upper class) and gender (female vs. male). Hence, the study was a 2×2×2×3 between-subjects design. The dependent variables were the complexity of children’s block constructions, including level of block building, rating of structural balance, and scoring for the quality of each participant’s final block construction. Additionally, each final block construction was assessed by four variables, namely: dimensionality, basic structure, structural details, representational play. The present study also submitted data of the height of structures, amount of time involved in block play, total number and types of blocks used to a Multivariate Analysis of Variance. Meanwhile, Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test Revised (PPVT-R) was adopted to assess preschoolers’ language ability.Results revealed that:(1) The effect of building reference on representational play was 4.435, and statistically significant (p<0.05). (2) Building setting showed significant in scoring for the quality of final block construction, the height of block structures, total number and types of blocks used as well as amount of time involved in block play. (3) The interaction of building reference and building setting showed significant in level of block building, rating of structural balance, scoring for the quality of final block construction, structural details, the height of block structures, and types of blocks used. (4) The main effect of grade showed significant in the complexity of children’s block constructions and PPVT. (5) A significant between-subjects gender difference in level of block building, rating of structural balance, and total number of blocks used was obtained. Besides, there was a marginal significant in amount of time involved in block play.Conclusions:(1) Building reference has an effect on block play. Specifically, preschoolers tend to perform more representational play with model of material object than picture of material object. (2) Setting difference has an effect on block play. In the study, preschool children built taller and more number and types of blocks used as well as amount of time involved in individual building setting than group setting. (3) Developmental changes in the complexity of block construction have been found. That is, the complexity of the block constructions increase with chronological age. On the other hand, there is no significant difference between the middle class and upper class preschoolers in terms of level of block building and rating of structural balance. Besides, no significant difference between the bottom class and middle class children concerning the representational play. (4) Findings also suggested that both the middle class and upper class children could build tridimensional constructions, while the bottom class children as opposed to linear or bidimensional constructions. Additionally, gender difference in level of block building and rating of structural balance was found, boys showed higher level than girls.