Transformations of preschool children's play activities in Ukraine : from the past to the present

This article describes the periods and stages of transformation of preschool children's play activities in Ukraine from the beginning of the twentieth century to the present. The concept of ‘transformation’ as a pedagogical category is considered as a harmonious unity of scientific knowledge and pedagogical practice, which is able to translate scientific knowledge into practical results. The game activity is presented as a kind of active activity of preschool children, which constitutes the main content of their life, is the leading activity and the basis for educational activities in the next age period. The socio-political, economic, organisational, pedagogical and other factors that made it possible to find out the prerequisites for the formation of software and methodological support for the game activity of preschool children and to characterise the periods and stages of transformation of the game activity of preschool children are revealed. The peculiarities of implementation of preschool children's play activities in the educational process of preschool educational institutions of Ukraine are analysed. The content of play activities in regulatory documents (the State Standard of Preschool Education of Ukraine - the Basic Component of Preschool Education (BCPE) (2021), the Partial Programme for Moral Education of Preschool Children ‘Treasury of Morals (2024), the Programme of Education of Early and Preschool Children ‘Education and Care / Education & Care’ (2021), the Comprehensive Programme for the Development, Training and Education of Preschool Children ‘Sunflower’ (2023) is analysed. In the direction of ‘Child's Play’ of the State Standard of Preschool Education (2021), a structural model of the game competence of preschool children is presented, which combines three components: emotional and value attitude, knowledge formation; skills; a classification of games that reflect the degree of activity and freedom of a preschool child in the organisation of game activities is shown: games organised by an adult ‘Playing with an adult’ and amateur free games of a child ‘Playing independently’. The article presents the results of testing the play activities of female students of the first (bachelor's) and second (master's) level of full-time and part-time higher education majoring in ‘Preschool Education’ at the Faculty of Education of the Mykhailo Drahomanov Ukrainian State University (33 test participants) who are already working as educators.