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to psychological functions. In other words, we should look for qualitative changes in
children’s memory, perception, thinking and volition. Later he realised that relevant
developmental changes take place in relations between these functions. This reinter-
pretation emphasises reorganisation of the whole system of psychological functions as
the indicator of children’s psychological development. So development is not possible
to observe directly as visible actions.
In early education, reorganisation of children’s psychological functions as a system
is not often an ex­plicit goal. Quality is not defined in terms of holistic psychological
development, but as quality service, stimulating environment, academic skills,
children’s well being, etc. Play ex­perience and environments that support play may
have an important place among quality factors in Nordic early education, but the
learning potential of narrative environments is not generally revealed (Hakkarainen
2006). My claim is that narrative learning in play and other imaginative situations is the
most important factor ex­plaining reorganisation of children’s psychological functions
as a system. at the same time, changes taking place in children’s psychological develop-
ment can be central indicators of quality in early education.
Play as learning environment­
The difference between academic and narrative learning can be shown by using an
ex­ample from Stig Broström (1996). He introduced the concept of “frame play” and
offered an ex­ample from Danish day care practice. In order to enrich children’s play,
the day care group visited a fire station and observed the activity at the station. The
group shared their ex­periences and discussed fire fighters’ work. Better knowledge
about real life is supposed to enrich children’s play. The visit to the fire station demon-
strated to children the tools of fire fighters, fire engines, ladders, special equipment,
etc. Children transfer this new knowledge to their play and use it as a part of the play
plot. We can see the difference between “fire station” play before the visit and after it.
Thus “frame play,” continues the tradition of “teaching” basic knowledge for play.
D.B. El’konin (1999) made an important observation in his famous work on play
development. He noted that a visit to the zoo did not have any remarkable influ-
ence on children’s play when new information was emphasised, but children’s play
changed radically after the second visit when emphasis was on social relations and
care for the animal inhabitants. This observation may be one of the reasons behind the
differentiation of the theme and content in play. In El’konin’s play theory the quality
and developmental impact of play depend on content understood in terms of the
quality of relations between roles. The essential difference between the “fire station”
play activities would be the content of role relations and the moral aspect of helping
others. Play ex­perience as such is not the ex­planation of psychological development
in early years.
How would the narrative learning approach influence methods of play enrichment
and child development? In the “fire station” theme the narrative approach would
emphasise the nature of the profession in helping people in accidents and problem
Pentti Hakkarainen