Martynova Anna Mikhailovna Teacher-psychologist, 1st qualification category Structural unit "Kindergarten No. 56" GBOU Secondary School No. 4 of the city. Syzran Samara region
Playing in the sand is one of the natural activities of a child. Therefore, we, adults, can use the sandbox for developmental, educational, and correctional purposes. By building sand figures using symbols, inventing various stories, we are in the most organic way for a child with disabilities (OVZ) form we transfer to him our knowledge and life experience, events and laws of the surrounding world.
The therapeutic effect of playing with sand was first noticed by the Swiss psychologist and philosopher Carl Gustav Jung. The most important psychotherapeutic property of sand is the ability to change the plot, events, and relationships. Since the game takes place in the context of a fairy-tale world, the child is given the opportunity to change a situation that is uncomfortable for him. He learns to overcome difficulties on his own. Playing with sand is a natural and accessible form of activity for every child. A child often cannot express his feelings and fears in words, and then playing with sand comes to his aid. By playing out the situations that agitated him with the help of toy figures, creating a picture of his own world from sand, the child is freed from tension. And most importantly, he gains invaluable experience in symbolically resolving many life situations, because in a real fairy tale everything ends well.
The process of play in sand therapy helps to move from feeling dependent on the current situation to becoming the creator of the situation. In addition, sand absorbs negative energy. The sand therapy method can be used with children starting from 3 years of age. Correction of the emotional sphere using this method makes it possible to solve a number of problems that arise in children with disabilities.
In particular, sand therapy allows you to work with aggressive, insecure, shy children; with children experiencing problems of shame, guilt, lies, difficulties in accepting their feelings. In addition, sand therapy combines a lot of exercises aimed at general relaxation, removing motor stereotypes and convulsive movements. During sand play, the child has the opportunity to express his deepest emotional experiences, he is freed from fears, and the experience does not develop into mental trauma. The goals of sand therapy are consistent with the child’s internal desire for self-actualization.
In their system, these exercises are of enormous importance for the development of the child’s psyche. Firstly, they stabilize the emotional state of children. Secondly, along with the development of tactile-kinesthetic sensitivity and fine motor skills of the hands, they teach the child to listen to himself and pronounce his feelings, help the child to feel protected in an environment that is comfortable for him.
This lays the foundation for further development of positive communication skills, improves object-based play activities, which contributes to the development of role-playing games and communication skills of a child with disabilities. It is important that projective games in the sand open up the potential capabilities of a child with disabilities, developing his creativity and imagination.
T.D. Zinkevich-Evstigneeva offers various types of sand games:
Educational games: games to get to know the world around us, geographical games; fantastic and historical, city tour games.
Projective games: projective games can be carried out individually and in a group; with their help, psychological diagnostics, correction and development of the child are carried out. The child chooses toys and builds his own world, his own fairy tale.
Playing with sand in a group is mainly aimed at developing communication skills: the ability to communicate harmoniously and effectively with each other and interact. A group can consist of 2, 3 people, or more, depending on the size of the sandbox.
Before you start playing with sand, you need to talk to your children about the rules of playing in the sandbox. A poem by T.M. will help with this. Grabenko:
There are no harmful children in the country -
After all, they have no place in the sand!
You can't bite or fight here
And throw sand in your eyes!
Don't ruin foreign countries!
Sand is a peaceful country.
You can build and do wonders,
You can create a lot:
Mountains, rivers and seas,
So that there is life around.
Children, do you understand me?
Or do we need to repeat it?!
To remember and be friends!
Getting started with sand. Place your palms on the sand and tell your child about your feelings: "I'm pleased. I feel warm (cool) sand. When I move my hands, I feel small grains of sand. How do you feel? Let the child try to talk about how he feels. Make prints of palms, fists, edges of the palms, creating patterns (sun, flower, etc.); "take a walk" on the sand with each finger in turn.
Examples of some exercises
1. "Sensitive palms" (according to T.D. Zinkevich-Evstigneeva)
- Place your palms on the sand, close your eyes, feel what it is like.
- Open your eyes, tell me how you felt (children's answers).
- Do the same, turning your palms on the other side. Tell us about your feelings.
2. Slide along the surface of the sand like a snake or like a machine.
3. Walk with your palms like an elephant, like a little elephant, like a fast bunny.
4. Leave prints of your palms, fists, and edges of your palms.
5. Create patterns and drawings - a sun, a butterfly, the letter A or a whole word.
6. "Walk" each finger of the right and left hand alternately.
7. Sift the sand through your fingers or use a pinch to sow a path of sand with a contrasting texture.
8. Place stones and natural materials of different structure and size on the sand in a special logical order.
9. Guide the figure along the sand labyrinth paths.
11. Lay out a geometric figure with chips.
12. Sift the sand through a sieve, draw a pattern with a brush or stick, sift the sand through a system of funnels, etc.
13. You can "play" on the surface of the sand, like on a piano or computer keyboard.
14. The sandbox can be used to find animals, objects, a certain letter made of plastic and buried among others in the sand (game variation "Magic bag" ) .
15. Sculpt letters from sand, raking it with the edges of your palms.
16. Transform letters "L" V "A" , "H" V "T" , "ABOUT" V "I" etc.
17. Find the letters hidden in the sand and make syllables or a word out of them.
You can write words in the sand in printed and written letters, first with your finger, then with a stick, holding it like a pen. Sand allows you to keep your child working longer. It's easier to correct mistakes in sand than on paper. This allows the child to feel successful.
18. Game "My city" . The speech therapist gives the task to choose figures whose names contain a given sound, and build a city using these figures. Then you can compose an oral history about this city and its inhabitants.
19. “Whose trace is this?” . Wet sand easily leaves hand or foot marks from shoes or the wheels of a toy car. Let the child try to guess where whose fingerprint is?
20. Sand applique. Apply a design to the cardboard with glue and sprinkle with sand. Shake off the excess and you will have a wonderful painting. Sand can be painted and dried.
21. "Archeology" . Bury the toy (the child doesn’t know which one). During the excavation, the child must guess from the opening parts what is hidden. Bury 2 – 3 items. Let him dig up one of them and try to determine what it is by touch.
22. "Paths of Sand" . Show your child how to grab a handful of dry sand and slowly pour it out, creating different shapes, such as paths (to the house of a bunny or a bear).
23. You can bury and dig up letters, numbers, geometric shapes - this will make it easier for the child to remember them.
24. Game "Name the Sound" (according to N.V. Durova). The psychologist invites the children to dig small holes in the sand for the ball. Then he pushes the ball into the child’s hole and calls the word, emphasizing the consonant sound with intonation. The child names the highlighted sound and rolls the ball back into the teacher’s hole. Then the task is given to another child, etc. Words: s-s-som, su-m-m-mka, za-r-r-rya, ku-s-s-juice, stu-l-l-l, ru-ch-ch-chka, kra- n-n-n, ball-f-f-f, roof-sh-sh-shka, d-d-house.
25. Game "Find a Friend" (according to N.V. Durova). The psychologist takes pictures out of the box (butterfly, cow, frog, rooster, bear) and distributes them to children.
Make houses for these animals; soon their brothers will come to visit them. (Children do.) Then the teacher takes out the following pictures from the box (squirrel, whale, peacock, horse, mouse).
How can we find out whose brother is where? To do this, let's say the names of the animals and highlight the first sound in these words. - whale - [To"]– he will go to visit the cow, the first sound in this word [To]; [To] And [To"]- brothers.
Children take turns naming those shown in the pictures, highlighting the first sound and selecting a pair. Conclusion: How do these pairs of sounds differ? (Hard - soft).
26. Exercise "Sand Rain" (according to N. Kuzub) The teacher slowly and then quickly pours sand from his fist into the sandbox, then onto his palm. Children repeat. Then the children close their eyes one by one, place their palm with their fingers spread out on the sand, the adults sprinkle sand on a finger, and the child names this finger.
27. Game "Who was that?" (according to R.G. Golubeva). The psychologist takes toys out of the box: cow, tiger, bee, snake, hedgehog. Each of them is assigned a specific sound: a cow moos "Mmm" , tiger - growls "rrrr" , bee is buzzing "w-w-w" , snake - hisses "sh-sh-sh" , hedgehog - snorts "f-f-f" . The teacher pronounces a sound for a long time and invites the children to determine who it was. Whoever names the animal correctly gets this toy.
28. Game "Echo" . The teacher pronounces the syllables, and the children repeat them in turn, and for each correctly completed repetition the child is asked to take any toy for subsequent play in the sand.
Ta-ka-pa - pa-ka-ta - ga-ba-da - po-bo-po - pu-bu-pu.
With the selected toys, children play sand hide and seek: one child closes his eyes, and the rest hide his toys in the sand.
29. Exercise "Unusual Traces" .
"The Little Bears Are Coming" - the child presses the sand with force with his fists and palms.
"Hares Jump" - the child hits the surface of the sand with his fingertips, moving in different directions.
"Snakes Crawling" - the child makes the surface of the sand wavy with relaxed/tense fingers (in different directions).
"Spiderbugs are running" - the child moves all his fingers, imitating the movement of insects (you can completely immerse your hands in the sand, meeting each other under the sand with your hands - "bugs say hello" ) .
You can also finish playing with sand with poems:
Look at our palms -
They have become wiser!
Thank you, our dear sand,
You make us all grow up (get wiser) helped!
The use of sand therapy gives positive results:
- children's interest in activities increases significantly;
- children with disabilities feel more successful;
- there is no place for monotony and boredom in classes;
- the child expands the range of object-based play actions;
- In the classroom, the level of social and everyday orientation of children with disabilities increases.
In classical sand therapy there is "gyre" transfers in nature. First, the inner reality is transferred to the sand. Then the experience is transferred to the inner world, to the unconscious layer. Then, in the form of some models, it is transferred to real life. In individual work, an educational psychologist never introduces anything into the sandbox or changes anything. When necessary during the analysis process, with the child’s permission, you can take an object, look at it, but not change it. "Creates" sandbox and "takes apart" her child himself. While working, pay special attention to which figure you chose first - identification with yourself, with your "I" .
General conditions for organizing sand therapy
A large box is used as a sandbox. Its traditional size in centimeters is 50 x 70 x 8 cm. It is believed that this size of the sandbox corresponds to the volume of the field of visual perception.
Color. The traditional sandbox combines the natural color of wood, blue and yellow. Thus, the bottom symbolizes water, and the sides symbolize the sky and the sun.
To organize games with sand, you need a large set of miniature objects and toys, which together symbolize the world. In classical sand therapy, there is the following classification of objects used in the process of creating sand paintings:
- people diverse in gender, age, cultural and national origin, professions, era (from primitive to modern,) poses should be both dynamic and static;
- land animals (domestic, wild, prehistoric);
- flying animals (wild, domestic, prehistoric);
- inhabitants of the water world (various fish, mammals, shellfish, crabs);
- furnished homes (houses, palaces, castles, other buildings, furniture of various eras, cultures and purposes);
- home stuff (dishes, household items, table decorations);
- trees and other plants (flowers, grass, shrubs, greenery, etc.);
- objects of celestial space (sun, moon, stars, rainbow, clouds);
- vehicles (land, water, air transport for civil and military purposes, fantastic vehicles);
- objects of the human environment (fences, hedges, bridges, gates, road signs);
- objects of landscape and natural activity of the Earth (volcanoes, mountains);
- accessories (beads, masks, fabrics, buttons, buckles, jewelry, etc.);
- natural natural objects (crystals, stones, shells, pieces of wood, metal, seeds, feathers, glass polished with water, etc.);
- fantastic objects and cartoon characters, fantasy, werewolf figures;
The forms and options of sand therapy are determined by the characteristics of a particular child with disabilities, specific tasks and its duration. Sand therapy can be used for the following purposes: for diagnostic purposes, for the purpose of providing primary psychological assistance; in the process of short-term psychotherapy; in the process of long-term psychotherapeutic influence. So, sand therapy has established itself as one of the effective non-traditional methods in correctional and developmental work with children with disabilities.
In preschool age, children lay the foundations of personal culture, orientation in the realities of the objective world, the phenomena of their own life and activities, understanding of themselves and the surrounding phenomena of social life. The formation of a child’s personality occurs successfully provided that the child is active, when he is included in the process of his own “construction.”
The world of children's emotions and sensations is very fragile, and the social situation in society at the present stage is not always conducive to maintaining mental well-being. Therefore, during psychological support within a preschool educational institution, it is necessary to use technologies aimed at preserving health and innovative elements.
One of the methods by which you can teach children to interact with peers is sand therapy method. It allows you to satisfy the child’s basic needs and relieve tension, gain some experience of interacting with other, somewhat different children, and accept each other. This is one of the most important components of a tolerant society. Sand therapy helps to identify the types of relationships in a group and correct them.
Playing with sand is one of the forms of natural child activity
Sand is a natural material, a very plastic tool for creativity. He allows everyone to work with him, even those who do not have a special artistic gift, are afraid of evaluation and refuse to draw. Working with sand teaches a person patience.
By creating compositions from sand, inventing various stories, we can convey to him our knowledge and life experience, the fundamentals of the laws of the world around us, in the most organic form for a child.
So, we invite the child to build his own social environment - his own world. Lose, “live”, solve problems (individually) and teach interaction with peers and acceptance of each other (in a group).
Anything is possible in sand play. By playing out problematic situations with the help of small figures, creating a picture out of sand, the child is freed from tension and subconsciously finds for himself those answers that are difficult to get from adults. Adults have a unique opportunity to see the inner world of a child and what in psychology is called “here and now”; in playing out various situations with the heroes of sand games, the transition of the imaginary into the real and vice versa occurs. The uniqueness of sand therapy makes it possible to make visible what does not have verbal forms for its reflection. The child not only offers a way out of the situation, but actually lives it with the help of miniature figures.
When starting to work with a group of children, first of all, it is necessary to create a natural environment in which each child would feel comfortable and protected. The tasks must correspond to the capabilities of all children (the group can consist of 2-4 people), the instructions are presented in a fairy-tale form. During work, we encourage imagination and creativity, excluding negative assessments of actions, ideas, and results.
The first group lesson can begin with a conversation about sensations: what sensations are, how we define them. Then, placing the children near a pallet of sand, invite them to touch and interact with the sand with their hands: “What do you feel when you touch the sand?” This exercise stabilizes the emotional state and is of great importance for the development of the child’s psyche.
The sand tray has a limited size. Thanks to this, children can not only reflect their experiences, but also achieve integration and engage in non-verbal interaction with other participants in the game.
Before starting to build a composition, a conversation is held about the current state of the group members. Then he chooses the direction of work within the framework of sand therapy. Instructions can be similar to projective tests or free: “You can create whatever you want in the sandbox. You are wizards who travel the world in search of places where no man has gone before. There you create your own fairyland. To do this, each of you can choose 3 figures and match them with buildings, stones, plants, animals that will live in your country.”
When the children pick up the figures, they can be asked to create a fairyland at the same time, each in their own section of the sandbox, trying not to interfere with each other.
After finishing the composition, everyone talks about their country and its inhabitants. Then you should invite the children to look at the overall picture that they have come up with and come up with a common name. Everyone offers their own option, but the children need to agree and choose one name. The psychologist asks: “How do these countries live with each other? Please see if they are friends? What does that require?".
After the children’s answers, the psychologist suggests using his own hands, without additional means, to make the interaction between these countries easy and simple. Each member of the group, on his own territory, comes up with an optimal, convenient solution to the general problem of interaction.
An important element of the work is creating a positive image at the end of the lesson or giving the former terrifying image a funny look. This is the way to a positive, life-affirming level.
It is important for us to monitor how children express themselves in play and in contact with each other. You will see how, in children’s sand games, the mechanism of natural regulation of interaction “turns on.” This is how it is formed empathy- the ability to understand and empathize with one’s neighbor.
Developing a tolerant attitude towards people with disabilities - this is one of the priority tasks of a psychologist in the context of inclusive education. The problem is very similar to a stone ball: the shape of the ball is visually very familiar to everyone, but the fullness is different - the ball is stone, polished by time and palms. And in order to somehow move it, you need to put in a lot of effort. So, let's start building “our own world” - after all, everything is in our hands. Carl Gustave Jung spoke about this: “The hands know how to unravel what the mind struggles in vain.”
In recent years, in the system of education and training, a tendency towards the intellectual development of the child has begun to be traced. At the same time, insufficient attention is often paid to the development of the emotional sphere. The mental development of a child is closely related to the characteristics of the world of his feelings and experiences.
Disorders of psychophysical development, characteristic of many children with disabilities, lead to a number of other secondary disorders.
These include difficulties in developing social communication skills and an insufficient supply of knowledge and ideas about the environment.
Everyone knows that children are self-centered, so it is so important to teach the child to look at the situation from the position of his interlocutor. By teaching a child to “look from the outside,” we help him look at himself differently, evaluate his own thoughts, feelings and behavior differently. This way the child gets the opportunity to express himself through communication.
Young children are often “captured by feelings” because they cannot yet control their feelings, which leads to impulsive behavior and difficulties in communicating with peers and adults.
Such children have reduced cognitive and speech activity, a slow rate of formation of higher mental functions, weak regulation of voluntary activity, as well as disturbances in various aspects of speech.
Today, the practice of inclusive education is actively developing in Russia, the purpose of which is to optimize the process of social rehabilitation of children with disabilities.
Children with disabilities are characterized by reduced learning ability, but they are able to use the help of an adult and transfer learned mental skills to other life situations.
The content of correctional work in accordance with the federal state requirements of preschool education is aimed at creating a system of comprehensive assistance to children with disabilities in mastering the basic educational program of preschool education, correcting deficiencies in the physical or mental development of students, and their social adaptation.
When solving these problems, one of the most popular methods of psychological assistance to children is sand therapy. Thanks to this relatively new method, the child develops the ability to express himself and creatively perceive the world.
It should be noted that the experience of implementing inclusive practices in preschool institutions is being developed in various ways and is at different stages of development.
Along with traditional methods, sand therapy is effectively used as an adjuvant. The therapeutic effect of playing with sand was first noticed by the Swiss psychologist and philosopher Carl Gustav Jung.
Working with children with disabilities, the need arose to use sand therapy in order to create psychological comfort for each child.
Sand therapy classes are aimed at the development and correction of emotional-volitional processes in children. Sand games provide a unique opportunity for adults to really see the child’s inner world at the moment and understand it.
The sandbox is an excellent mediator for establishing contact with a child. And if he speaks poorly and cannot tell an adult about his experiences, then in such games with sand everything becomes possible. By playing out an exciting situation with the help of small figures, creating a picture of sand, the child opens up, and adults get the opportunity to see the child’s inner world at the moment, and during sand therapy it will definitely “flow out” onto the sandy surface. But this is far from the only advantage of sand therapy: it remarkably develops fine motor skills (sand, due to its structure, has a beneficial effect on tactile sensations and stimulates the nerve endings that are located in the fingertips), imagination, creativity, imaginative thinking and much more.
Working with sand is calming (especially for hyperactive children) - it seems to contain life-giving solar energy that charges us with positive emotions.
The sandbox and “sand therapy” for children not only develops the child’s creative potential, activates spatial imagination, figurative and logical thinking, trains fine motor skills, but unobtrusively, gradually, sets children up to comprehend the moral truths of good and evil, and builds a harmonious image of the world.
Using the magical properties of sand, fairy tales suddenly come to life, the child himself becomes a direct participant and director of his own works, and then sees the result of his own creativity - this is exactly how sand therapy works for children.
Sand therapy is an effective method of helping a child. During classes, for example, “The sun smiled,” “Rain,” harmonization of the internal emotional state occurs, which is characteristic of negativism, depression, resentment, conflict, and aggressiveness.
Playing with sand is a natural and accessible form of activity for every child. A preschooler often cannot express his experiences and fears in words, and here games with sand come to his aid.
What could be more attractive for a preschool child than playing with sand and water. Children at this age are ready to potter around in the sand all day, building their fairy-tale cities and creating their own history. Nonverbal expression using a variety of objects, sand, water, as well as constructive and plastic materials is most natural for children, which becomes especially significant if the child has certain speech disorders.
Each selected figurine represents a character who can interact with other heroes. The child comes up with what they say or do; sometimes he may invite a psychologist to join the game and speak on behalf of a character.
In all these cases, the child feels like the master of his small world and is the director of the drama that plays out on the sand sheet. What was previously hidden in the depths of a child’s soul comes to light; The characters of the game come into motion, expressing the most relevant feelings and thoughts for the child.
By playing out the situations that agitated him with the help of toy figures, creating a picture of his own world from sand, the child is freed from tension. And various exercises help him with this;
"Artists"
The child is asked to draw geometric shapes on the sand (numbers, elements of letters: straight, inclined, wavy lines, semi-ovals, loops, etc.): “Draw a square (circle, oval, rhombus, rectangle)” on the sand, “Draw a number, which comes after five, etc.”
Education: If the child does not understand the purpose of the task, the teacher shows a square, a number and offers to draw the same one - according to the model. Then he again offers to complete the task according to the model using speech instructions.
"Builders"
The child is asked to build a sand tower. Trees can be grown around. (can be made from pine cones or tree sticks. Now let's try to count how many trees you planted?
Education: If the child has difficulty using additional objects, the teacher shows how to use one of them and offers to continue completing the task independently. The child is offered a fairy-tale plot: “In this tower, an evil wizard imprisoned the princess so that she could not get out; he dug a deep ditch around the tower. How will you save the princess?
Education: If the child does not offer options for action, the teacher shows additional items and asks how they can be used.
"Across the seas along the waves"
“The teacher draws dots on a sand tablet and asks the child to connect them.
Education: The teacher asks additional questions, for example, “What did we do? Wavy line. What does she look like? Right on the waves. Now let's also draw a boat. Then the child is asked to perform similar actions independently.
"What's hidden?"
The teacher reads a riddle to the child on a certain topic, and he must find the answer in the sand: “Guess the riddle, name the answer and find it in the sand.” (button, pinecone, piece of paper, pen, pencil, etc.)
Education: If the child finds it difficult to name the answer, then clarifying questions about the content are asked to help understand figurative comparisons.
"Complete the drawing"
The child is asked to use his finger to draw the second half of the object on the left or right side: “Complete the second half of the sun on the right side.”
Education: If the child finds it difficult to complete the task, the teacher together with the child clarifies the directions of the parties. Then he takes a stick and begins to draw the figures, then invites the child to continue. If it is difficult for a child to complete the part, then the back part is simplified and it is suggested that the rays of the sun be completed.
These simple exercises are of enormous importance for the development of a child’s psyche. They stabilize the baby’s emotional state, teach him to listen to himself and articulate his feelings. And this promotes the development of speech, voluntary attention and memory, and educational games enable children to learn about the diversity of the world around them, develop creativity and imagination, which is very important for children with disabilities. But the main thing is that the child gets the first experience of self-analysis and learns to understand himself and others.
To organize games with sand, you need a large set of miniature objects and toys, which, in turn:
- relieves muscle tension
- develops sensitivity and fine motor skills of the hands
- provides orientation in space
- Helps the child feel protected in a comfortable environment
- develops activity, expands life experience conveyed by the teacher in a form that is close to the child (the principle of information accessibility)
- stabilizes emotional states by absorbing negative energy
- allows the child to relate games to real life, comprehend what is happening, and find ways to solve a problem situation
- overcomes the “bad artist” complex by creating artistic compositions from sand using ready-made figures
- develops creative actions, finds non-standard solutions leading to successful results
- improves visual-spatial orientation, speech abilities
- helps expand vocabulary
- helps to master analysis and synthesis skills
- allows you to develop phonemic hearing and perception
- helps in learning letters, mastering reading and writing skills
Based on the techniques of working in the pedagogical sandbox, the teacher can make the traditional methodology for children of senior preschool age more interesting, exciting and productive.
The proposed sand therapy technique can be very useful. Nonverbal expression using a variety of objects, sand, water, as well as constructive and plastic materials is most natural for them, which becomes especially significant if the child has certain speech disorders.
As practice has shown, the use of sand therapy gives positive results - children's interest in activities increases significantly, children feel more successful; Cognitive and speech activity increases, the emotional background and behavioral disorders of a neurological nature are normalized, which in turn opens up new prospects for children with disabilities. If the child is non-speaking, then the work of a psychologist within the framework of sand therapy has a particularly beneficial effect on speech development.
Thus, the main goal of sand therapy is to increase the child’s awareness of his emotional manifestations and relationships and thereby ensure comprehensive harmonious personality development and emotional comfort.
The use of sand play therapy in working with children with disabilities.
“The best toy for a child is one that he can make change in different ways; The best toy for children is a pile of sand.”
K. D. Ushinsky
Is there a children's game that can harmonize the picture of the world, put a barrier in the way of cruelty, give a sense of the diversity of nature, relieve internal conflicts and fears, and reveal the concepts of good and evil?
Yes, there is such a game!
All generations of the human race have been amused by it, because there is nothing in the world simpler and more accessible, more convenient and diverse, more lively and more voluminous thansand game .
Playing with sand as a way of child development and self-therapy has been known since ancient times. The malleability of sand awakens the desire to create a miniature picture of the world from it. A person acts in the sandbox as a creator - one life story is replaced by another, following the law of existence: everything goes and comes, there is nothing that is irreparably destroyed, just the old turns into something different, new. By repeatedly experiencing this sensation, a person achieves a state of mental balance.
The principle of “sand therapy” was proposed by K.G. Jung, a Swiss psychotherapist, first recommended the use of sand for the purpose of diagnosing and correcting the emotional state of children. Later, G.M. Grabenko and G.D. Zinkevich-Evstigneeva proposed a system of sand games for fairy tale therapy, calling them correctional and developmental.
Sand attracts little “builders” with its unusual structure and the new sensations they experience when touching the sand. Sand often acts like a magnet on children. Before they even realize what they are doing, their hands begin sifting sand, building castles, etc. And if you add various toys to this, then the child has his own world, where he invents and imagines, and at the same time, learns.work and achieve goals .
In modern society, the problem of raising and educating children with developmental disabilities is increasingly arising. In our school there are children with mental retardation, speech retardation, autism, disabilities, etc. Such children are characterized by a decrease in cognitive activity, a poor supply of information about the world around them, which leads to the fact that schoolchildren do not acquire many of the most basic knowledge and ideas. With them the mostit is important to use non-traditional forms of work .
Today, quite a lot of methods of non-traditional influence are known (games, fairy tales, laughter, art, clay, wax, crystal therapy, etc.). A very interesting and effective pedagogical technology issand play therapy .
"Sand therapy" - one of the techniques that allows you to reveal the individuality of each child, resolve his psychological difficulties, develop the ability to realize his desires and the possibility of their realization. With correctly set goals, such play activities have important therapeutic, educational and educational value. When playing with sand, a child develops a feeling of security, since the sand world is a world under control.
Playing in the sand is one of the natural activities of a child. That is why you can use the sandbox in developmental and educational activities. By building pictures from sand, inventing various stories, we convey to him our knowledge and life experience, events and laws of the surrounding world in the most organic form for a child. At the same time, we also heal our own Soul, strengthening our Inner Child.
A great contribution to the development of “sand therapy” was made by domestic teachers - the St. Petersburg Institute of Special Pedagogy and Psychology, who are the authors of a number of books on this topic - Grabenko T. M., Zinkevich-Evstigneeva T. D. “Miracles on the sand. Sand play therapy”, Zinkevich-Evstigneeva T.D., Grabenko T.M. “Games in fairy tale therapy”, Zinkevich-Evstigneeva T.D., Nisnevich L.A. “How to help a “special” child”, Grabenko T. M., Zinkevich-Evstigneeva T. D. “Miracles on the sand: Workshop on sand therapy.”
Sand therapy technology is multifunctional; it allows you to simultaneously solve correction problems and the main task of speech development. The child himself solves the problems of self-expression, self-awareness and develops self-esteem, learns to work in a team.
Playing in the sand with figures is especially fruitful when working with children who cannot express their feelings in any way. Children with low self-esteem, increased anxiety and shyness usually willingly choose figures and shift their attention. Children with unstable attention are very expressive; play gives them rich kinesthetic sensations.
All games using sand therapy are divided intothree directions :
Educational games.
Such games are aimed at developing tactile-kinesthetic sensitivity and fine motor skills of the hands. And most importantly, the child talks about his feelings, thereby spontaneously developing his speech, vocabulary, perception
different tempos of speech, height and strength of voice, working on breathing. There is a development of attention and memory, phonemic hearing. The main thing is learning to write and read.
Educational games.
With their help, we help to understand the diversity of our world. Games to get to know the world around us (that which is next to us: animals, insects, seas, transport, etc.)
Projective games.
Aimed at the correction and development of the child.
In the process of sand psychotherapy, there are three stages of sand play: chaos, struggle and conflict resolution.
At the "chaos" stagethe child grabs a lot of toys, randomly places them on a sand sheet, and often mixes them with sand. Such actions reflect the presence of anxiety, fear, confusion, and insufficiently positive internal dynamics. Through “chaos” there is a gradual “living” of the psycho-emotional state and liberation from it. Repeated repetition of a traumatic situation allows you to change your emotional attitude towards it. The “chaos” stage can take from one to several sessions. You can notice how from picture to picture the number of figures used decreases and a plot appears.
The "fight" stagecan be observed in difficult children. Internal conflicts are unconsciously transferred onto the sand sheet: aggression, resentment, anxiety, ailments, real conflict relationships, etc. Creatures in the sandbox kill each other, there is a fight, war, heavy confrontation. After some time, a hero or forces may appear that restore order and restore justice.
At the "conflict resolution" stageone can observe more prosperous pictures: peace, tranquility, a return to natural activities.
So, K.G. Jung argued that the process of "playing in sand" releases blocked energy and "activates the self-healing capabilities inherent in the human psyche."
Basic principles of sand games:
1. Creating a natural, stimulating environment in which the child feels comfortable and protected while being creative.
For this purpose, tasks are selected that correspond to the child’s capabilities; instructions for games are formulated in fairy tale form; Negative assessment of his actions, ideas, results is excluded, imagination and creativity are encouraged.
2. “Revival” of abstract symbols: letters, numbers, geometric shapes, etc.
The implementation of this principle allows you to create and strengthen positive motivation for classes and the child’s personal interest in what is happening.
3. Real “living”, playing out all kinds of situations together with the heroes of fairy-tale games.
On the basis of this principle, the mutual transition of the imaginary into the real and vice versa is carried out. For example, finding himself in the role of the Savior of the Princess, the child not only offers a way out of the situation, but also actually plays it out on the sand with the help of miniature figures. Thus, he “in practice” becomes convinced of the correctness or error of the chosen path.
Sandland Games:
Games for the development of tactile-kinesthetic sensitivity and fine motor skills of the hands. We receive tactile sensations through the skin: “hot - cold”, “dry - wet”, “hard - soft”, “smooth - sharp”.
Typically used are games that offer T.D. Zinkevich-Evstegneeva and T.M. Grabenko in the “Workshop on Creative Therapy”:
- slide your palms along the surface of the sand, performing zigzag and circular movements (like cars, snakes, sleds, etc.);
- perform the same movements, placing your palm on the edge;
- “walk” with your palms along the laid routes, leaving your traces on them;
- create all sorts of fancy patterns on the surface of the sand with fingerprints, fists, knuckles, and edges of the palms;
- “walk” through the sand separately with each finger of the right and left hand in turn (first only with the index fingers, then with the middle, ring, thumb and finally the little fingers).
You can “play” on the surface of the sand, like a piano or computer keyboard. At the same time, not only the fingers move, but also the hands, making soft movements up and down.
The sandbox can be used to find a specific letter made of plastic and buried among others in the sand (a variation of the game "Magic Bag").
Games to develop diaphragmatic breathing:
"LEVEL THE ROAD"
From the children's car, the teacher makes a shallow groove in the sand, the child uses an air stream to level the road in front of the car;
"WHAT'S UNDER THE SAND?"
The picture is covered with a thin layer of sand. Blowing away the sand, the child reveals the image.
"HOLE"
The child, following the rules of breathing, takes in air through his nose, inflating his stomach and slowly, smoothly, and in a long stream, blows out a hole in the sand.
"HELP THE HARE"
Three or four depressions are made in the sand - “footprints” leading to the toy hare. There is a fox nearby. It is necessary to “cover up” all traces so that the fox does not discover the hare.
"THE ROAD TO A FRIEND"
Two toys are placed on the sand. You need to use a long, smooth stream to form a path on the sand from one toy to another.
"SECRET"
A toy or small object is buried shallowly in the sand. It is necessary to blow off the sand to reveal what is hidden.
Using sand therapy has many positive aspects:
. the child’s desire to learn something new, experiment and work independently increases significantly;
. in the sandbox, tactile sensitivity develops powerfully as the basis of “manual intelligence”;
. in games with sand, all cognitive functions (perception, attention, memory, thinking), as well as speech and motor skills, develop more harmoniously and intensively;
. object-based play activities are improved, which contributes to the development of role-playing games and the child’s communication skills;
. sand, like water, absorbs negative energy, which is especially important when working with “special” children.
Thus, the relevance of using sand games is determined, firstly, by solving speech problems; secondly, the development of coherent speech; thirdly, the development of fine motor skills of the hand; fourthly, correction of the mental processes of children with special needs and mental retardation.
The sandbox is an excellent mediator for establishing contact with a child. Teachers get the opportunity to see the child’s inner world at the moment. Playing with sand can easily solve problems such as developing communication skills, i.e. ability to communicate normally.