New York: Plenum Press] argues that at the infant-toddler age, children imitate everyday life in their play. Imitation is not being used in an everyday way, such as to copy, but rather in a psychological way, where a child can only imitate what s/he understands. Vygotsky [2004. Imagination and creativity in childhood. Journal of Russian and East European Psychology, 42(1), 7-97] argues that the more experiences a child has, the more they can draw upon for expressing creative and imaginative responses in play and learning. However, we know very little about how imitation and scientific concept formation occur in the infant-toddler age. It is during this early period that imagination is heightened and that there is a greater need for conceptual understanding in order to make meaning in everyday life. It is argued in this paper that imitation extends children's imaginative thinking in developing science concept formation. The larger study from which this article derives comprises the observation of four Bangladeshi children (aged 10-36 months) over a period of 2 years in Australia and Singapore. In this paper, an analysis of almost 22 hours of video data gathered over 2 years (12-36 months) of one child's everyday family life is presented. Hedegaard's dialectical-interactive approach [2008. Principles for interpreting research protocols. In M. Hedegaard & M. Fleer (Eds.), Studying children: A cultural-historical approach (pp. 46-64). London: Open University Press] has been employed in the analysis of the data. The findings indicate that imitation, imagination and creativity help the infant-toddler to develop science concepts gradually, with many rudimentary science concepts being acquired over the duration of the study period. We have termed this development incremental science.
The authors would like to clarify that in the article 'Small science: Infants and toddlers experiencing science in everyday family life' published with the journal Research in Science Education, 45 (3), pp. 445-464, the one focus family (Aarjaw family) has been withdrawn from the study. Therefore, the number of participants should be three (instead of four) and total hours of video data 30 h (instead of 51), collected over 1 year (instead of two). The substitute transcript (the vignette and the interpretation of the vignette) is added here below. In the 'Findings' section, the vignette and the interpretation of the vignette have been replaced only and please note that no conceptual change or content change of any significance has been made in the other parts of the 'Findings' section. The Vignette Activity settings: Preparing different shapes with playdough through a playful context Date: 17 September 2012, Location-Singapore, Participants: Jhuma (Jhumki's mother), Jhumki (23 months), Jhumki's teddy bears. Total video length: 50 min and field notes on the day Small science-press hard, push, roll and change of state of matter (dough becomes elephant, finger, doll, duck, cake)-force
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