Augmented Reality for Emotional and Social Development at Early Childhood

Resumen

Emotional competence and skills for social communication development can be concurrently supported through intentional thought and planning on the part of the early childhood educator. In this article, we offer a proposal for teachers to effectively implement interventions to support these two areas, all within the context of augmented reality. The areas of feeling exploration, social skills and conflict resolution can be investigated using augmented reality to support children and enhance and refine their social competence. Augmented reality (AR) provides an environment where exploration of feelings and interaction with equals is possible and which allows children to understand and practice social skills in a technologically-biased context. The interactive possibilities of AR enable children to explore and learn what can occur by observing how people behave and by observing the effects and consequences of a certain behaviour. Moreover, by using the AR application, children become active part of the interaction and they can observe how participants mutually influence each other and they can learn social skills by modeling and trying without being afraid of the results of the interaction. The article presents the implementation of a concrete proposal for emotional and social development in early childhood wich depicts everyday situations and experiences designed in colaboration with experienced educators.