THE PATH OF ANALYSIS

To understand the constant movement of the construction of the psyche, we need to identify what moves it, that is, the use of signs. The signs used make it possible to analyze their social and personal meaning, allowing us to go beyond what is apparent and think of processes, objects, or situations not previously revealed. The signs appropriated by the subject were first external before becoming internal, being established as instruments in the process of mediation that both allowed the appropriation of signs and was the object at the moment of playing, enabling new understandings of the social.

The analysis of results did not consider the functional processes separately in the episodes because “the specific transformations of each function determine changes in the set of functions of which they are part, that is, of the psyche as a whole” (^{Martins, 2013}, p. 70).

Just as the use of one tool or another determines the whole mechanism of the work operation, so the nature of the sign used is the fundamental factor upon which the entire process [of the development of higher psychological processes] depends. The essential relationship underlying the upper structure is the special form of organization of the entire process, which is built on the introduction into the situation of certain artificial stimuli that play the role of signs. (^{Vygotsky, 1995}, p. 123, our translation)

Thus, understanding the words/signs was the starting point for data analysis. However, “to understand the individual’s speech, [...] we must understand their thinking (which is always emotionally based), we must grasp the meaning of speech. The meaning is [...] the unity of thought and language” (^{Aguiar, 2001}, p. 130).

FUNCTIONAL PROCESSES AND ROLE-PLAYING GAMES

The term “role-play” is used to denote unstructured make-believe playing with implied rules and defined roles whereby children reproduce adult social roles to fit into society (^{Elkonin, 1987}). As adult and child social relations have historically diversified, role-plays have emerged as a psychological necessity. Therefore, its origin is related to “very concrete social conditions of the child’s life in society and not to the action of innate instinctive energy [...]” (^{Elkonin, 2009}, p. 80).

For this reason, role-playing games do not appear to be spontaneous but rather invented by children based on the relationships established between adults and between adults and children (^{Elkonin, 2009}). The main feature of the playful activity in role-plays is the fact that the child creates a fictional situation to perform an adult role, attributing meaning to it and transferring this meaning from one object to another.

To understand the meaning of role-playing for children, we initially sought their central themes, organizing and transcribing them in 23 episodes. The criterion for the clippings in the film was the presence of role-playing during the activity and the quality of the record, that is, if children’s speeches were understandable, since, due to the noise and the microphone range, some lines were inaudible. Chart 1 presents the episodes created by the children in their role-plays.

The most frequent scenario was "house" (which appeared 6 times), followed by “school” (5 times), “doll” (4 times), “doctor” (3 times), “make-up” (twice), and “salesperson”, “rescue team”, and “mechanic” (once each).

We found that children used the themes “house” and “school” more often, since they represent the relational field in this age group, which focuses mainly on family, school, child care, and the roles of mother and educator, as also observed by ^{Oliveira (2011}).

DEEPENING THE ANALYSIS

In the second level of analysis, three nuclei of meaning were established, highlighting the contradictory situations most commonly observed in the games: “The appropriate. The inappropriate”. “The said. The unsaid”; “I want to be... You cannot be”.

The first nucleus, “The appropriate. The inappropriate”, reflected the social approval considering gender issues and was based on the children’s speeches referring to toys suitable for boys or girls.

The analyses of the second nucleus, “The said. The unsaid”, aimed to demonstrate the explicit and implicit elements that emerged in role-playing situations so as to understand the subjects’ thought processes.

The final nucleus, “I want to be... You cannot be”, was based on the preferences expressed by the subjects for playing a certain role and obtaining or not the authorization from their peers, allowing them to play.

However, even though each nucleus of meaning had its specificity, they interacted with each other, and their determinations resulted from the historical processes constituting them.

In the third level of analysis, we assessed each subject on their relations during the role-playing activity, taking into account the contents expressed by them to identify how the established nuclei of meaning manifested in their speech. At the same time, some constitutive aspects of each subject were analyzed in an attempt to comprehend social characteristics that enabled their formation.

In discussing sense and meaning, we sought to understand them as constituted by the relationship between the symbolic and the emotional (^{Aguiar and Ozella, 2006}), recognizing the cognitive-symbolic and emotional aspects as inseparable. Thus, the following is the analysis of the subjects’ lines in some situations of the role-plays.

In playing adult roles, the child appropriates the social meaning of human productive activities, and their conduct is guided by this appropriation. However, the role-playing is unpredictable, and, in the end, the child might not always find the pleasure or satisfy the needs that led them to play. As shown in the game: So what if it is for a girl...

Z. (6-year-old boy) is alone inside a pink tent playing with the popcorn maker (miniature object toy). L.G. (6-year-old boy) and M. (6-year-old boy) remain outside, talking and watching their colleague inside.

Z.: “- Go get the prince for me” (addressing M.). C. (6-year-old girl) approaches, and Z. invites her: “- Let’s play here?”; “- How can I help?” (leaves the tent). “- I'll have to take off the slipper” (putting on the slippers that were outside the tent). The invitation to C. seems to be necessary for him to play in the pink tent, as his fellow boys refuse to play inside it.

Within seconds, Z. returns to the cabin, barefoot, slips in, and sits on the floor. He tries to close the “door” (attaching one piece of fabric to another with velcro).

Z.: “- Oh, Ma has the keys...” (Z. tells M., who is outside watching what he does).

L.G.: “- Want I put there for you, Z.?” (offering to help him join the velcro parts to close the tent door).

Z. just smiles but does not authorize L.G. to help him.

M.: “- Hey, Z., let me tells you something in the little hole there?” (M. approaches the tent, smiles, kneels next to the small window, and whispers something to Z. who is inside. We assume that, since the tent is pink, he tells his friend that a boy cannot play inside. Then he walks away).

Z.: “- So what if it is for a girl...” (Z. stays in the tent playing alone with the popcorn maker. After some time, Z. leaves and the game ends). (Episode 224-226 - 12/1/2014)

Moments before when playing house with the colleague L.G., Z. had dismantled the existing house that 1103 the girls had played and reassembled it under the table. This action of 1104 setting up a new house in a less visible place is necessary for them to allow themselves 1105 to play with the same toys the girls had previously used.

What drives a child to play is their unrealistic needs that arise from the perception of challenges or actions that cannot be accomplished due to their physical and psychological limitations. Therefore, the role-playing itself does not trigger these needs, as they already existed (^{Prestes, 2010}).

The child's primary concern is not learning to use human objects or being able to perform genuine adult tasks. Role-playing is an activity in which the motive is in its own process. Stating that the reason for playing is in the process means that, in fact, role-playing is not centered on the objects the child uses to represent different situations, or even on the characters they portray. Proof of this is that the children, at the end of the game, pick up the toys or objects, leave their characters behind, and become themselves again.

Despite not objectively presenting a drawing or object made, there was a product: the act of playing. This product is an affective-emotional state, which allows children to “ensure their success through relationships that can be established [...] during or at the end of the action” (^{Elkonin, 2009}, p. 220), as in the game “Wine or juice?”

L.H. (6-year-old boy) plays with the toy stove and has a glass and a cup in his hand. L.G. (6-year-old boy) has a puppet, which he rapidly brings closer to his colleague, while L.H. dodges every time.

L.H.: “- Hey, wan...wan wine?? Wan wine?? Hey... wan wine?? Hey... wan wine, you drunk?” (L.G. now rubs the puppet on the stove and does not answer his colleague’s question). “- Hey... wan wine?” (L.G. puts the puppet on L.H.'s face several times, which he does not like. The last time he is asked, he rubs the puppet on L.H.’s face).

L.H.: “- Hey... stop! Or I’ll tell the teacher. Hey... wan some wine?” (L.G. continues to move the puppet, now rubbing it on the stove. L.H. pretends to fill the glass and drink. L.G. slightly shakes his head “no”).

Every time L.H. asked L.G. if he wanted wine, the latter did not answer, just moved the puppet. After he threatened to tell the teacher, L.H. stopped bothering his colleague.

L.H.: “- I have a cup to you...” (he fills the little cup and gives it to the puppet, L.G. also helps). “- He can hav juice”. (L.H. moves the puppet as if it would swallow the liquid. They both pretend the puppet drank the juice). (Episode DSC 287 - 12/8/2014)

The child does not represent an adult with a particular profession or performs actions/tasks typical of the adult world, such as cooking/cutting the food. Their main focus is the relations that adults establish with each other when using objects, which manifest in the child’s relationships with other children or adults. As ^{Elkonin (2009}, p. 31) states: “[...] the role-playing game is influenced, above all, by human activity, work, and relations between people [...]; therefore, the fundamental content of the role assumed by the child is precisely the reformulation of this aspect of reality”.

What the child wants to convey is evident in the different themes that will constitute the content revealed in the role-plays. Therefore, this reconstruction of the adult role chosen by the child is linked to their concrete life conditions and relationships.

The conversion of the girl into the mother, and the doll into the daughter, allows the act of bathing, feeding, and preparing food to become the child's responsibility. These actions [in which various tasks are implicit, such as preparing the bath, cooling the baby's food, etc.] manifest the activities performed by the mother with her child, her love and tenderness, or even the opposite [...]. (^{Elkonin, 2009}, p. 404-405)

In this sense, in the role-playing, representation has as function beyond interpreting the relationships characteristic of the role: it identifies the model behavior portrayed by the interpreter or other participants. The child has relative freedom at this point because they have to adjust their conduct to the role, following its rules. Thus, freedom is an illusion. Therefore, ^{Elkonin (2009}) considers the game a school of arbitrary conduct.

An example is the game “Panties!”

L.H. (6-year-old boy) and T. (6-year-old boy) are sitting on the couch and playing with various small toys, such as Polly doll clothes and accessories.

T.: “- Where’is other’ doll ???”

L.H.: “- I don’t know...”

Both go searching for the Polly doll, looking over the couch and nearby. They find it. L.H. puts the boot on the doll, and T. holds a baby bottle.

T.: “- Do you have a nipple?”

L.H. keeps trying to put the boot on the doll, finding it difficult.

T.: “- What about the shirt?”

L.H. makes a face of discontent and looks for something.

T.: “- Here’s nother boot...” (he gives it to L.H. to put on the doll). “- This skirt goes where... It’s a shirt...” (he wants to warn that the skirt is wrongly dressed, as it is a shirt and not a skirt).

L.H.: “- What?”

T.: “- It’s a shirt...”

L.H.: “- I don’t know...” (looks for something and grabs the doll’s panties). “- These are... PANTIES!!!...” (he drops them quickly, makes a disgusted face showing his tongue, leaves everything behind, and goes away).

They disperse, ending the game. (Episode 92 - 12/04/2014)

A fundamental aspect of role-playing is providing the opportunity to experience the standards of conduct present in adult relationships, enabling the child, while interpreting, to submit to the rules that the adult role requires. Rule-based relationships are the source of the development of child morals.

Thus, role-playing fosters the child’s knowledge of social reality at a conscious and broad level of understanding. However, we must remember that the full “[...] psychic development of playing depends on the richness of the child’s access to knowledge about the world (or lack thereof) [...] [it depends on] their living conditions and education” (^{Pasqualini, 2013}, p. 90).

The creation of the imaginary situation, the definition of specific rules, and the child’s ability to control their behavior to achieve a certain end in role-playing situations are fundamental to their cognitive development, as it produces a zone of proximal development (ZPD).² They start to behave in a more evolved way than in real life activities and thus learn to separate object and meaning, which contributes to their development, since “[...] performing this action [which they have not yet mastered in reality] resolves the contradiction between the need to act and the inability to carry out the tasks required by the action” (^{Facci, 2004}, p. 69).

These considerations lead to the understanding that what determines the acceptance or refusal to play are the knowledge and ideas, the meaning and the sense that children have about the fundamental content of the role-play being interpreted. All these elements constitute the standards of conduct that permeate adult relationships, as observed in the game “Can I be a teacher?”, for which a brief description and some excerpts are given below.

In this game, the children portray the daily life of the classroom and the activities performed by students and teacher, among them, the teaching and writing of letters. Despite not being directly involved in playing school, L.H. tries to be accepted and experiences the conflict between wanting and not being able to be a teacher because his colleague refuses him.

A.M.: “- Don’t mess with things... Do you also want to be a teacher?”

A.M.: “- Okay... so you have to get some things first…” (she keeps L.H. waiting, not saying what he should look for. She does not pay attention to him).

[...]

L.H.: “- Get some things?...”

[...]

L.H.: “- See... I brought puppets”.

The eminently human psychic functions are revealed and mobilized in the game, enabling the child to interact in the world. Among them are the perception and attention to the objects that surround them, the memory of experienced situations, emotions, volition - when wanting to play a certain role, the conduct guided by the demands of the role, with their thinking leading their actions and their language enabling interaction. Nonetheless, as stated by ^{Martins (2013}), these functions manifest and come into action together, constantly relating to one another, as without their participation, both expressed and internalized, there can be no role-playing.

In this scenario, the other participants must accept the role played by a group member. What reasons lead the child to think that their peer will not be able to play the same role they play, in this case, that of the teacher? Why does A.M. find L.H. unable to be a teacher and therefore tries to deceive him by asking him to look for “some things first”, which she does not specify? It seems like she just wants to keep him deluded and under her power. Even when he takes the initiative to bring some objects, A.M. ignores them and still does not authorize him to be a teacher, perhaps not to relinquish this role.

For the first time, L.H. shows interest in playing the role of the teacher, disputed among colleagues and already played by those less inhibited and who interact more easily. We notice that L.H. seeks to broaden his ability to speak and behave as he tries to assume the teaching role. The role of the teacher is challenging for him, propelling him to the autonomy and decision-making shown when leaving the room and seeking puppets to fulfill the condition imposed, though not revealed, by A.M. and used only as a pretext to keep him around and dependent on what she should designate. L.H. submits himself to the condition imposed by A.M. because he values the role of the teacher played by the adult and demonstrates feeling happy and empowered to do so.

[...] this means that the child sees the adult, above all, from the perspective of their functions. They want to act as an adult, [...] and under this very general desire, first suggested by the adult (the educator or the parents), they begin to act as if they were the adult. This feeling is so encompassing that a small allusion is enough for the child to transform joyfully into an adult, of course in a purely emotional aspect. It is the strength of this sensation that explains the ease with which children assume the roles of adults. (^{Elkonin, 2009}, p. 404)

Even before being allowed to play teacher, L.H. starts acting as one because when he returns with “some things”, he brings puppets, pedagogical material widely used during preschool classes for storytelling.

The child manifestations present in the described game reveal the aspect of arbitrary behavior, that is, the performance of actions consistent with the assumed role. They also refer to the morality issues in the action, that is, an incipient evaluation of the reliability of actions in relation to the similarity with the model begins to take place, according to which these actions will or will not be allowed. However, even though this verification is very weak, “[...] the value of the game is originating this function. This is precisely why the game can be considered a school of arbitrary conduct” (^{Elkonin, 2009}, p. 420).

These considerations reveal the idea that, during role-plays, children learn to control each other, exert some kind of power, discriminate, and thus form preconceptions about what is authorized and unauthorized, right and wrong, good and bad, beautiful and ugly, among others.

Role-playing [...] enables the child to overcome the level of consciousness limited to the immediate present, that is, allows the abstract (theoretical) activity. Thus, the target of their actions ceases to be the content of the specific act, moving to the process that articulates various actions and objects, present or symbolized. Consequently, the breadth and complexity of the human world are perceived by children, challenging them […] and culminating in a complete restructuring of their consciousness. (^{Martins, 2006}, p. 42-43)

The game under review - “Can I be a teacher?” - suggests a power relationship between those who authorize or disallow the adult roles to be played, and therefore, have the control over both social relations that adults develop and the relationships between the children participating in the game. In this case, the girl A.M. demonstrates to have this control, and the boy L.H. feels motivated to reach it when he challenges himself to be the teacher.

Human power corresponds to the ways of being, acting, thinking, and feeling as products of the sociocultural life activity, developed as a possibility of action and as a guiding activity in the environment, with the purpose of satisfying the needs of the subject. Thus, mastering oneself and the knowledge of the world where one lives is an expression of power (^{Marino Filho, 2010}).

When the child needs to play a certain role in the game, the possibility of a special activity that promotes their development arises. Therefore, role-playing allows the emergence of new needs, which lead the subject to want to interpret new roles, experiencing different forms of power. Consequently, the child begins to experience the sensation of being able to exert greater influence while playing, feeling the social power of this new role. This power is not natural, but something social relations create in the individual.

By not abandoning the teacher role, A.M. does not want to give up the power it gives her. When L.H. handed her the puppets, A.M. took them with a laconic “Okay!", without interaction, which could reveal her limitation on the mediating role that verbal language would play in negotiations. On the other hand, L.H. also demonstrated the same limitation by not reacting or expressing himself verbally.

During the episodes, we observed that, in the school role-play, the role of the teacher was not portrayed by all students, but only by those who demonstrated mastery of the actions that the role required and had the sympathy of other participants. “It is not enough to acquire a certain power, one must learn to use it in different situations and be able to master the spheres of its performance” (^{Marino Filho, 2010}, p. 267).

Thus, the research procedure design allowed the space and time expansion for role-playing, from the first to the second phase of data collection. When the pedagogical planning enlarged this space, it increased the possibilities of negotiation and personal empowerment, thus providing better conditions for the mediating interaction between the children.

Different psychic processes emerged in the game: aspects of childhood experience that caught the child’s attention, who perceived and retained them in memory, expressing them through language, since “the thought function [acts] as a ‘reagent’ (analogy to chemical processes) for all psychic functions” (^{Martins, Abrantes e Facci, 2016}, p. 24). In this sense, we identified an evolution in the verbal language of the children, throughout the different role-plays observed, which allows us to state that there was thought development.

The last analysis is uniquely marked by the content of the game - drugs - used by the boys Z. and G.B., who played school and at some point started talking about “marijuana”.

From the game transcript, we extracted a few lines from Z.: “[marijuana] is ‘dugs’”, “[it doesn’t] do anything”, “marijuana is cigarette”, “‘dug’ is money”, “they [the bad guys] steal”. What Z. said reveals a reality to which children are very early exposed, and that contrasts with the “protected world” that the school seeks to provide for them. These statements refer to the different meanings that Z. attributes to drugs from his social context.

He did not simply say words; he used them to express his conscience and the personal and moral sense he assigned to them. We can notice that the social meanings attributed to the words “marijuana”, “drug”, and “cigarette” were partially grasped by Z., with the sense that drugs do nothing, they are only used to make cigarettes and a source of money.

Character traits are formed and developed in the relationship between the individual and the environment, that is, only in the community, which institutes the reaction models that are constructed in identical or similar situations. In established social relations, the individual assimilates reaction models guided by norms, rules, customs, moral requirements, etc. specific to the group to which they belong. Therefore, social experience institutes not only circumstance reaction models but also parameters for self-analysis, providing the guiding points by which people conduct their behaviors (^{Martins, 2006}, p. 37).

EXTRAPOLATING THE SCHOOL WALLS

The discussion about drugs between the two boys sheds light on the process of insertion in the sociocultural universe of the community where they live. It reveals evidence about moral demands and ways of reacting to the circumstances in which these children find themselves. Thus, it points to the importance of the social role of the school, which, although constituted as part of this social fabric, is as a place not only committed to transmitting the culture historically built by humankind but where children, especially from the underprivileged classes, can be welcomed and protected from the harassment of enticers, traffickers, and from current serious social problems.

Therefore, contemporary society must seek ways to cope with the effects of economic, political, and social issues on child development, emphasizing role-playing as one of the means for children to elaborate on these effects. In this sense, we highlight the need for public policies that enable children to be welcomed full-time into the school learning space, listening to them, and providing them more favorable conditions to protect and guide them.

Just as learning guides and stimulates internal developmental processes, role-playing also fosters growth by triggering new needs that drive evolutionary changes.

[...] children always behave far beyond the usual conduct for their age. They act as if they are older, bigger, stronger, and more capable than they really are. They act or try to act like an adult in relation to the objects and concepts of the adult world, of the human universe. Thus, having the adult behavior as reference [...] [role-playing] contains, in a condensed form, all the tendencies of the child's later development. (^{Rossler, 2006}, p. 60-61)

Experiencing imaginary situations enables a leap in child development and allows them to have a sense of social belonging, one of the strongest needs in human beings. The child starts to behave more maturely, trying to solve the new situation they are experiencing. They have to resolve the contradiction generated by what they want and what they cannot yet accomplish, so they create an imaginary world in which they can meet their needs. Thus, a new relationship arises between the thought situation and the real situation, between the semantic field and the visual field, driving the semantic field.

Finally, role-playing provides “[...] a situation of transition between the child’s action with concrete objects and their actions with meanings” (^{Oliveira, 2011}, p. 69). Through social mediation, the child develops their language skills and expands their sign system. Consequently, by using role-playing games, the child appropriates the concrete world of human objects, actively relates to the objects used by adults, develops awareness about the objective world, and establishes a boundary between what they have mastered and what they still cannot control in terms of tasks and actions.

Role-playing broadens the repertoire of those involved, as it favors interaction between colleagues, enabling new appropriations. The relationship is one of reciprocity; in school, new plots become known, and the actions become more complex as the roles are diversified. It is the life that pulsates outside school manifesting itself within the school. “How to enrich the content of the game? The fundamental source is the ideas children have of the surrounding reality, and if they do not have them, the game cannot be carried out” (^{Elkonin, 2009}, p. 302).