BOOK REVIEWS.*********

La Educaci6n Preescolar: Desafio yAventura.Lavanchy Bobsien, S.Editorial Universitaria,Santiago, Chile. 1993.La autora con este libro haee un gran aporte ala educaci6n inicial, entregando una serie deorientaciones, muy concretas y realistas aleducador que se desempefia en este nivel. Almismo tiempo, la forma didactica en que seexponen los contenidos en el texto, permitenguiar a quien se encuentra en proceso deformaei6n profesional.

Sylvia Lavanchy recoge en su libro una seriede experiencias personales, con nifios menores,vividas en diferentes etapas de su vidaprofesional, con las que se ilustran muyclaramente los contenidos que se estanabordando. Esto ayuda al educador a apreciara traves de ejemplos concretos la relacionexistente entre 10 que plantea te6ricamente ylas reacciones de los nifios segim sea la etapadel desarrollo que vive, las experiencias que hatenido y los tipos de apendizajes que el haadquirido.

Haee una exposicion exhautiva de algunosaspectos fundamentales para ofrecer al nmo eneste periodo una educaciOn de calidad, comoson: las caracteristicas propias del nifio, suforma de aprender la organ-izacion ydistribucion del espaeio fisico; distribucion deltiempo durante la permanencia del nmo en eljardin infantil y los ternas 0 eontenidosapropriados para los menores.

En los eapitulos que aborda la organizacion deespaeio y equipamiento en el jardin infantil yla distribucion de la jornada diaria,da a eonoeercon bastanta profundidad los principios en queestos deben basarse; los prop6sitos que esnecesario considerar y la finalidad que tienecada uno de los espacios que se organizantanto en el interior como en el exterior delCentro Educativo y los momentos que serequieren organizar durante la permanencia delnifio en el jardin infantil. A la vez en ambostemas, entrega ejemplos muy apropiados y

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sugerencias para evaluar estos aspectos para si,asegurar una buena calidad del procesoeducativo.

Los contenidos 0 ternas en el nivel preescolarlos ve desde un enfoque que considera losintereses y necesidades de los nifios,describiendo los problemas que pueden surgiral guiarse con este enfoque y analizando elsignificado que tienen los intereses ynecesidades de los pequefios.lo que permiteorientar al educador de parvulos en esteaspecto tan importante para ayudaradecuadamente al desarrollo del nino.

Sylvia Lavanchy finaliza su obra dando aconocer una pauta de observaci6n que esfactible de ser utilizado por el educador seencuentra a cargo de un grupo de nifios,facilitandole el proceso de obtenci6n yanalisis de informacion que le permitenevaluar a los nifios y orientar su quehacereducativo. Esta pauta considera la evoluciondel nmo en los aspectos : psicomotor, cog­nitivo y afectivo entre los 2 y 6 alios deedad. En el aspecto psicomotor considera lacordinaci6n motriz gruesa y frna; en el aspectocognitivo el conocimiento fisico logico­matematico, social y la representacion; enel aspecto afectivo, se da enfansis a 10referente a autonomia e iniciativa .

Otro gran valor que este texto tiene, es que suaurora, rescata los principios que sustentan ala Edueaci6n Parvularia de los llamadosprecursores, como tambien de aquellosmaestros y teoricos que han aportadoexperiencias, ideas y teorias a este primernivel de la educacion, los que se reflejan enforma coherente y constante a traves de todasu obra.Elena Alvarez -Salamanca M.

Working Towards Better Childcare.J. Peeters, M. Vandenbroeck (Eds)University of Ghent, Belgium. pplSl400 B.Fr." Pour un meilleur accueil des enfants " est unouvrage collectif du Departement de

Psychologie Generate de l'Universite de Ganden collaboration avec le Centre de rechercheet de Formation pour le jeune enfant (VBJK ).

II s'agit du rapport de treize annees derecherche et de formation avec le soutien de laFondation van Leer et de "Kind en Gezin ",retracant les recherches de 1972 a 1992 quiont vu la creation de projets et lamodernisation des modes de garde de enfantsen Flandre.

Chaque collaborateur Ii cet ouvrage contribueIi developper dans sa specialite les raisons duchangement,mais tous s'accordent pourintensifier les recherches vers des cebtresd'accueil qui meritent dime pris au serieux,Ensemble, ils retracent l'evolution depuisplus de lOans.

Prof.R.Baekelm ans, chef du departement dePsychologie generale de Gand, dans son articleII Source d'inspiration ", decrit comment I'Universite de Gand, depuis lomgtempsmaintenant a montre un interet pour lesproblemes concernant la garde des jeunesenfants. II souligne l'interaction des diversesorganisations academiques, Fondations etautres associations qui ont mis en communleurs recherches sur la qualite de Ia garde desenfants en Flandre et rappelle notamment lestravaux menes au niveau de I' OMEP/WOVO/VCOK.

M. Vandenbroeck, charge de recherche etcoordinateur OMEP, dans un premier temps,recapitule pour les lecteurs peu familiarisesavec les organisations en Flandre, les plusimportantes formes de garde et d'accueil etleurs repartitions qualitatives et quantitativessur Ie territoire flamand (creches, jardinsd'enfants, garderies).

Dans un second temps, M.Vandenbroeck etJ.Peeters soulignent leur cadre de referenceutilise pour analyser la qualite de 1'accueilavec comme point de reperes : II ChildcareNetwork of the European Community ". Ceschema de travail offre l'avantage d'unconsensus international mais ce choix peut etrevu comme un encouragement vers une

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discussion europeenne sur la qualite des gardesd'enfants dans son propre pays. Ils se referentaussi aux criteres rapportes par Balaguer. lisabordent enfm la recherche et les debouchespratiques sur une veritable action en creant desmateriaux, des livres et des films videos pourla formation directe de puericultricesd'institutrices et de gardiennes sans oublier lesservices de services d'accueil en dehors desheures scolaires,

Alln Somers coordinatrice et responsable dela revue KIDO attire 1'attention sur uneimportante categorie de travailleurs de la petiteenfance: les gardiennes familiales a domicile­Finalement pour conclure ce rapport, J.Peetersresume les restrictions existant encore enFlandre et lance un nouveau defi de dix ans.

Cet ouvrage existe en anglais ou en flamand etpeut etre complete par une brochure soit enfrancais soit en flamand : II Accueil extrascolaire - une nouvelle approche " Min. desAffaires SocialesJacqueline Andries, Belgium.

Children's Saving: A Study in theDevelopment of Economic Behaviour.Edmund J.S. Sonuga-Barke & Paul Webley.Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Hove UK.,1993. ppl50-When you put money in the bank whathappens to it? How can you help yourself toresist temptation? Do you think it hard foreveryone to save? These are the kinds ofquestions that children from 4 up to 12 yearsold were posed in the study on thedevelopment of economic behaviour des-cribedin this book .

Sonuga-Barke and Webley explore howchildren learn to make decisions about theresources available to them; learn therelationship between current and futurechoices; use strategies to preserve thoseresources. They relate this development to thechildren's social world; including culturalexpectations to behave econ-omically, and theinformation provided by parents and banks.

To explore these issues the authors create a

number of cleverly designed games, in whichchildren had to make decisions about savingand spending tokens they collected. Forinstance, the tokens could be spent on sweets,which were cheap and readily available, orcould be deposited in a savings box untilenough had accumulated for a more expensivetoy. Therefore the children were faced with achoice between immediate gratification and amore distant goal - which, has previously beendocumented - presents difficulties for youngchildren. In these games they had also to avoidlosing money, for example to a robber or at atoll booth. The children's decisions aboutwhere to keep their tokens throughout thegame were taken to indicate theirunderstanding of the various functions ofbanks.

The children were asked to explain theirdecisions and for their views on the benefits ofusing banks. Their understanding of conceptsunderlying economic behaviour (for example"temptation") was also tapped. Theirexplanations are quoted in generous measure;and they are revealing (e.g. "If I spend all mymoney on sweets the robber won't be able toget them") and fun to read.

The study reveals a change in the nature ofchildren's understanding of saving, from saving"because its good"; a social function, to savingto protect money, and eventually saving to earninterest, a truly economic function.

A central issue that arose from the games wasthe logic behind the young children's decisions,which usually did not leave them enoughmoney to make the larger purchase. Were theyacting irrationally, or were their choicesadequate in the context of their world? Thislead to an interesting discussion of the waythat parents structure their children's economicfortunes - they could (at least by the childrenin this study) be relied upon to top upchildren's pocket money; to buy larger itemsfor Christmas or birthdays; and often openedsavings accounts for their children withoutinvolving them - so the children did not in factbenefit from saving their own pocket money.Were they also used to acting to prevent their

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resources being claimed by their siblings?Perhaps the children were making appropriatechoices given the fmancial context they wereused to.

What other agents could be involved in thebuilding up of economic knowledge? There isa chapter which provides an analysis of theinformation provided for children by banksencouraging them to open a savings account.

The book includes two commentaries by Bertiand by Maital and Maital, and a reply bySonuga-Barke and Webley to their comments.They fmish by stressing the historical andcultural context and the function of economicbehaviour. Most importantly, they see theattempt of children to behave economically asattempts to solve problems of practicalimportance in their own world, not simply asa reflection of their knowledge about theeconomic world of grown ups.Rachel Wright.Institute of Education, London.

The following important book from Spain isbrought to the attention of readers. It is insynopsis form, rather than a review, but willbe of interest Ed.

Curvas de Crecimiento Estaturo-ponderalen Escolares de 4 a 14 Aiios de laComunidad Autonoma de Castilla-LaMancha.J.A. Saez Crespo; F. Fernandez Paez; J.Adel Ama Manzano y Sixto Lopez-TriviiioRodriguez.ISBN 84-604-8056-9 (1993) Deposito Legal:M-34037-1993La valoracion del crecimiento infantil es elprincipal motivo de demanda de asistenciasanitaria, y es parte del examen sistematico desalud, tanto en el escolar sano, como en laexploracion clinica del nifio enfermo.

Por ello, los autores de este estudio ofrecen lospatrones de crecimiento representativos de lapoblaci6n escolar castellano- manchega con losque poder comparar la situacion que goza undeterminado nifio/a respecto de su poblacion dereferencia. Con ello, pretendemos obviar los

errores que supone la utilizacion de curvas deotras paises 0 comunidades, que no constituyenparametres comparatives adecuados a nuestrarealidad.

El trabajo esta elaborado mediante unaencuesta transversal con una muestra aleatoriay representativa de 7.456 escolares (3.994nifios y 3.462 nifias), siguiendo los criteriostecnicos de la O.M.S. (1978) Y del CentroInternacional de la Infancia de Paris. EIresultado de este estudio son unas CurvaNPercentila,es y Baremos N"mbicoN enpuntuaeiones tipicas derivadas "S" muy utilesen el seguimiento de un determinado escolar,y para conocer si el proceso de crecimientotiende a mejorar 0 empeorar con el tiempo.

Con el uso sistematico de las CURVAS DECRECIMIENTO permitiran la adecuadaevaluacion del desarrollo de cada escolar y laconfirmacion de que las medidas de talla ypeso se encuentran dentro de los limitesnonnales. Caso de que no ocurra asi, detectarprecozmente las alteraciones en el ritmo decrecimiento y derivar el caso a la Atenci6nEspecializada para su diagnostico y tratamientoeficaz, evitando la aparicion de cronificacionesque podrian afectar de forma irreversible aldesarrollo del escolar.Dr A. Saez CrespoUniversidad Complutense de Madrid.

Helping Bereaved Children: A handbook forPractitioners. Ed. Nancy Boyd Webb. 1993,The Guildford Press New York. ISBN 0­89862-136-5 pp304.Drawing on their experience as child therapists,with extensive reference to the specialistliterature, the contributors to this handbookpresent and discuss current thinking on childbereavement and the current "state of the art"on play therapy and counselling, for the benefitof practitioners and more especially, traineepractitioners who seek to help bereavedchildren. The Editor, Dr Webb Contributes 7of the 14 chapters. In the three introductorychapters she presents an excellent survey of thepublished literature, reviewing and commentingcritically on theories and reported experience ina field in which as two collaborators observe,

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"The literature on child's grief and mourning isquite sparse, in fact this field is still in itsinfancy" p.170.

With more than 25 years of experience as ateacher and consultant, Dr Webb discusses thechild's understanding about death and thetheories as to the progression of understandingas the child grows older. She reviews children'sresponses to bereavement, both emotional andphysical, the nature of grief and mourning andthe influence of the circumstances of the deathand the part played by the home environment.She comments on the opinions and conclusionsof researchers as to what constitutespathological or disabling grief as opposed to"normal" grief. The child's need for therapyand counselling and the advantages anddisadvantages of alternative forms and theirlikely effectiveness are also assessed.

The chapters which follow present detailedstudies of specific cases under the headings ofdeath in the family. in the school and in thecommunity. With one exception, the authorsare writing from personal knowledge andinvolvement. Quoting Barth (p65) it is notedthat "There is no 'correct therapy for use withinfamilies.....The only approach seems to be toprovide as few sessions as possible and leavethe work of mourning to the family".

The book concludes with examples of grouptherapy sessions. Each case study ends with alist of discussion questions. There is supportfor the work from Dr. D.L.Schuman that thistext HwlH fill a large gap in the training ofthose who will ~ncounter grieving children intheir work". Each chapter has a useful list ofreferences.

As someone who has recently been involvedwith the running of a support group forbereaved children within a primary school, 1would have found such a comprehensive andinformative handbook useful. To thoseembarking on such a venture, and indeed anyprofessional who may be faced with thedilemma of whether. when and how tointervene, I recommend this book unreservedly.Jane Tannock, Solihull, UK.