There are several forms to conceive preschool aims and the manners that the teacher should conduct pedagogical activities. How such conceptions are articulated in practice? During one academic year we observed on a daily basis the activities developed by a group of 22 preschoolers (ages 4 to 6) attending a private school; the procedures used in, the contents of, and the duration of each activity were recorded. Structured activities occupied about half of the time each month. Among structure activities, copying, painting, cutting and pasting, free-style and directed drawing occupied most of the time. With regard to content, those related to Writing and Social Studies were given more emphasis than those related to Math and Sciences. We infer from those practices a conception of preschool whose goal is to prepare to literacy, which is conceived as transmission of a transcription code. The emphasis on graphic aspects in teaching letters and numbers hampers their inclusion in real communicative contexts, wasting the time that could be assigned to the teaching of Sciences.
Pedagogical Pratices; Preschool; Implicit Conceptions