Teaching in the Light of Activity Theory Applied to Preschool: Reflections on Brazilian Practice

BACKGROUND: Activity Theory applied by the teacher to preschool education favors the development of new psychological formations, such as perception, attention, memory, thought, language, and voluntary self-regulation, which prepare the child for school. OBJECTIVE: To highlight the contributions of N.F. Talyzina based on Activity Theory applied to preschool education and to reflect on the theory’s use in the Brazilian education system. DESIGN: This article is theoretically built from research in a sandwich doctorate program in Puebla, Mexico and internship supervision practices for psychologist training at a public university in Brazil’s central-west region. RESULTS: Activity Theory is seldom applied to teaching, including in Brazil, and there is little knowledge about the scientific contributions of one of its practitioners, the late N.F. Talyzina. We chose the preschool stage as the focus of our reflections, and we maintain that the introduction of role-playing as the main activity in early childhood education promotes the development of psychological neoformations and prepares the child for the next stage of school. Finally, we present the internship practices in applied psychology in a Brazilian children’s group, with evidence of advances. CONCLUSION: There is a need for expansion of the formative experiments reported here to the Brazilian population, for scientific dissemination of the results, and promotion of teacher training and qualification in Activity Theory.