The hat dynamics: Possibility to work on identity with babies

Abstract

When entering to the collective space, the daycare is usually the first place where the children will have a relationship with other children in the same age. Then, they start to interact with other similar people, who, at the same time, is diverse/different. At this age, the work on identity is essential, with their name, so little by little the children may recognize this world going beyond the one's self. Here, we report the experience lived at Interaction I from CECI - Child Interaction Center/UNICAMP with babies aged 6 months to 1 year and 3 months, in which music was the triggering element of such experiences to recognize oneself and the other person. The hat dynamics consists of singing a song mentioning each child's name in lyrics; at that time, the hat is put on the child's head. From the repetitions and requests from the children themselves, who started to demonstrate in a non-verbal way their wish for the song, bringing us the hat or using other materials on head, such as buckets and sieves and clapping hands, we recognized how much this experience has been significant to them. Today, many children follow the song with clapping, recognize their name when sung and other children, who already walk, take the hat to the colleagues, which is a way to interact between them and perceive this environment extension.