Share in play activities.

Yaden, Rowe and MacGillvray (1999) state that one of the most researched areas of early literacy learning in recent years has been the play-literacy connection. They point out that children often include literate behaviours in their invented scripts and adult mediation will serve to increase the amount of literacy-related play and also help to develop vocabulary.

Julie's role in the sociodramatic play sequence with her two children is limited. While she helps put dress-up clothes together for her son and daughter, and she offers a label for the costume, "You're dressing up as a hobo", she quickly detaches herself both physically and verbally. She moves away from the children allowing them to play on their own. It appears that she sees her role to simply pick up the cast off clothes and reorganize them for her children. When Julie's daughter's pajamas fall down in one routine, her son points this out to Julie while he laughs hysterically. Julie simply acknowledges the incident with a smile but there is no verbal comment. Julie allows her children to experiment with gender without commenting. Her son chooses to wear a pair of women's high-heeled shoes and his sister's pink nightgown and at another point he pulls a doll, like a baby, from his belly. His younger sister then dresses in her brother's army attire and states that she is pretending to be a boy.

Julie's two children are involved mainly in parallel play with repetitive loops. That is, the activity seems to involve a child choosing something to wear, the mother or child labelling the character portrayed, the children role playing a short stint, the children casting off the clothes, the mother picking up the clothes, and the loop then repeating. Julie remains disengaged and detached with the children's actual play until they start singing rather animated Elvis Presley-like versions of "Jesus Loves Me" and "Jesus Loves the Children". At that point, Julie is quick to express her dissatisfaction and say "Sing like you were taught to sing…come on guys." She then accompanies them to try to refocus them on singing in the more traditional style.