An investigation of children’s social behaviour using the design of Bronfenbrenner’s ecological model in a multicultural pre-school

The aim of this paper is to explore children‟s social behaviour in a multi-ethnic pre-school in Malaysia, in response to concern expressed about the development of social interaction skills. Drawing from Bronfenbrenner‟s (1979) ecological model, that the social meaning which can be attributed to any behaviour is rooted in a complex of interacting factors, observations and interviews were conducted with the children, parents and teachers. Observations of classroom activity and of free play were recorded through field notes and digital camera. The study involved 25 children and their parents, and teachers from one PERPADUAN Pre-school in Malaysia. The study revealed helpful, sharing, cooperative behaviour and respectful occurring during learning activities develops child‟s interaction. These behaviours that the children practised were related to the teacher‟s view, who acknowledged that these behaviours are stressed in the pre-school curriculum activities and in line with three ethnic groups commonalities. Children relate to each other within and between the ethnic groups based on reciprocal and shared play activity. An ecological model of children‟s social behaviour Multi-ethnic Pre-school has emerged from this research extended ecological model to explain the commonalities.