Name:	Beth Ferholt
Education:	M.S. in Elementary Education with Specialization in Reading, Hunter College, New York, 2001 B.A. in English Literature with Teacher Certification, Swarthmore College, Swarthmore, 1993
Research Interests :	I am working to develop a collection of methodological tools, including experimental video ethnography, which could help to interpret and represent complex social interactions such as play.  I am particularly interested in “perezhivaniye”, a process of emotionally identifying with another person or character in a story by imitating their actions (Stanislavski).  I am also interested in the historical condition of adults entering into fantasy play with children, adult development in adult-child joint play, and early literacy development. I am currently studying a US implementation of the Scandinavian playworld educational practice with a research team at The Laboratory of Comparative Human Cognition and collaborating researchers in Finland and Japan.  The playworld practice is based in the ideas of L.S. Vygotsky and G. Lindqvist, and is designed to enable adults and children to engage in joint pretense as a means of promoting the development of both children and adults.  In the playworld practice children and adults “bring a story to life” through joint scripted and improvisational acting, costume and set design, and multimodal rehearsal and reflection.
Publications:	Baumer, S., Ferholt, B., & Lecusay, R. (2005). Promoting narrative competence through adult-child joint pretense: Lessons from the Scandinavian educational practice of playworld. Cognitive Development, 20(4), 576-590.
Conference Presentations:	Ferholt, B. Adult-Child joint play in Gunilla Lindqvist's creative pedagogy of play: glimpsing the future through a playworld. Imaginative Education: Provoking Excellence Across the Curriculum (Annual Meeting of the Imaginative Education Research Group), Vancouver, Canada, July 18-21, 2007. Marjanovic-Shane, A, Ferholt, B., Beljanski-Ristic, B. From Play to Art: From Experience to Insight -- Transformations of the relationships. Play Matters: Joint Conference of the International Play Association/USA and Association for the Study of Play (TASP), Rochester, New York, April 25-28, 2007. Ferholt, B., A Literary Analysis of a Playworld: When a Book Comes to Life. Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, San Francisco, April 7-11, 2006. Ferholt, B. Adult involvement in the US instantiation of the Playworld Practice: Theorizing Play through the Study of Adult-Child Joint Play.  Cross-cultural Perspectives on Learning and Development Through Art and Play, Laboratory of Comparative Human Cognition, University of California, San Diego, November 4-10, 2006. (Conference organized by S. Baumer and B. Ferholt, funded by the Pacific Rim Research Program.) Ferholt, B, Lecusay, R., Baumer, S. Understanding Adult-Child Relations within Play Pedagogy: Adult Perezhivaniye in the Playworld Educational Practice. First Congress of the International Society for Cultural and Activity Research, Seville, Spain, September 20-24, 2005. Ferholt B, Lecusay R., Baumer, S. Innovative Uses of Video Ethnography in Pedagogical Research: Moving Beyond Interpretive Film Practice. First Congress of the International Society for Cultural and Activity Research, Seville, Spain, September 20-24, 2005. Baumer, S., Ferholt, B., Lecusay, R., Rowan, T. Playworld as a tool for supporting children’s self-understandings. First Congress of the International Society for Cultural and Activity Research, Seville, Spain, September 20-24, 2005. Baumer, S., Nillson, M., Ferholt, B. The Playworld of Baba Yaga: A Pilot Study of a Narrative-Based Early Childhood Educational Practice. The First International Workshop on Activity Theory Based Practical Methods for IT Design in conjunction with The Third Nordic Conference on Cultural and Activity Research, Copenhagen, Denmark, September 2-3, 2004. Ferholt, B., Rainio, P. Playworlds: A Transitory Activity which Combines Literature, Play, Drama and Philosophical Dialogue. Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, San Diego, April 12-16, 2004.
Video Work:	"Creation of a Playworld: Learning in the Space between Fantasy and Reality" (19 min., 2004)
Research Experience:	Research Assistant   Laboratory of Comparative Human Cognition, UCSD (2002-2003) Professional Development School Project, Hunter College (2002)
Teaching Experience:	Teaching Assistant with Undergraduates Department of Communication, UCSD (2002-2007): Introduction to Communication, Professor Geoffrey Bowker Youth, Culture and Media, Professor Shawn Travers Communication and the Individual, Professors Yrjo Engestrom and Michael Cole Children and Media, Professors Sonja Baumer and Peg Griffin Narrative Theories, Professor Sonja Baumer The Politics of Bodies, Professor David Serlin Visual Culture, Professor Brian Goldfarb Introduction to Video Production, Professor Giovanna Chesler
Teaching Experience with Children:	Pre-Kindergarten through Second Grade Teacher, Reading Teacher, Day Care Center Director and Elementary School After School Program Coordinator New York City (1993-2002)
Awards:	Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education Travel Grant, for study at Oulu University, Finland (2003)
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