Abstract
Role of children and child groups in socialization is often neglected, because traditionally child rearing / socialization / enculturation is seen only as a process of transmitting knofledge of the older generation to the next generation. The paper will focus on the role pf Romani children from one Romani settlement in Eastern Slovakia in a process of second language socialization.
In conditions of segregated community children are the members of the community which have to use Slovak (the L2 of the community) most regularly. Besides this, one of traditional task of older children is also taking care of younger children.
One of activities of groups of children is also preten play with school instruction as a main topic. ONe of the basic "rules" of this game is using Slovak (L2 of the community) within the frame of the play.
Thepretend play will be analyzed in this paper as a form of learning process.