Vygotsky

Vygotsky

1. A01

   • The importance of social and cultural factors in cognitive development
   • Child as an apprentice of more knowledgable other
   • Zone of proximal development
     • The area between a child's actual development and the potential level that could be achieved with the help of a more experienced other
   • Scaffolding
     • Providing support as child learns new concepts, as the skills develop the support is gradually removed until the individual can complete the task with no assistance
     • Guided participation
       • A specific type of scaffolding which refers to the transmission of cultural practices, where children actively engage in cultural activities
   • Socio-cultural theory

2. A02

   • Comparisions
     • Piaget
       • Places considerably more emphasis on social factors contributing to cognitive development
         • Piaget emphasises the importance of independent explorations
       • Vygotsky places more emphasis on the role of language in cognitive development
       • Piaget places more emphasis on stages whereas Vygotsky said learning could be accelerated by others
   • Evaluation
     • Good applications to education
       • For example pairing children with a more able other
       • However if Piaget's theory is correct, the child may not be 'ready' to progress and this practice would essentially be pointless
     • Theory does not offer a rich, detailed explanation of child development
       • However good basis for future research
     • Little scientific evidence
     • While some level of instruction may be beneficial, over-instruction might result in the child being less likely to learn independently and less inclined to show initiative in problem solving
     • Vygotsky's theory presupposes that adults will always have an enhancing effect on children, in some instances it may be more difficult for children to understand the world by answering obscurely when asked about difficult topics such as death and sex

3. Research

   • Wood and Middleton
     • 12 mothers and their children aged 3-4, task involved using wooden blocks to make pyramid structure. Mothers shown how to construct it before the session and at the end child tried to build pyramid without help
     • identified general and specific verbal instruction, preparation, modelling
     • Concluded that effective tutorial involves a dynamic, interative process
   • Rogoff
     • Girl scouts engaged in a cultural activity, were given advice by those more experienced, i.e the elderly and changed their behaviour and techniques as a result
     • Concluded that with the support of others you can transform abilities