11.2 vygotskys theory of development

Key terms

Zone of proximal development — the gap between a child’s current level of development (defined by the cognitive tasks they can perform unaided) and what they can potentially do with the right help from a more expert other

Scaffolding — the process of helping a learner cross the zone of proximal development (ZPD) and advance as much as they can given their stage of development. The level of help declines as a learner crosses the zone of proximal development

vygotsky

  • Russian psychologist, was influenced by Piagets work

  • Agreed on the basics of cognitive development, and that children’s reasoning ability develops in a particular sequence, with having different abilities at different ages

  • Difference is that vygotsky saw cognitive development as a social process, learning from more experienced others

  • Knowledge is first intermental (between the more and less expert individual). Then intramental (within the mind of the less expert individual)

  • Also saw language as a much more important part of cognitive development

Cultural differences of cognitive abilities

  • reasoning abilities are acquired from the more experienced individuals

  • So children pick up the mental ‘tools’ from physical, social and work environments of their culture

  • So not all children have equal development

The zone of proximal development

  • the role of learning through interaction with others

  • Identified a gap between a child’s current level of development and what they can potentially understand after interaction with more expert others

  • Expert assistance allows a child to cross the ZPD and understand as much as they are capable, as they are still limited by age

  • Children don’t just learn more facts, they acquire more advanced reasoning abilities

Scaffolding

  • the kind of help adults and more advanced peers give a child to help them cross he zone of proximal development

  • Wood and Middleton. Observed 20 women teaching their children to build a tower. The most successful at teaching were those that were scaffolding

  • Wood suggested that as a learner crosses the zone of proximal development, the level of help declines from level 5- level 1

  • Gradually withdrawing help as the child progresses

Levels of help

  1. Demonstration

  1. Preparation for child

  1. Indication of materials

  1. Specific verbal instructions

  1. General prompts

Van Keer

  • classes that were taught using whole class teaching plus peer tutoring, were compared with classes just taught by whole-class teaching

  • Existing classes were allocated to each condition, so can be described as a natural experiment

Evaluation

Support for ZPD

  • Clear evidence to show there is a gap between the level of reasoning a child can achieve on their own and what they can achieve with the help from a more expert other

  • Roazzi and Bryant- Gave children 4-5 years the task of estimating the number of sweets in a box. In one condition they worked alone, another condition they worked with the help of an older child

  • The groups with help were correct more often, shown children can develop additional reasoning abilities when working with a more expert individual

Support for scaffolding

  • Roazzi and Bryant showed that older children provide support for younger children to master new tasks

  • Conner and Cross used a longitudinal study to observe children engaging in a problem solving talk with the help of their mothers. Found over time that the mothers didn’t need to intervene and help as much, shows scaffolding

Real world application

  • learning is schools should be done through group work, peer tutoring and teachers

  • Evidence - Hilde Van Keer found that students that were tutored by older students, in addition to in class teaching, progressed further in reading. Alborz also found that teaching assistants improve the rate of learning in children

Counterpoint — may not be universal. Matthews and Lui found that in china classes of up to 50 children learn effectively with ‘lecture style classrooms’. So may have overestimated the importance of scaffolding in learning

Vgotsky vs Piaget

  • vgotsky proposed that learning with a more experienced other can enhance learning

  • But if this was true, we would expect all children to pick up similar skills and form similar mental representations. Piaget and Howe found each child had different conclusions/ facts about the objects that moved down the slope.