Lev Vygotsky
Cognitive Development, the relationship between language and thinking.
He investigated child development and how this was guided through the role of culture and interpersonal communication. Vygotsky observed how higher mental functions developed through social interaction with significant people in a child's life, particularly parents, and other adults. Through these interactions, a child came to learn the habits of mind of his/her culture. Perhaps Vygotsky's most important contribution concerns the inter-relationship of language development and thought. It establishes the explicit and profound connection between speech (both silent inner speech and oral language), and the development of mental concepts and cognitive awareness (metacognition).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lev_Vygotsky
Vygotsky's Social Development Theory
Vygotsky approached development differently from Piaget. Piaget believed that cognitive development consists of four main periods of cognitive growth: sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operations, and formal operations (Saettler, 331). Piaget's theory suggests that development has an endpoint in goal. Vygotsky, in contrast, believed that development is a process that should be analyzed, instead of a product to be obtained. According to Vygotsky, the development process that begins at birth and continues until death is too complex to to be defined by stages.
Vygotsky believed that this life long process of development was dependent on social interaction and that social learning actually leads to cognitive development. This phenomena is called the Zone of Proximal Development . Vygotsky describes it as "the distance between the actual development level as determined by independent problem solving and the level of potential development as determined through problem solving under adult guidance or in collaboration with more capable peers" (Vygotsky, 1978). In other words, a student can perform a task under adult guidance or with peer collaboration that could not be achieved alone. The Zone of Proximal Development bridges that gap between what is known and what can be known. Vygotsky claimed that learning occurred in this zone.
Therefore, Vygotsky focused on the connections between people and the cultural context in which they act and interact in shared experiences. According to Vygotsky, humans use tools that develop from a culture, such as speech and writing, to mediate their social environments. Initially children develop these tools to serve solely as social functions, ways to communicate needs. Vygotsky believed that the internalization of these tools led to higher thinking skills. When Piaget observed young children participating in egocentric speech in their preoperational stage, he believed it was a phase that disappeared once the child reached the stage of concrete operations. In contrast, Vygotsky viewed this egocentric speech as a transition from social speech to internalized thoughts. Thus, Vygotsky believed that thought and language could not exist without each other.
The Application of the Social Development Theory
Traditionally, schools have not promoted environments in which the students play an active role in their own education as well as their peers'. Vygotsky's theory, however, requires the teacher and students to play nontraditional roles as they collaborate with each other. Instead of a teacher dictating her meaning to students for future recitation, a teacher should collaborate with her students in order to create meaning in ways that students can make their own. Learning
becomes a reciprocal experience for the students and teacher.
The physical classroom, based on Vygotsky's theory, would provide clustered desks or tables and work space for peer instruction, collaboration, and small group instruction. Like the environment, the instructional design of material to be learned would be structured to promote and encourage student interaction and collaboration. Thus the classroom becomes a community of learning.
Because Vygotsky asserts that cognitive change occurs within the zone of proximal development, instruction would be designed to reach a developmental level that is just above the student's current developmental level. Vygotsky proclaims, "learning which is oriented toward developmental levels that have already been reached is ineffective from the view point of the child's overall development. It does not aim for a new stage of the developmental process but rather lags behind this process" (Vygotsky, 1978).
Appropriation is necessary for cognitive development within the zone of proximal development. Individuals participating in peer collaboration or guided teacher instruction must share the same focus in order to access the zone of proximal development. "Joint attention and shared problem solving is needed to create a process of cognitive, social, and emotional interchange" (Hausfather,1996). Furthermore, it is essential that the partners be on different developmental levels and the higher level partner be aware of the lower's level. If this does not occur, or if one partner dominates, the interaction is less successful.
http://chd.gmu.edu/immersion/knowledgebase/theorists/constructivism/vygotsky.htm
Vygotsky observed how mental functions developed with social interactions. His most important contribution is through the inter-relationship between language development and thought. It establishes a connection between speech and the development of metacognition.
People learn in all different ways, there are Gardner’s 8 multiple intelligences and the lessons need to be structured in different ways for all of the class to understand and take in. Students learn by communicating with each other, this is social interaction at its best. For example, on Tuesday we had an ICT class and we had to try and get comments on other people’s blogs. This while it seems easy was quite difficult to master; we all ended up mastering it. If it was not for social interaction it would not have been done. This shows that social interaction is not only important for children, but for adults as well. I think the most important part of Vygotsky’s work is that learning becomes reciprocal, both students and teachers learn off one another. As a teacher you must never assume that you know more than the students, they can also teach you things. I think that this is a very important part of life not just a teacher, but as a person, you can learn anything off anyone not matter what age they are and I think people need to be open to these things.
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