L.S. Vygotsky: Mind in Society (1978)

7/27/2019 L.S. Vygotsky: Mind in Society (1978)

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L. S. VYGOTSKY

Mind in SocietyThe Developmentof HigherPsychological Processes

Edited by Michael ColeVera John-SteinerSylvia ScribnerEllen Souberrnan

Harvard University PressCambridge, MassachusettsLondon, England


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1Tool and Symbol inChild Development

The' primary purpose of this book is to characterize the uniquelyhuman aspltcts of behavior, and td offer hypotheses about the way thesetraits have been formed in the course of human history and the waythey develop over an individuaFs lifetime,

This: analysis Will be conoerned with three fundamental issues: (I)What is the rclatioll bernreen human beings and their environment,both physical and social? (2) What new forms of activity were responsi-bfe for establishing labor as the fUndamental means of relating humansto natllre and what ate the psychological consequences of these formsof acth'ity? (3') What is the nature of the relationship between the useof foots and 'the ' d e ; ~ ment of speech? None of these q u e s t i o ~ s hasbeen fully treated by scholars c o n ~ r n c d with understanding animaland human psychology.


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pointed out, iu o l ~ r < l p p r o a c h e s t


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22month-old child remains intact throughoHl Iwr li(('tinw. This analysispostulating the independence of intelligtlnt uctioll from ~ p e e c h runsconh"ary to our own findings, which reveal the integration of speechand practical thinking in the course of development.

Shapiro and Gerke offer an important analysis of the developmentof practical thinking in children based upon experiments modeled afterKohler's problem-solving studies with chimpanzees:'> They theorizethat children's practical thinking is similax to adult thought in certainrespects an d different in others, and emphasize the dominant role ofsocial experience in human development. In thei r view, social experienceexerts it s effect through imitation; when the child imitates the wayadults us e tools and objects, she masters the very principle involvedin a particular activity. They suggest that repeated actions pile up, oneupon another, as in a multi-exposure photograph; the common traitsbecome clear and the differences become blurred. The result is a crystalized sclleme, a definite principle of activity. The child, as she becomes more experienced, acquires a greater number of models thatshe understands. These models represent, as it were, a reBned cumulative design of all similar actions; at the same time, they are also a roughblueprint for possible types of action in the future.

However, Shapiro and Gerke's notion of adaptation is too f i n n ~ y linked to a mechanical conception of repetition. For them, social ex-perience serves only to furnish the child with motor schemas; they donot take into account the changes occurring in the internal structureof the child's intellectual operations. In their descliiptions of children'sproblem solving, the authors are forced to note the "specific role fulfilled by speech" in the practical and adaptive efforts of the growingchild. Bu t their description of this role is a strange one. "Speech," theysay, "replaces and compensates for rea] adaptation; it does not serve asa bridge leading to past experience but to a purely social adaptationwllich is achieved via the experimenter." This analysis does not allowfor the contribution speech makes to the development of a new structural organization of practical activity.

Guillaume and Meyerson offer a different conclusion regarding therole of speech in the inception of uniqnely human forms of behavior. IIFrom their extremely interesting experiments on tool use among apes,they concluded that the methods used by apes to accomplish a giventask are similar in principle and coincide on certain essential points tothose used by people suffering from aphasia (that is, individuals whoare deprived of speech). Their .findings support my assumption that

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>,(>l'ceh plays UII ('sst>Jllinl mI. ill tlw organization of higher psychoJogicalfunctions. 10

These expcrimculal "x


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sumed that the child's mind contains all stages of fl lhm' intellectualdevelopment; they exist in complete form, awaitillg the proper momentto emerge.

Not only were speech and practical intelligence assumed to havedifferent origins, bu t their joint participation in common operationswas considered to be of no basic psychological importance (as in thework of Shapiro and Gerke). Even when speech and the use of toolswere closely linked in one operation, they were still studied as separateprocesses belonging to two completely different classes of phenomena.At best, their simultaneous occurrence was considered a consequenceof accidental, external factors..

The students of practical intelligence as well as those wno studyspeech development often fail to recognize the interweaving of thesetwo functions. Consequently, the children's adaptive behavior and signusing activity are trea ted as parallel phenomena-a view that leads toPiaget's concept of "egocentric" speech.J2 He did not attribute animportant role to speech ,in the organization of the child's activities,nor did he stress its communicative functions, although he was obligedto admit its practical importance.

Although practical intelligence and sign use can operate independently of each other in young children, the dialectical unity of thesesystems in the human adult is the very essence of complex human behavior. Our analysis accords symbolic activity a specific organizingfunction that penetrates the process of tool use and produces fundamentally new forms of behavior.

SOCIAL INTERACTION AND THE TRANSFORMATIONOF PRACTICAL ACTIVITYBased on the discussion in the previous section, and illustrated by

experimental work to be described later, the following conclusion maybe made; the most significant moment in the course of intellectual de-velopment, which gives birth to the purely human forms of practicaland abstract intelligence, occu"'$ when speech and practical actiVity.two previously completely independent lines of development, converge.Althougb children's use of tools during their preverbal period is comparable to that of apes, as soon as speech and the use of signs areincorporated into any action, the action becomes transformed and organized along entirely new lines. The specifically human use of tools isthus realized, going heyondthe more limited use of tools possible [lJ(}O!t

Prior to JOu:ilorillg bis own behavior, tlac chilcl " C ' ~ l r l " III 1111,,111 IIIsurroundings with the help of speech. This prOdllc'I'S IlC'W \'(1111 hili" \-\ alIIthe environment in addition to the new organizntioll of IwhllVICIl If',1 IIThe creation of these uniquely human forms of bohavlor 111(\1 1II'(I(IIIl'1the intellect and become the basis of productive work: llw 1I\Il't'ilkullyhuman form of the use of tools.

Observations of children in an experimontal situation l i i lnilttr (0that of Kohler's apes show that the children not only act in atlt'mptillgto achieve a goal but also speak. As a rule this speech arises spontaneously and continues almost without interruption throughout the experiment. I t increases and is more persistent every time the situation becomes more complicated and the goal more difficult to attain. Attemptsto block it (as the experiments of my collaborator R. E. Levina haveshown) are either futile or lead the child to "freeze up."

Levina posed practi cal problems for four- and ve-year-old childrensuch as obtaining a piece of candy from a cupboard. The candy wasplaced out of reach so the child could not obtain it directly. As the childgot more and more involved in trying to obtain the candy, "egocentric"speech began to manifest itself as part of her active striving. At firstthis speech consisted of a description and analysis of the situation, 'butit gradually took on a "planful" character, reflecting possible paths tosolution of the problem. Finally, it was included as part of t'he solution.

For example, a four"and-a-nalf-year-old girl was asked to get cLmdyfrom a cupboard with a stool and a stick as possible tools. Levina'sdescription reads as follows: (Stands o n a stool, quie tly looking, feelingalong a shelf with stick) "On the stool." (Glances a t experimenter. Putsstick in other band.) "Is that reany toe candy?" (Hesitates,) "l can get itfrom that other stool, stand and get it." (Gets second stool.) "No, thatdoesn't get it. I could use the stick." (Takes stick, knocks at the candy.)"I t will move now." (Knocks candy.) "I t moved, I couldn't get it withthe stool, but the, but the stick worked."13

In such circumstances it seems both natural and necessary forchildren to speak while they act; in our research we have found thatspeech not only accompanies practical activity but also plays a specificIole in carrying it out. Our experiments demonstrate two importantfacts:

(1) A child's speech is as important as the role of action in attainingthe goal. Children not only speak about what they nrc doing; theirspeech and action are part of one and tlte same complr;;c lJ!lychologicalfunction, dlrcctrd towl.\rd tho solution of tho problCln I1t hand.


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the Jess direet its . ~ o l l J t i o o , the greater the impOllullcl' playl'!l fly . ~ p ( ' e c h in the operation as a whole. Sometimes speech bCf.:ollwS of such vitalimportance that, if not permitted to use it, young childretl CiUlTlot accomplish the given task.

These observations lead me to the conclusion that children solvepractical tasks with the Mlp of tMir speech, as well as tMir eyes andhands. This unity of perception, speech, and action, which ultimatelyproduces intemalization of the visual field, constitutes the central sub-ject matter for any analysis of the origin of uniquely human forms ofbehavior.

To develop the first of these two points, we must ask: What is it that.really disttnguishes the actions of the speaking child from the actionsof an ape when solving practical problems?

The first thing that strikes the experimenter is the incomparablygreater freedom of children's operations, their greater independencefrom the stmctu re of the concrete, visual situation. 'Children, with theaid of speech, create greater possibilities than apes can accomplishthrOUgh action. 9.ne important manifestation of thiS g ~ e a t e r Hexibilityis !hat i l d _is a b l e . J o j g n o r ~ the direct line b e ~ ~ e I ~ a ~ t o r goal.Instead, he engages in a number of preliminary acts, using what wespeak of a; instru-me'ntal, or e d i a t ~ d (indirect), m ~ t h o d s . fj) The p r o c e ~ - s 'of solving'a task the child is able to incJude stimuli that do not lie withinthe immedia te visual field. Using words (one class of such stimuli) tocreate a specific plan, the child achieves a much broader range ofactivity, applying as tools Dot only those objects thaLlie near at hand,bu t searching for anlipreparin.g .stlch _ ~ t i 1 ! ' : u l i as - - E Z ~ be U $ ~ i inthesOlution of the task, anaplanning future lL9,tions. --second, the practical operations of a child who can speak becomemuch less impulsive and spontaneous than those of the ape. The apetypically makes a series of uncontrolled attempts to solve the givenproblem. In contrast, the child who uses speech divides the activity intotwo consecutive parts. She plans how to solve the problem throughspeech and then carries out the prepared solution through overt activity. Direct manipulation is replaced by a complex psychologicalprocess through which inner motivation and intentions, postponed intime, Stimulate their own development and realization. This new kindof psychological structure is absent in apeS, even in r'i.ldimentary forms.

Finall'y, it is decisively important that speecn not only facilitates thechild's effective manipulation of objects but also controls the chilas ownbehaVior. Thus, with the help of speech children, unl.ilfe apes, acquirethe capacity to be both the subjects and objects of their own behavior.

~ : < p o r j l 1 w l \ t l l l j l l V ( ' ~ l i g l l t i ( ) n of the ( ' g ( ) ~ c n t r i c s p l ~ e c h of children engaged in val'iol1s iH'livlli('s slIch as that illustrated by Levina producedthe second fal:t ()f great importance demonstrated by our experiments:the relative amount of egocentric speech, as measured by Piaget's methods, increases ill relation to the difficulty of the child's task.H On thebasis of these experiments my collaborators and I developed thehypothesis that children's egocentric speech should be regarded asthe transitional form between external and internal speech. Functionally,egocentric speech is the basis for inner speech, while in its externalform it is embedded in 'communicative speech.

One way to increase the production of egocentric speech is tocomplicate a task in such a way that t he child cannot make direct use Qftools for its solution. When faced with such a challenge, the children'semotiomil use of language increases as well as their efforts to achieve aless automatic, more intelligent solution. They search verbally for anew plan, and their utterances reveal t he close connection between egocentric and socialized speech. This is b e s ~ seen woen the experimenterleaves the room or fails to answer the children's appeals for help. Uponbeing deprived of the opportunity to engage in social' speech, childrenimmediately switch over to egocentric speech.

'While lthe interrelationship of these two functions of language isapparent in this setting, it is important to remember that egocennicspeech is linked to children's social speech by many transitional forms.The first significant illustration of th e link between these two languagefunctions occurs when children find that they are unable to solve a problem by themselves. They the n tum to an adult, and verbally describe themethod that they cannot carry out by themselves. The greatest changeiD)1 children's capacity to use language as a problem-solving tool takesplace somewhat later in their development, when SOcialized speech(which has previously been used to address an adult) is turned inward.Instead of appealing to the adult, children appeal to themselve:s; language thus takes on an intrapersonal function in addition to its inter-personal use. When children develop a method of behavior for guiding themselves that had previously been used in relation to anotherperson, when they organize their own activities according to a socialfonn of behavior, they succeed in applying a social attitude to themselves. The history of the process of the internalization of social speech1S also the history of the socialization of children's practical intellect.

The relation between speech and action is a dynamic one in thecOurse of children's development. The structural relation can shift even

d u r i n ~ an experimont. Tho crucial change occurs as follow:;: At an


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early stage speech ar:companies the child's actJow, nllel I'dlccts thevicissitudes of problem solving in a disrupted and ehaolic fonn. Ata later stage speech mOVes more and more toward tbc starting point ofthe process, so lthat it comes t,o precede action. It functions then as anaid to a plan that has been conceived but not yet realized in behavior.An interesting anal'ogy can be found in children's speech while drawing(see also chapter 8). Young children name their draWings only afterthey have completed them; they Iileed to see them before they can decidewhat they are. As children get older they can decide in advance whatthey are going to draw. This displacement of the naming process signifiesa change in the function of speech. Initially speech follows actions, isprovoked by and dominated by activity. At a later stage, however, whenspeech is moved to the starting point of an activi.ty, a new relation between word and action emerges. Now speech guides, detennines, anddominates the course of action; the planning function of speech comesinto being in addition to the already existing function of language toreflect the external world.U

Just as a mold gives shape to a stlbstance, words can shape anactivity into a shucture. However, that structure may be changed orreshaped when children learn to use language in ways that allow themto go beyond previous experiences when planning future action. Incontrast to the notion of sudden discovery popularized by Stern, weenvisage verbal, intellectual activity as a series of stages in which theemotional and communfcative functions of speech are expanded b y theaddition of th e planning function. As a resultthe child acquires the abH-ity to engage in complex operations extending over time,

Unlike the ape, which Kohler tells us is "the slave of its own visualfield," children acquire an independence with respect to their concretesurroundings; they cease to act in the immediately given an d evidentspace. Once children learn how to use the planning function oftheirlanguage effectively, their psychological field changes radically. Aview of the future is now an integral part of their approacnes to theirsurroundings. In subsequent chapters, I will describe the developmentalcourse of some of these central psychological functions in greater debiI .

To summarize what has been said thus far in this section: Thespecifically human capacity for language enables children to providefor au.'{iliary tools in the solution of difficult tasks, to overcome impulsiveaction, to plan a solution to a problem prior to its execution, and tomaster their own behavior. Signs and words serve children first andforemost as a means of social contact with other people. The cognitive:md communicative functions of language then become the basis of a

new and ~ l I p l ' r j C I I fOlIll of .1


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tioll equally wi!h words and sticks, U C / l l ( ) I l ~ l l a l l T l ~ lhi' IllucJo1l1cutai :UlUillseparable tie between speech and actioll ill thl' child's [IClivity; l : h i . ~ unity becomes particularly clear when compared with the separation ofthese processes in adults.

In stunmary, children confronted with a problem that is slightly toocomplicated for them exhibit a complex variety of responses includingdirect attempts at attaining the goal, the use of tools, speech wl'ectedtoward the person conducting the experiment or speech that simplyaccompanies the action, and direct, verbal appeal's to the object ofattention itself.

I f analyzed dynamicaUy, this alloy of speech and action has a veryspecific function in tbe history of the child's development; it also demonstrates the logic of its own genesis. From t he very first days of the child'sdevelopment his actiVities acquire a meaning of their own in a system ofsocial behavior and, being directed towards a definite purpose, are refracted through the prism of the child's environment. The path fromobject to child and from child to object passes 'through another person.This complex human structure is the product of a developmental process

,deeply rooted in the links between individual an d social history.

The Dev'elopment ofPerception and Attention

The linkage between tool use and speech affects several psychological functions, in particular perception, sensory-motor operations,and at,tention, each of which is part of a dynamic system of behavior.Experimental-developmental research indicates that the connectionsand relations among functions constitute systems that change as radicallyin the course of a child's development as do the individual functionsthemselves. Considering each function in tum, I will examine howspeech introduces qualitative changes in both its form and its relation toother functions.

Kohler's work emphasized the importance of the structure of thevisual field in organizing the ape's practical behavior. The entire processof problem solving is essentiaUy determined by perception. In thisrespect Kohler had ample grounds for believing that these animals arebound by their sensory field to a much great er exfent than ad ult humans.They are incapable of modifying their sensory field by means of voluntary effort .. Indeed, it would probably be useful to view as a general lav..the dependence of all natural forms of perception on the structure ofthe sensory field.

However, a cllild's perception, because it is human, does not deveropas a direct continuation and further perfection of the forms of animalperception, not even of those animals that stand nearest to humankind.Experiments conducted to clarify this problem led us to discover somebasic laws that characterize the higher human forms of perception.

The first set of experiments concerned developmental stages ofpicture perception in chiJdren. Similar experiments describing specificaspects of young chUdren's perception and its dependence on higher

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Interaction betweenLearning and Dev,elopment

The pIobJems encountered in the psychological analysis of teachingcannoE be correctly resolved or ev.en formulated withOllt addressing therelation between learning and development in school-age children. Yeti t is the most unclear of aU the basic issues on which the application ofchild de'V'elopmcnt theories to educational processes depends. Needlessto say, the lack of fheoretical clarity does not mean that the issue isremoved altogether from current research efforts into learning; not onestudy can avoid this central theoretical! issue. But the relation betweenlearning' and development remains methodologically undear becauseconcrete research studies have embodied theoretically vague, criticallyunevatuated, and sometimes internally contradictory postulates, premises, and peculiar solutions to the problem of this fundamental relationship; and these, of course, I1esult in a variety of errors.

Essentially, all current conceptions of the :relation between devdop


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learning. An example oJ such a theory is Piaget's exlrcllwly complex undinteresting theoretical principles, which also shape the ('xpcrimcntalmethodology he employs. The questions Piaget uses in the course of his"clinical conversations" with children dearly illustrate his approach.When a five-year-old is asked "why doesn't the sun fall?" it is assumcdthat the child has neither a ready answer for such a question nor thegeneral capabilities for generating one. The point of asking questionsthat are so far beyond the reach of the child's intellectual skills is toeliminate the influence of previous experience and knowledge. Theexperimenter seeks to obtain the tendencies of children's thinking in"pure" form, ent irely independent of learning.1

Similarly, the classics of psychological literature, such as the worksby Binet and others, assume that development is always a prerequisitefor learning and that i f a child's mental functions (intellectual operations)have not matured to the extent that he is capable of learning a particularsubject, then no instruction will prove useful. They especially fearedpremature instruction, the teaching of a subject before the child wasready for it. All effort was concentrated on nnding the lower threshold oflearning ability, the age at which a particular kind of learning nrstbecomes possible.

Because this approach is based on the premise that learning trailsbehind development, that development always outruns learning, itprecludes the notion that learning may playa role in the course of thedevelopment or maturation of those functions activated in the course oflearning. Development or maturation is viewed as a precondition oflearning but never the result of it. To summarize this position; Learningforms a superstructure over development, leaVing the latter essentiallyunaltered.

The second major theoretical position is that learning is development. This identity is the essence of a group of theories that are quitediverse in origin.

One such theory is based on the concept of reflex, an essentially'old notion that has been extensively revived recently. Whether reading,writing, or arithmetic is being considered, development is viewed as themastery'of conditioned reBexes; that is, the process of learning is COm-pletely and inseparably blended with the process of development. Thisnotion was elaborated by J a m ~ , who reduced the learning process tohabit formation and identified the learning process with development.

Reflex theories have at least one thing in commOn with theOriessuch as Piaget's: in both, development is conceived of as the elaborationand substitution of innate responses. As James expressed it, EducatiOH,

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in short, CanJlol lw lll'ltf'r d ( ~ s ( , J ' i b ( : d than by calling it the organizationof acquired hllhib ot couduct and tendencies to behavior."2 Development itself is rL'duced primarily to the accumulation of all possibleresponses. Any acquired response is considered either a more complexform of or Ii substitute for the innate response.

But despite the similarity between the nrst and second theoreticalpositions, there is a major difference in their assumptions about thetemporal relationship between learning and developmental processes.Theorists who hold the Brst view assert that developmental cycles precede learning cycles; maturation precedes learning and instruction mustlag behind mental growth. For the second group of theorists, bothprocesses occur simultaneously; learning and development coincide atall points in the same way that two identical geometrical6gures coincidewhen superimposed.

The third theoretical position on the relation betwe en learning anddevelopment attempts overcome the extremes of the other two bysimply combining them. A clear example of this approach is Koffka'stheory, in which development is based on two inherently different butrelated processes, each of which influences the other.s On the one handis maturation, which depends directly on the development of the nervoussystem; on the o ther hand is learning, which itself is also a developmentalprocess.

Three aspects of this theory are new. First, as we already noted, isthe combination of two seemingly opposite viewpoints, each of whichhas been enoountered separately in the history of science. The very factthat these two viewpoints can be combined into one theory indicatesthat they are not opposing and nmmally exclusive but have somethingessential in common. Also new is the idea that the two processes thatmake up development are mutually dependent and interactive. Ofcourse, the nature of the interaction is left virtually unexplored inKofFka's work, which is limited solely to very general rem.arks regardingthe relation between these two processes. It is clear that for iKoffka theprocess of maturation prepares and makes poSSible a specific process oflearning. The learning process then stimulates and pushes forward thematuration process. The third and most important new aspect of thistheory is the expanded role it ascribes to learning in child development.This emphasis leads us directly to an old pedagogical problem, that offormal discipline and the problem of transfer.

Pedagogical movements that have emphasized formal discipline andurged tho tcaching of classical languages, ancient civilizations, andmnthomnl!cq hOVil t\ssumcd that regardless of the irrelevance of these


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p.articular subjects for dai.ly living, they were of tIll' ~ 1 ( 1 1 1 1 C ' ~ 1 vuhw forthe pupil's mental development. A variety of studies haY!' cllllcd intoquestion the soundness of this idea. It has beenshnwn that learning inone area has very little influence on overall development For example,reflex theorists Woodworth and Thorndike found that adults who, afterspecial exercises, had achieved considerable success in determining thelength of short lines, had made virtually no progress in the ir ability todetennine the length of long lines. These same adults were successfullytrained to estimate the size of a given two-dimensional figure, but thistraining ,did not make them successful in estimating the size of a seriesof other two -dimensional figures of various sizes and shapes.

According to Thorndike, theoreticians in psychology and educationbelieve that every particular response acquisition directly enhancesoverall ability in equal measure.4 Teachers believed and acted on thebasis of the theory that the mind is a complex of abilities-powers ofobservation, attention, memory, thinking, and so forth-and that anyimprovement in any specific ability results in a general improvement inall abilities. According to this theory, if the student increased the attention he paid to Latin grammar, he would increase his abilities to focusattention on any task. The words "'accuracy," "'quick-Wittedness," "abili tyto reason," "memory," "'power of observation," "attention," "concentration," and so forth are said to denote actual fundamental capabilitiesthat vary in accordance with the material with which they operate; thesebasic abilities are substantially modified by studying particular subjects,and they retain these modifications when they turn to other areas. Therefore, i f someone learns to do any single thing well, he will also be ableto do other entirely unrelated things well as a result of some secretconnection. It is assumed that mental capab.iIities function independently of the material with which they operate, and tllat the developmentof one ability entaus the development of others.

Thorndike himself opposed this point of view. TIrrough a vari ety ofstudies he showed that particular forms of activity, such as spelling,are dependent on th e maste ry of specific skills and material necessary forthe performance of that particular task. The development of one particula r capabHity se1dom means the development of others. Thorndikeargued that specialization of abilities is even greater than superficialobservation may indicate. For example, if, out of a hundred individualswe choose ten who display the ability to detect spelling errors or tomeasure lengths, it is unlikely that these ten will display better abilitiesregarding, for example, the estimation of the weight of objects. In the

same way, SPC('Ollll


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85the operations of the type 00 whose basis the principle was llssimilatedConsequelltly, in a k i ' ~ g one step il} I'eaming, a child makes two steps indevelopment, that is, learning and development do not coincide. Thisconcept is the essential aspect of the third group of theories We havediscussed.

ZONE OF PROXIMAL DEVELOPMENT:A NEW APPROACHAlthough we reject all three theoretical positions discussed above,

analyzing them leads \is to a more adequate view of the relation betweenleaming and development. The question to be framed in arriving at asolution to this problem is complex. It consists of two separate issues:first, the general relation between learning and development; andsecond, the specific featmes of this relationship when children reachschool age.,

That children's learning begins long before they attend school isthe st arting pOint of this discussion. Any learning a child encounters inschool always has a previous history. For example, children begin tostudy arithmetic in school, but long beforeoand they have had someexperience with q u a n t i t y ~ t h e y have ha d to deal with operations ofdivision, addition, subtraction, and ,determination of size. Consequently,children have their own preschool arithmetic, which only myopicpsychologists coul'd ignore.

It goes without saying that learning as it occurs in the preschoolyears differs markedly from school learning, which i.s concemed with theassimilation of the fundamentals of scientific knowledge. But even when,in the period of her first questions, a child asSimilates the names ofobjects in her environment, she is lea,rning. Indeed, can it be doubtedthat children learn speech from adults; or that, through asking questionsand giving anSWers, children acquire a variety of ]nfonnation; or that,through imitating adults and through being instructed about how toact, children develop an entir e repository of skills? L e ~ : l r l l j n g and development are interrelated from the child's very first day of life.

koffb, attempting to clarify the laws of child learning and theirrelation to mental development, concentrates his attention on the simplest learning processes, those that Occur in the preschool years. His erroris that, while s'eeing a similarity between preschool and school learning,he fails to discern the difference-he does not See the specilically newelements that school learning introduces. He and others assume thatthe difference between preschool and school learning consists of non

systemat-i(: learning in lI lIC case and systematic learning in the other.But "systematicness" is Dot the only issue; there is also the fact thatschool leanling introduces something fundamentally new into the child'sdevelopment. In order to elaborate the dimensions of school learning, wewill describe ,a new and exceptionally important concept without whichthe, issue cannot be resolved: the zone of proximal development.

A well known and empirically established fact is that learningshould be matched in some manner with the child's developmental level.For example, it has been established that the teaching of reading, writing, and arithmetic should be initiated at a specific age level. Onlyrecently, however, has attention been directed to the fact that we cannotlimit ourselves merely to detennini ng developmental levels if we wish todiscover the-actual relations of the developmental process to learningcapabilities. We must determine at least two developmental levels.

The first level can be called the actual developmental level, that is,the level of development of a child's mental functions that has beenestablished as a result of certain already completed developmentalcycles. When we determine a child's mental age by using tests, we arealmost always dealing with the actual developmental level. In studiesof children's mental development it is generally assumed that only thosethings that: ohildren can do on their own are indicative of mental abilities.We give children a battery of tests or a variety of tasks of varyingdegrees of difficulty, and we judge the extent of their mental development on the basis of how they solve them and at what level of difficulty.On the other hand, if we offer leading questions or show how the problemis to be solved and the child then solves it, or if the teacher initiatestne solution and the child completes it or solves it in collaboration withother children-in sJhort, if the child barely misses an independentsolution of the problem-the solution is not regax'ded as indicative of hismental development. This "truth" was famtliar and reinforced by common sense. Over a decade even the profoundest thinkers never questioned the assumption; they never entertained the notion that whatchildren can do with the assistance of others might be in some senseeven more indicative of tlleir mental development than what tIley can,do alone.

Let us take a simple example. Suppose I investigate two childrenupon entrance iato school, both of whom are ten years old chronologic,tlly and eight years old in terms of mental development Can I say thatthey are the same age mentally? Of course. What does this mean? I tmeans that th('y cnn independently deal with tasks up to the degree ofdifficulty thn\ I I l I ~ Iw('n standardized fOF the eight-year-old level. U ]

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pendent activity of children, not their lrlJitativo llcllvlly. Indicates theirJevel of mental development. This view is expressed in all currenttesting systems. In evaluating mental development, consideration isgiven to only those solutions to test problems which thp. child reacheswithout the assistance of others, Without demonstrations, and withoutleading questions. Imitation and learning are thought of as purelymechanical processes. But recently psychologists have shown that aperson can imitate only that which is within her developmental level.For example, if a child is having difficulty with a problem in arithmeticand the teacher solves it on the blackboard, the child may grasp thesolution in an instant. But if the teacher were to solve a problem inhigher mathematics, the child would not be able to understand thesolution no matter how many times she imitated it.

Animal psychologists, and in particular Kohler, have dealt with thisquestion of imitation quite welL6 Kohler's experiments sought to determine whether primates are capable of graphic thought. The principalquestion was whether primates solved problems independently orwhether they merely imitated solutions they had seen perfonned earlier,for example, watching othe'r animals or humans use sticks and othertools and then imitating them. Kohler's special experiments, designedto determine what primates could imitate, reveal that primates can useimitation to solve only those problems that are of the same degree ofdifficulty as those they can solve alone. However, Kohler failed to takeaccount of an important fact, namely, that primates cannot be t,aught (inthe human sense of the word) through imitation, nor can their intellectbe developed, because fhey have nO ZONe of proximal development. Aprimate can learn a great deal through training by using its mechanicaland :mental skills, but it cannot be made more intelligent, that is, itcannot be taught to solve a var.iety of more advanced problems independently. For' this reason animals are incapable of learning in thehuman sense of the tenni human learning preS1,lpposes a specific socialnature and a process by which children grow into the intellect ual life ofthose around them.

Children can imitate a variety of actions that go well beyond thelimits of their own capabilities. Using imitation, children are capableof doing much more in collective activity or under the guidance ofadults. This fact, which seems to be of littl e significance in itself, is offundamental importance in that it demands a radical alteration of theentire doctrine concenling the relation between learning and development in children. One direct consequence is a change in conclusions tha tmay be drawn from diagnostic tests of development.

Formerly, it wns hclievl..o that by using tests, we determine themental developml.'lJt level with which education should reckon andwhose limits it should not exceed. This procedure oriented learningloward yesterday's development, toward developmental stages alreadycompleted. The error of this view was discovered earlier in practicethan in theory. I t is demonstrated most clearly in the teaching ofmentally retarded children. Studies have established that mentallyretarded children are not very capable of abstract thinking. From thisthe pedagogy of the special school drew the seemingly correct conclusion that all teaching of such children should be based on theuse of concrete, look-and-do methods. And yet a considerable amountof experience with thi.s method resulted in profound disillusionment.It turned out 'that a teaching system based solely on concretenessone that eliminated from teaching everything associated with abstractthinking-not only failed to help retarded children overcome theirinnate handicaps but also reinforced their handicaps by accustomingchildren exclusively to concrete thinking and thus suppressing therudiments of any abstract thought that such children still have. Precisely because retarded child..ren, when left to themselves, will neverachieve well-elaborated forms of abstract thought, the school shouldmake every effort to push them in that direction and to develop inthem what is intrinsically lacking in their own development. In thecurrent practices of special schools for retarded children, we can observe a beneficial shift away from this concept of concreteness, one thatrestores look-and-do methods to their p roper role. Concreteness is nowseen as necessary alfd unavoidable only as a stepping stone for developing abstract thinking-as a means, not as an end in itself.

SjmilarIy, in normal children, learning which is oriented toward developmental levels that have already been reached is ineffective fromthe viewpoint of a chiM's overall development. lit does not aim fora new stage of the developmental process but rather lags behind thisprocess. Thus, the notion of a zone of proximal development enables usto propound a new formula, namely that the only "good learning" isthat which is in advance of development.

The acquisition of language can provide a paradigm for the entireproblem of the relation between learning and development. Languagearises initiaJly as a means of communication between the chil'd and thepeople in his environment. Only subsequently, upon conversion tointernal speech, docs it come to organize the child's thought, that is,become an fnlemnl menta) function. Piaget and others have shownthat rcasoninll: \ ) ( ' ( ' I l r ~ il. 1I chlldren's group as an argument intonded

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to provG one's OWll point of view before it occurs as an illtel'llal activitywhose distinctive feature is that the child begins to perceive and checkthe basis of his thoughts. Such observations prompted Piaget to conclude that communication produces the need for checking and con6rming thoughts, a process that is characteristic of adult thought.7 In thesame way that internal speech and refl..ective thought arise from the'interactions between the child and persons in her environment, theseinteractions provide the source of development of a child's voluntarybehavior. Piaget has shown that cooperation prOvides the basis for thedevelopment of a child's moral judgment. Earlier research establishedthat a child nrst becomes able to subordinate her behavior to rules ingroup play and only later does voluntary self-regulation of behaviorarise as an internal function.

These individual examples illustrate a general developmental lawfor the higher mental functions that we feel can be applied in its entirety to children's learning processes. We propose that an essentialfeature of learning is that it creates the zone of proXimal development;that is, learning awakens a variety of internal developmental processesthat are able to operate only when the child is interacting with peoplein his environment and in cooperation with his peers. Once these processes are internalized, they become part of the child's independentdevelopmental achievement.

From this point of view, learning is not devePopment; however,properly organized learning results in mental development and sets inmotion a variety of developmentaf processes that would be impossibleapart from learning. Thus. learning is a necessary and universal aspectof the process of developing culturally organized, specifically human,psychological functions.

To swnmarize, the most essential feature of our hypothesis is thenotion that developmental processes do not coincide with learningprocesses. Rather, the developmental process lags behind the learningprocess; this sequence then results in zones of proximal development.Our analysis alters the traditional view that at the moment a childassimilates the meaning of a word, or masters an operation such asaddition or wr itten language, her developmental processes are basicallycompleted. In fact, they have only just begun at that moment. Themajor ~ o n s e q u e n c e of analyzing the educational process in this manneris to show that the initial mastery of, for example, the four arithmeticoperations provides the basis for the subsequent development of avariety of highly complex internal processes in children's thinking.

Our hypothesis establishes the unity but not the identity of learning

processes nnd illlc'llI.d ~ k v o l ( ) p l l l e l l t a l proc

Documents

L.S. Vygotsky: Mind in Society (1978)