Vygotsky-style Learning

Lev Semenovich Vygotsky1896-1934

“…an essential feature of learning is that it creates the zone of proximal development; that is, learning awakens a variety of internal developmental processes that are able to operate only when the child is interacting with people in his environment and in cooperation with his peers.”

Vygotsky, L. (1978) Mind in Society: The Development of Psychological Processes.

Zone of Proximal Development

The zone of proximal development is the distance between achild’s “actual developmental level as determined byindependent problem solving” and the higher level of“potential development as determined through problemsolving under adult guidance or in collaboration with morecapable peers.”

Vygotsky, L. (1978) Mind in Society: The Development of Psychological Processes.

Stages of the ZPD

Developed from R.G. Tharp and R. Gallimore (1988). Rousing minds to life (pp. 3-39).

Zone of Proximal Development

Performance is developed.Assistance is disruptive.

Performance is self-assisted

Performance is assisted by more capable peers

Vygotsky-style Classrooms

“Activity Settings”

Activity settings

Contexts in which collaborative interaction, intersubjectivity, and assisted performance occur - in which teaching occurs

not randomdetermined absolutely by restriction to the context of goal-directed action

arise from the pressures and resources of the larger social system of which the participants are a partcan be used as a unit of analysisthe who, what, when, where, and why - the small recurrent dramas of everyday life - played on the stages of home, school, community, and workplace

Who

People who can achieve the goal of an action are determined by the goal and the settingmakes for the maximum contribution of each individual desirable to the entire group

What

a description of the things that are done a description of how they are done

operations• Ex. Handling of the host during Communion• Ex. “metacognitive” strategy of questioning that assists

the child to retrieve from memory the bits of information needed to locate lost shoes

scripts• Ex. Care and feeding of pets• Ex. Classroom procedures

When

Activity settings are patterned in time, cannot exist without timethey are driven by productive activity, occur as often and for as long as the product requires - when the product is produced or the goal achieved, the scheduled activity should end

Where

Activity settings must have a place to existbest placed where the tools, the materials, or the uses of the product dictate - where the production can best occurmuch truth in the adage that schools teach no thing, but teach only how to talk about things

Why

Can be described in terms of motivation and meaning

goal for the activity setting usually provides the motivational impetus⌧if not, contingency management⌧not identical for all members

organizational structures in the minds of individuals and the cultural meaning of the interaction [schemata]

Vygotsky-style Teaching

Therefore the only good kind of instruction is that which marches ahead of development and leads it; it must be aimed not so much at the ripe as at the ripening functions. It remains necessary to determine the lowest threshold at which instruction in, say, arithmetic may begin, since a certain minimal ripeness of junctions is required. But we must consider the upper threshold as well; instruction must be orient toward the future, not the past.”

Vygotsky, L. (1962) Thought and Language.

Good Teaching: a new definition

“Teaching consists in assisting performance through the ZPD. Teaching can be said to occur when assistance is offered at points in the ZPD at which performance requires assistance.”

Tharp, R. & Gallimore, R. (1988) Rousing Minds to Life.

Seven Means of Assistance

Modelingcontingency managementfeeding back

Instructingquestioningcognitive structuring

Task Structuring

Modeling

The process of offering behavior for imitation

Contingency Management

The process of assisting performance by arranging for rewards or punishments to follow specific behaviors, depending on whether the behaviors are desired.

Feeding-back

This is the process of assisting performance providing performance information that compares a given performance to an established standard.

Instructing

A linguistic process for assisting performance that calls for specific action. Effective instructions are embedded in a context: contingency management, feeding-back, and cognitive structuring.

Questioning

Most characteristic means for assisting performance in formal learning situations. Calls for an active linguistic and cognitive response, provoking creations by the student.Two types of questions

Questions

those that assessinquires to discover the level of the pupil’s ability to perform without assistance

those that assistinquires in order to produce a mental operation that the student cannot or will not produce alone.The assistance provided by the question is the prompting of that mental operation

Cognitive Structuring

An organizing structure for thinking and actingprocess of organizing the raw stuff of experiencestructures that organize content and/or functions and refer to like instancesmost frequently practiced

Designing school activity settings

teacher participates at times in at least one activity setting with studentsauthority of the teacher used to organize activity settings and to make resources of time, place, persons, and tools availableactivity setting has a product as a goal, a product that is motivating for the studentsfocus = ability of the teacher to assist the students [cooperative learning; assisting themselves]permanent or temporary activity setting as determined by goalall members should be engaged in the joint productive activity whose purpose is ever-increasing competence to assist performanceteacher designs activity settings, which create products, assistperformance, foster intersubjectivities, promote cognitive growth of each individual, refocus accountabilities, and turn schools into a culture of learning.

Vygotsky-Style Assessment

A continuous process that includes the social context of learning and instructiondynamic versus static

Static Assessment

Refers to measuring the student’s individual performance, what the student has already learned

Dynamic Assessment

Refers to measuring the student’s assisted performance during collaboration, the student’s potential development, or what the student is in the process of learningprocess summarized

Dynamic Assessment Procedure (DAP)

Test the learner working alone (static) to provide a baseline measure (highest level without assistance) of skills on a taskprovide a controlled protocol of assistance and instruction (dynamic) while child works on comparable taskposttest with an alternate form of original measure while the learner works alone (static) on a the taskcompare test and retest measures to establish the learner’s zone of proximal development (ZPD) (the range from the baseline to the highest level obtained with assistance).

Analyze the learner’s performance both quantitatively and qualitatively on both product and process

a. Identify the upper limit of the ZPD as expressed by mental age, grade equivalent, reading level, or test score (quantitative)b. Investigate processing strengths and weaknesses and learning style to determine the specific kind of assistance required to obtain optimal performance (qualitative).

DAP cont.

Classroom Assessment Techniques [Angelo & Cross]

Goals inventorySelection of techniqueModel technique in an activity setting

Vygotsky Vocabulary

MediationConceptScientific ConceptSpontaneous ConceptToolZone of Proximal DevelopmentEgocentric Speech

Happy Spring