Socio-Cultural DevelopmentVygotsky

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Objectives • Theory/theorist background• Identify socio-cultural influences on development

– Social and cultural factors that affect children’s development

• Describe Vygotsky’s theory of social constructivism– Social sources of individual thinking

• Identify the role of language and private speech• Define the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD)

– Apply this concept

• Define scaffolding– Apply this concept

• Identify educational implications of Vygotsky’s perspective• Compare and contrast the perspectives of Piaget and Vygotsky

Socio-cultural influences

• Two backgrounds:– Children growing up in a

Western middle-class society

– Children growing up in a village or tribal culture

Adult-child interactions

Play Education Responsibilities

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Socio-cultural influencesWestern middle-class society Village and/or tribal culture

Children typically excluded from taking part in adult work, which is generally outside of home.

Children spend their days in contact with, or participating in, adult work.

In early childhood, parent interactions focus on preparing the child to succeed at school.

In early childhood, children start to assume mature responsibilities.

Adult-child conversations and play enhance language, literacy and other school related knowledge.

Parents have little need to rely on conversation or play to teach children.

Schools given the role of equipping children with the skills they will need to become competent workers.

Children receive little or no schooling.

(Gaskins 1999; Morelli, Rogoff & Angelillo 2003)

Lev Vygotsky 1896-1934

• A Russian psychologist and educator– Born 1896 (same year as Piaget)– Jewish middle class family– Privately tutored

• Graduated Moscow State University 1917– Taught literature and psychology for seven years– Post-World War revolutionary Russia– Over 100 books and articles

• Theory not known among English-speaking educators until 1960s when works were translated– Few scholarly works published during his lifetime– Shortly after his death Vygotsky’s work was banned in the Soviet

Union for more than twenty years

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Socio-cultural theory

Emphasises…

• Sociocultural forces– The situation of a child’s development and learning

• Crucial roles played by parents, teachers, peers and the community– Interactions occurring between children and their environments

• Mediation – Human and symbolic intermediaries between the learner and the

material to be learned• Psychological tools

– Symbolic systems internalised by learners to become their inner cognitive tools

Social constructivism• Complex mental processes begin as social activities

– Dialogue promotes cognitive development– Children incorporate the ways that adults and others talk

about and interpret the world into their own ways of thinking

– Through their interactions with children adults transmit their society’s values and skills to the next generation ... thus influencing the course of future development

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Cultural apprentices

• Knowledge is constructed in a social context • Learners as active participants

• Children are ‘apprentices’ of their culture– Fishing/hunting cultures pass on

ecological knowledge– Trading cultures pass on skills in

mathematics– Smiths and tradesmen pass on the skills

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Students, teachers and knowledge• How is knowledge passed on in Australian, German and

Japanese classrooms? How do they differ?• In a Japanese classroom there are students and there is

knowledge and the teacher serves as a mediator between them.*

• In a German classroom there are also students and knowledge, but teachers perceive this knowledge as their property to dispense to students as they think best.*

• In the Australian classroom we again have teachers and students and knowledge…– What is their relationship in this context?

• Delivery of knowledge - by ‘expert’ teachers?• Co-construction of knowledge?• Student discovery of knowledge?

*Stiegler & Hiebert 1999, cited in Kozulin et al.2003 Vygotsky’s educational theory in cultural contextClip art images

Socio-cultural influences on cognition and learning

• Human cognition and learning as social and cultural rather than individual phenomena

• Explored relationships between– Language and thought– Instruction and development– Everyday and academic concept formation

• The nature of knowledge in the classroom– Children defined by their age and IQ versus culturally and socially

situated learners– Teachers as:

• Role model? • Source of knowledge? • Mediator of knowledge?

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Cultural tools• Allow people in a society to communicate, think, solve

problems, create knowledge• These tools (type and quality) influence the pattern and rate

of development• Real tools

– Printing press– Computer – Internet

• Symbolic tools (psychological)– Language– Signs– Codes

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Language

• Social instrument– Language development broadens participation

• Cognitive tool– Dialogues transformed into higher cognitive processes

Thought and language are interdependent• self-talk

• children talk to themselves out loud• inner speech private speech

• children talk to themselves mentally• language transformed into inner verbal thought

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Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD)

• Children can perform more challenging tasks when assisted• Challenging tasks promote maximum cognitive growth

• Actual developmental level – Extent to which the child can perform tasks independently

• Level of potential development – Extent to which the child can perform tasks with assistance

• The range of tasks a child cannot yet do on their own, but can do with the help of others is known as the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD)

• To help a child move through the ZPD, assistance is provided by scaffolding

Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD)“...what we call the Zone of Proximal Development...is a distance between the actual developmental level determined by individual problem solving and the level of development as determined through problem solving under guidance or in collaboration with more capable peers” (Vygotsky 1978, p.86).

Beyond reach at present

ZPD

Child’s current achievement

Vygotsky, L 1978, Mind in society: The Development of Higher Mental Processes, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press.

Within the ZPD are those skills or tasks too difficult for a child to master on his or her own; but that can be done with guidance and encouragement from a knowledgeable person

Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD)

Tasks the child cannot

complete even with help

Tasks the child is capable of

completing with help and guidance

(scaffolding)

Tasks the child can complete independently

Cannot do yetBeyond ZPD

Can do with helpWithin ZPDCan do alone

Scaffolding

• Assistance provided by more competent peers or adults to enable the task to be done successfully

• Scaffolded instruction allows the learner to move through the ZPD

• Modelling; feedback; instruction; questioning; encouragement; task structuring; chunking; breaking the problem down

• Scaffolding is gradually withdrawn

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Actual development

Zone of proximal development(ZPD)

Potential development

Student responsibility

Adult – then joint responsibility

Self responsibility

What student can do on

his/her own unassisted

Scaffolding Assistance from more

capable others: teacher, adults, peers

Transition from other assistance to self-

assistance

Assistance provided by

the self

Internalisation,automatisation

Clues; reminders; examples; modelling; encouragement; breaking problem down

Social speech

Adult uses language to model process

Adult and student share language and activity

Self-talk Inner speech - Private speech Student uses for himself/herself

language that adults use to regulate

behaviour: self-control

Silent dialogue the student

has with self: conscious

mental activity

Internalised and transformed to

inner verbal thought:

self-regulation

Putting it all together: Language + ZPD + Scaffolding

Teaching implications

• Students need many opportunities to learn with a teacher and with more-skilled peers

• Work within the zone of proximal development– Establish a level of difficulty

• Challenging, but not too difficult• May mean differentiating learning experiences

– Evaluate independent performance• Provide scaffolding

– Scaffolded instruction– Assisted performance

• Teacher or more capable peer– Cooperative learning

• Incorporate language and self-instruction in teaching– Model language use when completing tasks– ‘Think’ out loud

• Regularly monitor and assess students’ independent performance

Summary of key principles and concepts

• Learners are:– Active participants– Self-regulated

• Social interaction is necessary – Cooperative dialogues between

children and more knowledgeable members of society

– Vital roles of parents, teachers, peers in cognitive development

• Culture is transmitted to the next generation– Values, beliefs, customs, and

skills of a social group – Children apprentices of their

culture• Complex mental processes

begin as social activities.

• Thought and language become increasingly interdependent– self-talk

• children talk to themselves out loud – inner speech and private speech

• children talk to themselves mentally

• Children can perform more challenging tasks when assisted by more competent individuals– Actual developmental level

• child can perform tasks independently– Potential development

• child can perform tasks with assistance– Zone of Proximal Development– Scaffolding

• Challenging tasks promote maximum cognitive growth

Criticisms

• Has the role of language in thinking been overemphasised?– Verbal interactions are not the only means through which children learn.– What about children who are deaf?

• What of cultures where schooling and literacy are not emphasised?• What about biological contributions to children’s cognition?• Can facilitators be ‘too’ helpful in some cases?

– Such as when a parent becomes too overbearing and controlling.

• Do children become lazy and expect help when they might have done something on their own?

• Vagueness around the concept of ZPD– Is the width the same across all areas of learning?– Does it vary with time of day?

Strengths

• Recognises social and cultural influences – Supporting current belief that it is important to evaluate contextual

factors in children's development and learning.

• Recognises that societal, cultural and historical factors will lead to differences in problem solving and cognitive development.

• Research based on observations of children from Western industrialised societies has generally supported Piaget’s ideas, whereas tudies of children growing up in other societies and cultures have been more consistent with Vygotsky’s views.

A brief comparison:

Piaget Vygotsky

Sociocultural context Little emphasis Strong emphasis

Constructivism Cognitive constructivist Social constructivist

Stages Strong emphasis on stages of development

No general stages of development proposed

Key processes in development & learning

Equilibration; schema; adaptation; assimilation; accommodation

Zone of proximal development; scaffolding; language/dialogue; tools of the culture

Role of language Minimal – Language provides labels for children’s experiences (egocentric speech)

Major – Language plays a powerful role in shaping thought

Teaching implications Support children to explore their world and discover knowledge

Establish opportunities for children to learn with the teacher and more skilled peers