Vygotsky's theory of cognitive development Flashcards
What did Vygotsky and Piaget agree on?
Vygotsky was a Russian psychologist influenced by Piaget’s work.
They agreed that children’s reasoning abilities develop in a particular sequence, and that such abilities are qualitatively different at different ages, with a child typically capable of particular logic at particular ages.
What was the major different in Vygotsky’s thought?
Vygotsky saw cog development as a social process of learning from more experienced others (referred to as ‘experts’)
Knowledge is first intermetal, between the more and less expert individual , then intramental - within the mind of the less expert individual
Vygotsky also saw language as a much more importnant part of cognitive development than Piaget did.
Cultural differences in cognitive development?
is reasoning is acquired from the more experienced individuals that the child has contact, this suggests that the child will acquire the reasoning abilities of those particular people
means that there may be cultural differences in cognitive development - children pick up mental ‘tools’ that will be the most important for life within the physical, social and work environments of their culture
mental tools include: hand-eye co-ordination needed to hunt with a bow and arrow
what is the zone of proximal development?
Vygotsky identified a gap (which is the zone of proximal development) between a child’s current level of development (what they can understand and do alone), and what they can potentially understand after interaction with more expert others.
expert assistance allows a child to cross the ZPD and understands as much of a subject or situation as they are capable - children are still to some extent limited by their developmental stage
more advanced reasoning abilities are needed to deal with a more advanced understanding in a situation, as opposed to individual exploration of the world.
Vygotsky is suggesting that children can learn more facts through social interaction but they also require more advanced reasoning abilities.
believed that higher mental functions e.g. formal reasoning could only be acquired through interaction with more advanced others.
what does Scaffolding mean?
refers to all the kinds of help adults and more advanced peers give a child to help them to cross the zone of proximal development.
most of Vygotsky’s knowledge of ‘scaffolding’ is influenced by psychologist Bruner and colleagues - so the theory is sometimes called the ‘Vygotsky-Bruner model’
what did Wood, Bruner and Ross note the particular strategies that experts use when scaffolding?
In general, as a learner crosses the zine of proximal development, the level of help given in scaffolding declines from level 5 (most help) to level 1 (least help)
An adult is more likely to use a high level of help strategies when first helping, then to gradually withdraw the level of help as the child grasps the task
Strength for Vygotsky’s theory - research support for the ZPD
There’s clear evidence showing that there is a gap between the level of reasoning a child can achieve on their own and what they can achieve with help from a more expert other
e.g. ROAZZI and BRYANT gave children aged 4-5 the task of estimating the number of sweets in a box - in one condition, the children worked alone, in the other they worked with another older child.
most children working alone failed to give a good estimate . with the help of the older child, children were observed to offer prompts pointing the younger children in the right direction to work out how to arrive at their estimate.
Most 4-5 year olds receiving this help successfully mastered the task.
Shows that children can develop additional reasoning abilities when working with a more expert individual - suggestion that ZPD is a valid concept
Strength of Vygotsky’s theory : research support for scaffolding.
Observed in many studies e.g. Roazzi and Bryant that adults and older children provide support for younger children learning to master new tasks
Research also shows that the level of help given by an expert partner declines during the process of learning - as predicated from the principle of scaffolding.
e.g. Conner and Cross - longitudinal procedure - following up 45 children, observing them engaged in a problem - solving tasks - with help of their mothers at 16,26,44 and 54 months.
distinctive changes in help were observed over time - mothers used less and less direct intervention and more hints and prompts as children gained experiences.
Mothers also increasingly offered help when needed rather than constantly
means that adult assistance with children’s learning is well described by the concept of scaffolding.
Strength - practical application in education
Vygotsky’s ideas very influential in 21st century education - idea of children learning faster with appropriate scaffolding has raised expectations of what they should be able to achieve.
social interaction in learning - through group work, peer tutoring and individual adult assistance from teachers and TAs has been used to scaffold children through their ZPD.
There is evidence suggests that these strategies are effective:
e.g. Van Keer and Pierre Verhaeghe found that 7 years olds tutored by 10 year olds, in addiction to their whole-class teaching progressed further in reading than the controls who just had the whole-class teaching
A review of the usefulness of teaching assistants (Alborz)) concluded that teaching assistants are very effective at improving the rate of learning in children.
Means that Vygotsky’s ideas have value in real-world settings.
Counterpoint -
Although Vygotsky’s ideas about the role of social interaction have had useful applications, these may not be universal.
Lui and Matthews point out that in China classes of up to 50 children learn very effectively in lecture-style classrooms with very few individual interactions with peers or tutors.
This should not be possible if Vygotsky were entirely correct
Means Vygotsky may have overestimated the importance of scaffolding in learning
Extra - Vygotsky versus Piaget
Plenty of evidence to support the idea that , as Vygotsky said, interaction with a more experienced other can enhance learning - we have seen this in studies by Conner and Cross and Van Keer and Verhaeghe above.
But - if Vygotsky was right about the process of interactive learning, we would expect all children learning together to pick up very similar skills and a very similar mental representation of materials.
Recall that Howe found that what children learn actually varies considerable between individuals, even in group learning situations.
