Vygotsky’s SocioCultural theory
Lev Vygotsky while also viewing children as active seekers of knowledge emphasize on the profound
effects of the socio-cultural context on their thinking. As a university student Vygotsky was interested in
literature and later turned to psychology. His theory of human cognition is inherently social and cognition
based. He rejects the individualist perspective and focuses on the socially formed mind.
OVERVIEW : According to Vygotsky, infants are endowed with basic perceptual, attention, and memory
capacities that they share with other animals. These develop during the first two years
through direct contact with the environment. Then rapid growth of language leads to a
profound change in thinking. It broadens preschoolers’ participation in social dialogues with
more knowledgeable individuals, who encourage them to master culturally important tasks.
Soon young children start to communicate with themselves much as they converse with
others. As a result, basic mental capacities are transformed into uniquely human, higher
cognitive processes.
LANGUAGE
Believed language helps children think about mental activities and behaviour and select courses of action.
Vygotsky saw it as the foundation for all higher cognitive processes, including controlled attention,
deliberate memorization and recall, categorization, planning, problem solving, abstract reasoning, and
self-reflection.
In Vygotsky’s view, children speak to themselves for self-guidance. As they get older and find tasks easier,
their self-directed speech is internalized as silent, inner speech —the internal verbal dialogues of
everyday situations. Children’s self-directed speech is now called private speech instead of egocentric speech.
Children use more of it when tasks are appropriately challenging (neither too easy nor too hard), after they
make errors, or when they are confused about how to proceed.
Furthermore, children who freely use self- guiding private speech during a challenging activity are more attentive
and involved and show better task performance than their less talkative agemates. Finally, compared with
their agemates, children with learning and behaviour problems engage in higher rates of private speech over a
longer period of development. They seem to use private speech to help compensate for impairments in
attention and cognitive processing that make many tasks more difficult for them.
SOCIAL ORIGINS OF COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
Zone of proximal development —a range of tasks too difficult for the child to do alone but possible with the help
of adults and more skilled peers through questioning, prompting and suggesting strategies.
To promote cognitive development, social interaction must have certain features.
Intersubjectivity
· The process whereby two participants who begin a task with different understandings arrive at a
shared understanding. This creates a common ground for communication, as each partner adjusts to
the other’s perspective.
Adults try to promote it when they translate their own insights in ways that are within the child’s grasp. As
the child stretches to understand the adult, she is drawn into a more mature approach to the situation.
The capacity for intersubjectivity is present early, in parent–infant mutual gaze, exchange of vocal and
emotional signals, imitation, and joint play with objects, and in toddlers’ capacity to infer others’
intentions.
Later, language facilitates intersubjectivity. As conversational skills improve, pre-schoolers increasingly seek
others’ help and direct that assistance to ensure that it is beneficial. Between ages 3 and 5, children strive for
intersubjectivity in dialogues with peers, as when they affirm a playmate’s message, add new ideas, and
contribute to ongoing play to sustain it. In these ways, children create zones of proximal development for one
another.
Scaffolding
· Adjusting the support offered during a teaching session to fit the child’s current level of performance. The
adult uses direct instruction, breaking the task into manageable units, suggesting strategies, and offering
rationales for using them. As the child’s competence increases, effective scaffolders gradually and sensitively
withdraw support, turning over responsibility to the child. Then children take the language of these dialogues,
make it part of their private speech, and use this speech to organize their independent efforts.
Scaffolding captures the form of teaching interaction that occurs as children work on school or school-like tasks,
such as puzzles, model building, picture matching, and (later) academic assignments.
Barbara Rogoff (1998, 2003) suggests the term guided participation , a broader concept than scaffolding. It
refers to shared endeavours between more expert and less expert participants, without specifying the
precise features of communication. Consequently, it allows for variations across situations and cultures.
A wealth of research indicates that when adults promote intersubjectivity by being stimulating, responsive, and
supportive, they foster many competencies—attention, language, complex play, and understanding of
others’ perspectives (Bornstein et al., 1992; Charman et al., 2001; Morales et al., 2000).
Furthermore, children whose parents are effective scaffolders use more private speech, are more successful
when attempting difficult tasks on their own, and are advanced in overall cognitive development (Berk &
Spuhl, 1995; Conner & Cross, 2003; Mulvaney et al., 2006).
CULTURAL RELATIVISM AND SAFFOLDING
Among Caucasian-American parent–child pairs, adult cognitive support—teaching in small steps and offering
strategies—predicts children’s mature thinking and academic competence (Stright et al., 2001). And adult
emotional support—offering encouragement and transferring responsibility to the child—predicts children’s effort
(Neitzel & Stright, 2003)
In an investigation of Hmong families who had emigrated from Southeast Asia to the United States, once again,
parental cognitive support was associated with children’s advanced reasoning skills. But unlike Caucasian-
American parents, who emphasize independence by encouraging their children to think of ways to approach a
task, Hmong parents—who highly value interdependence and child obedience—frequently tell their
children what to do (Stright, Herr, & Neitzel, 2009). Among Caucasian-American children, such directive
scaffolding is associated with kindergartners’ lack of self-control and behavior problems (Neitzel & Stright, 2003).
Among the Hmong children, however, it predicted favorable kindergarten adjustment—capacity to follow
rules, be organized, and finish assignment
MAKE BELIEVE-PLAY
Vygotsky (1933/1978) regarded make-believe play as a unique, broadly influential zone of proximal development
in which children advance themselves as they try out a wide variety of challenging skills. In Vygotsky’s theory,
make-believe is the central source of development during the preschool years, leading development forward in
two ways.
ü First, as children create imaginary situations, they learn to act in accord with internal ideas, not just in
response to external stimuli. While pretending, children continually use one object to stand for another—a
stick for a horse, a folded blanket for a sleeping baby— and, in doing so, change the object’s usual meaning.
Gradually they realize that thinking (or the meaning of words) is separate from objects and that ideas can be
used to guide behaviour.
ü Second, the rule-based nature of make-believe strengthens children’s capacity to think before
they act. Pretend play, Vygotsky pointed out, constantly demands that children act against their impulses
because they must follow the rules of the play scene. (For example, a child pretending to go to sleep obeys
the rules of bedtime behavior. A child imagining him self as a father and a doll as his child conforms to the
rules of parental behavior (Bodrova & Leong, 2007). Through enacting rules in make-believe, children better
understand social norms and expectations and strive to follow them.
Pretending is also rich in private speech—a finding that supports its role in helping children bring
action under the control of thought (Krafft & Berk, 1998). And pre-schoolers who spend more time
engaged in sociodramatic play are better at following classroom rules and regulating their emotions and
behaviour (Berk, Mann, & Ogan, 2006; Lemche et al., 2003).
Finally, Vygotsky questioned Piaget’s belief that make-believe arises spontaneously in the second year of
life. Vygotsky argued that, like other higher cognitive processes, the elaborate pretending of the
preschool years has social origins and that children learn to pretend under the guidance of experts.
Vygotsky and Education
The Vygotskian classroom goes beyond independent discovery to promote assisted discovery .
Teachers guide children’s learning with explanations, demonstrations, and verbal
prompts, tailoring their interventions to each child’s zone of proximal development. Assisted discovery is
aided by peer collaboration, as children work in groups, teaching and helpinging each other. Vygotsky's
educational message for the preschool years is to provide socially rich, mean ingful activities in children's
zones of proximal development and a wealth of opportunities for make-believe play-the ultimate means of
fostering the self-discipline required for later academic learning. Once formal schooling begins, Vygotsky
emphasized literacy activities (Scrimsher & Tudge, 2003). As children talk about literature, mathematics,
science, and social studies, their teachers inform, correct, and ask them to explain. As a result they
reflect on their own thought processes and shift to a higher level of cognitive activity in which they think
about how to symbolize ideas in socially useful ways. Gradually they become proficient in manipulating and
controlling the symbol systems of their culture.
● Reciprocal Teaching
In reciprocal teaching, a teacher and two to four students form a collaborative group and take turns leading
dialogues on the content of a text passage. Within the dialogues, group members apply four cognitive strategies
questioning, summarizing, clarifying, and predicting.
The dialogue leader (at first a teacher, later a student) begins by asking questions about the content of the text
passage Students offer answers, raise additional questions, and, in case of disagreement, reread the original text.
Next, the leader summarizes the passage, and children discuss the summary and clarify unfamiliar ideas. Finally,
the leader encourages students to predict upcoming content based on clues in the passage.
It creates a zone of proximal development in which children gradually learn to scaffold one another's
progress and assume more responsibility for comprehending text passages. By collaborating with others,
children forge group expectations for high-level thinking and acquire skills vital for learning and success
in everyday life.
Elementary and middle school students exposed to reciprocal teaching show impressive gains in reading
comprehension compared to controls taught in other ways (Rosenshine & Meister, 1994; Sporer, Brunstein,
& Kieschke, 2009. Takala, 2006).
● Cooperative Learning
According to Vygotsky, more expert peers can also spur children's development, as long as they adjust the help
they provide to fit the less mature child's zone of proximal development.
Evidence is mounting that it promotes development only under certain conditions. A crucial factor is
cooperative learning, in which small groups of classmates work toward common goals. Conflict and
disagreement seem less important than the extent to which peers achieve intersubjectivity by resolving
differences of opinion, sharing responsibilities, and providing one another with sufficient explanations to
correct misunderstandings. And in line with Vygotsky's theory, children profit more when their peer partner
is an "expert"-especially capable at the task. When older or more expert students assist younger or less expert
students, both benefit in achievement and self-esteem, with stronger effects for low-income, minority students.
(Ginsburg-Block, Rohrbeck, & Fantuzzo, 2006: Renninger, 1998).
Western children usually require extensive guidance for cooperative learning to succeed. When teachers
prompt, explain, model, and have children role play how to work together effectively, cooperative learning
results in higher-level explanations, greater enjoyment of learning, and achievement gains across a wide
range of school subjects (Gillies, 2000, 2003; Terwel et al., 2001, Webb et al., 2008). It also enhances peer
relationships generally, leading students to cooperate more in future group activities within and outside the
classroom (Blatchford
EVALUATION OF VYGOTSKY’S THEORY
In granting social experience a fundamental role in cognitive development. Vygotsky's theory helps us
understand the wide cultural variation in cognitive skills. Vygotsky's theory leads us to expect highly
diverse paths of development.
Vygotsky's (1934/1986) theory also underscores the vital role of teaching in cognitive development.
According to Vygotsky, from communicating with more expert partners, children engage in "verbalized
self-observation, reflecting on, revising, and controlling their own thought processes. In this way, parents
and teachers engagement with children profound advances prompts the complexity of children's thinking
Vygotsky's theory has not gone unchallenged. Although he acknowledged the role of diverse symbol systems
(such as pictures, maps, and mathematical expressions) in the development of higher cognitive processes, he
elevated language to highest importance. But in some cultures, verbal dialogues are not the only-or even
the most important-means through which children learn.
When Western parents help children with challenging tasks, they assume much responsibility for children's
motivation by frequently giving verbal instructions and conversing with the child. Their communication resembles
the teaching that occurs in school, where their children will spend years preparing for adult life. But in cultures that
place less emphasis on schooling and literacy, parents often expect children to take greater responsibility for
acquiring new skills through keen observation and participation in community activities (Paradise & Rogoff, 2009;
Rogoff, 2003).
Vygotsky said little about biological contributions to children's cognition. His theory does not address
how basic mator, perceptual, memory, and problem-solving capacities spark changes in children's social
experiences, from which more advanced cognition springs. Nor does it tell us just how children internalize
social experiences to advance their mental functioning (Miller, 2009, Moll, 1994).
Vygotsky's theory is vague in its explanation of cognitive change. He died very young leaving a lot of his theory to
be in the hands of later researchers.
