Vygotsky’s theory of cognitive development

• Vygotsky agreed with Piaget that children develop reasoning skills sequentially but believed that this process was mainly dependent on social processes. Vygotsky claimed knowledge is:

  • First intermental (between someone more expert and someone less expert).

  • Then intramental (within the individual).
• Reasoning abilities are acquired via contact with those around us and as a result there will be cultural differences in cognitive development because we all grow up and learn about the world surrounded by cultural values and beliefs. Children pick up the mental ‘tools’' that are most important for life from the world they live in.
• The zone of proximal development (ZPD) is dependant on social interaction and is the gap between:

  • What a child knows or can do alone

  and

  • What the child is capable of, following interaction with someone more expert.

  The role of a teacher is to guide the child through this gap to as full a level of understanding as the child's developmental ability will allow (collaborative learning); encourages child to use language.
• For Vygotsky cognitive development was not just about acquiring more facts but about becoming more skilled at reasoning. The most advanced (formal) reasoning can only be achieved with the help of experts, not simply through exploration (scaffolding).
• The process of helping a learner cross the ZPD and advance as much as they can, given their stage of development. Typically the level of help given in scaffolding declines as the learner crosses the ZPD.
• Wood identified progressive strategies that can be used to scaffold learning. For example, prompts might be (from most to least help):

  • Demonstration (mother draws an object with crayons).
  • Preparation for child (mother helps child hold crayon).
  • Indication of materials (mother points to crayons).
  • Specific verbal instructions (mother says, How about using the green crayon?").
  • General prompts (mother says, Now draw something else.).
• Children are apprentices - learn through learning under someone.