Lev Vygotsky Theory On Child's Education

Vygotsky contends that teaching in the formal environment of the school plays a decisive role in the development of the child’s ability to use abstract concepts. Write an essay in which you show why Vygotsky placed such a strong emphasis on schooling in the development of the child’s thinking.

Lev Vygotsky as a theorist was concerned with both what is developing within the child and the driving forces that enable or propel this development (Van der Veer, 1994). He believed that “the acquisition and development of conceptual thinking” (Van der Veer, 1994) was influenced by instructions in scientific concepts. Vygotsky stated that these concepts, which are made up of various psychological tools, play a crucial role in the mental development of the child (Crain, 2011) and that they, together with a formal schooling environment and the instructions set out by the teacher restructures and raises the child’s development to higher levels. (Karpov & Bransford, 1995). In this essay, we are going to look at psychological tools, scientific concepts, and the zone of proximal development about Vygotsky’s idea that teaching in a formal environment plays a crucial role in the child’s development and their ability to use abstract concepts.

Vygotsky was a Marxist in his beliefs and thus stated that humans can be understood within a social-historical setting. This in turn gave rise to his theory that showed the cooperation between two lines of development; the natural line (within) and the social-historical line (without) (Crain, 2011). The natural line comes from within and shows how development comes from psychological tools manifested inside the individual and works in conjunction with the social-historical line that shows how the environment and outside factors influence development. Vygotsky proposed that humans have “created psychological tools to master their own behavior” (Crain, 2011, p. 236) and as societies develop so did other mental tools. He believed that people used these tools, also known as signs, to aid their thinking and behavior (Crain, 2011). According to Vygotsky, there are a few psychological tools or signs that ultimately aid our ability to use abstract concepts; speech, writing, and numbering systems. Speech is a very important tool as it “frees our thought and attention from the immediate situation” (Crain, 2011, p. 236). This means that we can use speech (that symbolizes various things) to talk about situations and events beyond was is happening now i.e. we can talk about the past and make inferences about the future (Crain, 2011). Speech acts as a tool that helps the child participate in social life and guides their thinking. Writing and numbering systems, on the other hand, while great human achievements, don’t come as easily to the child as speech does. Writing and numbering systems are harder to obtain because they force children to detach from the physical aspect of speech and instead use abstract symbols to convey words and meaning. This is where learning in the formal environment plays a crucial role as instruction is needed to guide this process (Crain, 2011). Vygotsky (1930 as cited by Crain, 2011) argued that these sign systems have a huge impact on the cognitive development of the child and he acknowledged that while the natural line is important, after about two years of age, the child is largely influenced by outside factors.

Before looking at schooling and how it enables the child’s ability to use abstract concepts, we need to look at the role of play. “The young child also gains freedom from the concrete situation through play.” (Crain, 2011, p. 247-248). Using made-up situations we can see children inferring different roles to different objects by thinking things through in an imaginative way. While this play may be imaginative and spontaneous, it is still formed through various rules that the child believes need to be followed (Crain, 2011). It can be argued that these are the building blocks that influence a child’s conceptual thinking. During imaginative play, the child partakes in abstract thought which is guided or facilitated by the adults and the rules set forward to them.

Vygotsky found immense value in the kind of abstract concepts taught in school. He referred to these as scientific concepts which are made up of disciplines taught in school; math, science, and social sciences. Contrasted to this are spontaneous concepts that children come to on their own and develop outside the school setting and in their everyday lives (Crain, 2011). It is shown that the development of these concepts is the result of different approaches to learning (Karpov & Bransford, 1995). According to Davydov (1972 as cited in Karpov & Bransford, 1995), the types of learning that impact these concepts are empirical and theoretical learning. Empirical learning is formed based on the child looking at and comparing common characteristics within different objects and forming their own concept based on those characteristics. This is how the child learns and forms concepts that are not always factual (Karpov & Bransford, 1995). Everyday concepts come from the child’s own experience and scientific concepts are formed through a process of teacher-learning. However, these two concepts are not mutually exclusive. According to Vygotsky (1994, p.365) “the two types are united into a single system of concepts formed during the course of the child’s mental development.” (as cited in Kozulin, 2003, 251). This is where traditional schooling instruction and guided or facilitated learning comes into play. The child uses both their own experiences and the knowledge taught to them to form their conceptual thinking.

It is believed that prior knowledge is relevant and forms the basis of all education and according to Ausubel (1968 as cited in Kozulin, 2003), the most important thing that influences a learner's learning is what he or she already knows. “Conceptual change implies the presence of prior knowledge in the students’ minds.” (Kozulin, 2003, p. 247). Vygotsky placed a large amount of emphasis on language and how words influence and structure how we think. At a young age, the child goes through stages in which words infer meaning that may or may not be different to an adult’s idea of what that word means. This shows that a child’s use of concepts and their general understanding goes through development and that instruction plays a role in conceptual thinking (Van der Veer, 1994). According to Karpov & Bransford (1995), research shows that traditional instruction makes use of the child’s empirical learning as a method to deal with school subjects. They use empirical learning to form empirical concepts which then influence how they use school subjects. This goes back to John-Steiner & Mahn (1996), who stated that development starts at a young age with our dependence on others- our caregivers. The child relies heavily on the experience of others, and when starting a task, the child looks to those with more experience to shape their learning. Over time, the child begins to take responsibility for their own learning. Rogoff (1990 as cited in John-Steiner & Mahn, 1996) referred to this as guided participation; the child’s form of participation with those around them; their parents and peers, and in the context of a formal environment, their teachers. When learners actively engage in tasks through understanding and participation it allows them to acquire strategies and knowledge to use in conceptual thinking.

The teacher imparts knowledge or gives instructions to learners to guide their thinking. “They give cognitive development a new goal, pressing children to think more abstractly than they ordinarily would.” (Crain, 2011, p. 251). Meaning children are guided and encouraged to think about scientific knowledge and how it fits into more abstract concepts. Through this instruction, the child’s mind is focused on forwarding thinking and promotes new paths of development to take place. While Vygotsky strongly believed that a formal environment was key to abstract thinking, he also noted that development is not straightforward and that children learn and develop differently at different paces and stages (Crain, 2011). This can be seen through curriculum planning. The teacher can create a step-by-step program for children to learn from, however, children do not always develop according to it (Crain, 2011). This can be seen through the zone of proximal development; the distance between the actual developmental level as determined by independent problem solving and the level of potential development as determined through problem-solving under adult guidance or in collaboration with more capable peers (Vygotsky, 1935, p . 86 as cited in Crain, 2011, p. 252).

Many scholars strongly agree with Vygotsky’s idea that the teacher guides the learner in thinking more abstractly and to do this they need to educate learners instead of waiting for them to make certain discoveries on their own (Crain, 2011). This is also imperative because of society and the fact that learners need to reach certain milestones by a certain period in their life. If this is not guided within formal learning, students might only reach these discoveries at a later stage than is socially acceptable. For learners to reach these discoveries, the teacher needs to know what knowledge the learner can learn and comprehend. This cannot be done through simple testing as tests only show us how far the learner has developed, not their capabilities in learning new content (Crain, 2011).

The zone of proximal development accounts for this distance. It shows that when students are given a task to do and are equally instructed and guided through it, their ability to conceptualize it and their potential outcomes are not the same (Crain, 2011). Vygotsky (1978 as stated in Kozulin, 2003), places the learner’s interactions with their teachers (as well as other adults) and generally more competent peers at the forefront of the zone. Therefore, the primary role of the teacher and the schooling environment is of great importance as it is in this zone that teachers can make inferences on the student’s learning processes and guide their thinking (Kozulin, 2003). It is within this zone that Vygotsky believed educators would have a good understanding of what their learners’ potential abilities are (Crain, 2011).

The zone acts as an assessment for the child’s new learning and practically speaking, it’s gained interest in the process of teaching. Scaffolding is a technique that promotes the theory of the zone of proximal development. With scaffolding, an adult provides the learner with a fair amount of assistance but then begins to reduce the amount of assistance given as the child gets the hang of the activity. The assistance scaffolds the learning until the child is finished with their task (Crain, 2011). The most common example of this is when a child learns to ride a bicycle. Scaffolding comes in the form of the child first learning to ride their bike with pedals. Once the child is confident enough, the pedals come off and the child is aided by their parents who help balance and guide them. Finally, the child can steer, pedal, and balance on their own.

Upon evaluation of Vygotsky’s theory, researchers have found that children grown and learn through various inward factors but to fully develop, they need the tools given to them by their culture and scientific concepts. Instruction, he said, enables the child to develop while working within the zone of proximal development, however, he didn’t account for how much instruction was needed. Instruction propels the child forward, but too much and could undermine their independence and hinder their ability to think abstractly. Students need to be encouraged to know how to think without hindering their ability to do so on their own (Crain, 2011).

Considering the above, we can see how the building blocks and psychological tools the child is equipped with aid them in their development. Vygotsky believed that the process of information from the elementary to higher mental functions is created by signs; primarily speech and language. As the child is influenced by culture and their language develops, their ability to use higher mental functions develops as well. Their everyday and scientific concepts work collectively to infer meaning to tasks given to them. Within the formal environment of a school, the teacher can scaffold and guide the child’s learning within the zone of proximal development to better their ability to use abstract concepts. Therefore, it can be said that the formal environment of the school plays a large role in developing abstract concepts and the ability to use these higher mental functions.