Lev Vygotsys Sociocultural Theory of Learning

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Lev Vygotsys Sociocultural Theory of
Learning

• By Teresa Hankins

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Brief History

• His theoretical perspective was developing in a
  time of political turmoil in the soviet union and
  he was blacklisted by the Communist Govt. under
  the reign of Stalin for being pseudoscientific.
• Not until 1956 (2 years after Stalins death) was
  Vygotskys work finally published.

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Vygotsys key components to understanding learning

• Cultural interaction
• Language
• Internalization
• Ontogeny
• Zone of Proximal Development

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Culture differs for each individual but is
equally important.
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Culturally Mediated

• People live in an environment transformed by the
  artifacts of prior generations, extending back to
  the beginning of the species. Vygotsky,
• Culture is considered a unique medium of humans
  existence because humans live in a double
  world, simultaneously natural and artificial.
• 
  
  
  Luria, 1928, ,pp. 91
• Vygotsky believed that this is what made humans
  uniquely different from other animals.

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Today we see that some animals do have what is
considered a culture.
Japanese macaques
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Culture continued

• Culture is where language and speech are derived
  for each individual.
• Language has evolved over time to preserve
  information and make it available to later
  generations. (e.g. religion, science, and
  survival techniques.)

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Impact of Language

• From Birth, children interact with adults who
  socialize them into their culture their stock of
  meanings, their language, their conventions, and
  their way of doing things.
• Language enables people to navigate through
  general thoughts and see relations between
  concepts.

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Language continued

• Speech enables children to navigate through
  thoughts and attain conclusions based on how
  weve learned to initially navigate.
• Young children display this when they think
  outloud and engage in self-talk to navigate
  through their ideas.

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Language continued

• As the learner becomes more capable through
  experience, outloud thinking becomes self-speech,
  which is internal. This is considered internal
  dialogue that helps the learner work through
  complex ideas and he either will accept or deny
  them, based on whatever cultural precursors have
  been set in place.

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Internalization

• We become human through the internalization of
  culture Vygotsky

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Internalization

• When a child is first born, the culture is an
  independent entity from the child. As the child
  begins to process the culture, as part of his
  learning foundation, he internalizes his culture
  to build future knowledge.

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In other words

• Culture is interiorized as mental activity, thus
  becoming internal to the child pp.493, 495

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Zone of Proximal Development

• The gap between a childs current level of
  development on his own, and the potential level
  of development with the help a teacher

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ZPD 2 distinct levels

• What the child can achieve alone
• 2. The childs potential development with guidance

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1. What the child can currently achieve
independently

• This level is the most current within the zone
  and is determined by independent problem solving.
• It is the first level of development to be
  directly influenced by the childs environmental
  and cultural components

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2. The Childs potential development with
appropriate guidance

• This level is based on what the child can achieve
  through the problem solving under the adult
  guidance.
• The idea of more capable peers is now integrated
  into this theory but Vygotsky would disagree

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Ontogeny

• Vygotsky viewed ontogeny as a series of
  qualitative, dialectic transformations.
• Meaning that higher mental functioning form in
  stages, each a complex process of disintegration
  and integration.

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Dialectical Transformations

• Learning is attained through fluid
  interactions between the learner and the
  environment. As a result of continuous feedback
  between learner and environment, knowledge is
  then improved, and thus it is transformed.

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Process of Ontogeny
Promotes higher thought process and functioning
Provokes new variety of memories to be formed
Modified and altered perceptions formed
Various outcomes of interactions
Behavior Regulator
Produces approaches to various interactions
Speech
Language
Culture
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Ontogeny

• A clear indication of ontogeny is with the
  effects of formal schooling.
• The consequences of formal schooling on cognitive
  development
• Education provides the new tools of the
  intellect, but without contexts of use, these
  tools appear to rust and fall into disuse

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Formal schooling

• The medium of instruction is writing.
• The materials, tasks, and goals are organized by
  a curriculum.

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Formal School continued

• So now, the environment within a school can be
  viewed as a distinct culture in itself where a
  whole new set of norms and expectations guide the
  learning process

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Writing continued

• Writing is visual, physical speech.

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The impact of Constructivism can be seen in

• Educational structure
• Guides curriculum, and learning activities
• Virtual Environments used as learning tools
• Design of VE to effectively stimulate learning
• Such as in Geography lessons
• Behavior modification techniques
• Has been helpful to develop self-regulation

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Consider this

• Culture is the source of the mind

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?

• How has your culture guided your development of
  thought processes?