My interest in cognitive theories has led me to a Russian psychologist, Lev Vygotsky. His work, which produced the volume Thought and Language, was done between 1924 and his death in 1934. The first translations that made this work available were published in 1962.
Of interest to me is the study of the development of thought and its relation to language. Through Vygotsky's studies, we see how a child progresses through the stages of concept development, and how adults, through the medium of language, provide the bridge to learning.
Below are links to research work on that provides additional
information about Vygotsky, and include a reflection that I put
together as a theoretical background for a classroom observation.
A geography lesson using Microsoft Encarta
and Publisher.
Lev Vygotsky, Background and links from Best Practices In Education
Lev Vygotsky, A Tutorial in Educational Psychology from Cortland College, by Dr. Margaret D. Anderson At the home page of this site, there are also tutorials about Piaget, Erikson, Kohlberg and Maslow.
COGNITIVE PSYCHOLOGY AND ITS APPLICATION TO EDUCATION
University of Colorado in Denver, Celebrities in Cognitive
Science: Links to papers on and about Vygotsky
http://carbon.cudenver.edu/~mryder/itc_data/cogsci.html#vygotsky
A prologue to Volume 5 of Lev Vygotsky's work: A review of
Vygotsky's work relating tot he development of thought in adolescents
http://sorrel.humboldt.edu/~cr2/vygprol.htm
Who is Vygotsky? A link from UCD, a biography
http://www.ced.appstate.edu/vybio.html
Vygotsky Reference List: A reference list of authors and works
that support and relate Vygotsky's theories
http://www.ced.appstate.edu/vybiblio.html
Vygotsky and Scio-cultural Theory
http://carbon.cudenver.edu/~mryder/itc_data/soc_cult.html#vygotsky
Lecture 6: Vygotsky's theory: Central questions
How does the sociocultural approach differ from 'maturation' and
'processing speed' accounts of development?
How does the sociocultural approach require a rethinking of the
notion of the 'individual' in development?
How can the sociocultural approach account for individual differences
in development?
http://www.dur.ac.uk/~dps0em/lect6.htm
THE PROBLEM OF CONSCIOUSNESS IN VYGOTSKY'S
APPROACH.
Abstract: The problem of human consciousness is discussed in the
framework of development of Vygotsky's approach both in theoretical
and methodological planes. In different periods of his work the
analysis of this problem was based on different positions. The
ideas of the zone of proximal development, the cultural sign and
internalisation are discussed in connection with Vygotsky's approach
to the problem of consciousness as certain fragments of his search
for the theory of consciousness.
http://edtech.oulu.fi/aino/uusiv01.htm
MIND IN SOCIETY: The Development of Higher Psychological Processes
L. S. VYGOTSKY
Edited by Michael Cole, Vera John-Steiner, Sylvia Scribner, and
Ellen Souberman
http://128.103.251.49/Web_Backlist/Backlist_Categ/Mind_Society.html
Vygotsky and the Dialectical Method by Andy Blunden
http://home.mira.net/~andy/txt/vygotsk1.htm
Critical and Vygotskian theories of education: a
comparison. By Willem L. Wardekker, Dept. of Education, Vrije
Universiteit, Amsterdam
http://psych.hanover.edu/vygotsky/wardekkr.html
Social Development Theory (L. Vygotsky)
http://www.gwu.edu/~tip/vygotsky.html
THE VIRTUAL FACULTY'S: A project to celebrate Vygotsky's birth
100 years ago, a forum to discuss his theories, plus links
http://www.massey.ac.nz/~ALock/virtual/project2.htm
A SOCIO-CULTURAL/SEMIOTIC
INTERPRETATION OF INTERCOMMUNICATION
MEDIATED BY COMPUTERS
Maximina M. Freire
The Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
The aim of this paper is to investigate intercommunication ediated
by computers, and to discuss its meaningful features from a joint
theoretical perspective which combines some elements of sociocultural
theory with some of socio- semiotic approaches. This study is
structured in three sections. The first one deals with "contextualization"
and discusses some general characteristics of CMC environments.
The second section deals with "semiotic mediation" and,
speculates on the way(s) people appropriate and transform tools,
and on to what extent distinctive uses of thesame tools may influence
and/or create new practices. The third section deals with "textual
analysis" and explores the concepts of "register"
and "genre". Reflections upon such steps of investigation
emphasize the appropriateness of recognizing texts as a suitable
unit of analysis, and suggest that, more than mediators in communicative
events, texts may also be a "bridge": a tool for achieving
action goals through an adequate selection of genre and register.
http://psych.hanover.edu/vygotsky/freire.html
Vygotsky's Developmental Theories and the Adulthood of Computer
Mediated Communication: a Comparison and an Illumination
Mary Cecilia Bacalarski, MA
Universidade de Sao Paulo, Sao Paulo, S.P., Brazil
The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas, USA
Abstract
This paper aims at showing how Vygotsky's methods of analysis
and conclusions about the development of human thought and language
are still accurate today and can be successfully employed in the
study of Computer Mediated Communication (CMC). Vygotsky's claims
on concept formation and maturation will also be analyzed in detail
and proven helpful in establishing the current and future phases
of CMC. Ten other topics in Vygotsky's studies will be briefly
touched upon, as suggestions for further studies.
http://psych.hanover.edu/vygotsky/bacalar.html
Vygotsky and education: The sociocultural genesis of dialogic
thinking in classroom contexts for open-forum literature discussions
Suzanne M. Miller
State University of New York at Buffalo,
Graduate School of Education, 368 Baldy Hall, Buffalo, New York
14260 USA
Problem and Framework. Recent research and theory suggest that
the kinds of thinking students develop in literacy activities
depend largely on the social- cognitive contexts for language
use in classroom interactions (e.g., Bloome & Green, 1984;
Heath, 1983; Langer, 1987; Miller, 1991). In this sociocultural
approach to mind, thinking originates in collaborative dialogues
which are internalized as "inner speech," enabling children
to do later in "verbal thought" what they could at first
only do by talking with supportive adults or more knowledgeable
peers (Bakhtin, 1981; Vygotsky, 1962, 1978; Wertsch, 1991). A
recent line of inquiry in colleges, for example, has focused on
how through instructional dialogues related to literacy students
learned to think in academically appropriate (yet diverse) ways
(Berkenkotter et al., 1988; Herrington, 1985; McCarthy, 1987).
Calls for such naturalistic investigations in secondary schools
(Fillion & Brause, 1987; Langer, 1987) focus on whether in
the discourse of different subject-areas contexts students learn
distinct ways of thinking (Hedley, 1985) or fundamental thinking
strategies (Baker & Brown, 1984; Dewey, 1933; Resnick &
Klopfer, 1989). For example, some have posited a distinct disciplinary
role for the study of literature in the school curriculum (Bruner,
1986; Langer, 1990), yet there is also evidence that students
develop general reflective and metacognitive stances and strategies,
as well, that can carry over from one format or context to another
(Abercrombie, 1960; Birnbaum, 1982; Langer, 1985; Lytle, 1982;
Miller, 1990).
http://psych.hanover.edu/vygotsky/miller.html
Adult Guidance in Youth Development Revisited:
Identity Construction in Youth Organizations
William R. Penuel
Clark University
Introduction: The Challenge of Youth Development
In Vygotsky's (1987) notion of the zone of proximal development,
a special role is given to adults and more capable peers in leading
development by providing a kind of strategic assistance to young
people in learning new tasks. The role of adults in providing
opportunities for practice in a multitude of tasks within activities
has been further elaborated by sociocultural researchers (Wertsch,
1979) and has been transformed in more recent theories of learning
proposed by Lave & Wenger (1991). Still, much of the work
on learning in the zone of proximal development, and the role
of adults within the zone, has
focused on younger children (see, for example, Rogoff, 1990).
What I plan here is to examine the role of adults in providing
strategic assistance to adolescents acting within a community-
based organization in a mid-sized city in the United States. The
task I set for myself here is one of particular relevance to both
sociocultural theory and practice, insofar as I provide a framwork
for understanding the role of adults (and more capable peers)
in supporting youth in making their own choices in their lives,
in providing them access to social power on par with adults, and
in ensuring that youth voices are heard in their
communities.
http://psych.hanover.edu/vygotsky/penuel.html
The Social Construction of Data: Methodological Problems of
Investigating Learning in the Zone of Proximal Development
Peter Smagorinsky
The ZPD has powerful methodological significance for educational
researchers. The implications stem from questions about the extent
and character of the zone itself, in particular the way the conceptualization
of the ZPD suggests that the mind is not fixed in its capacity
but rather provides a range of potential. The mind, therefore,
is both elastic in terms of the different directions cognitive
growth may take depending on the sociocultural environment in
which it develops, and unbounded in terms of its potential for
growth and the physical space it occupies.
http://psych.hanover.edu/vygotsky/smagor.html
Psychological Institute Russian Academy of Education Centre
of Psychology and Psychotherapy
INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE
L.S.Vygotsky and the Contemporary Human Sciences
Moscow, September, 5-8, 1994
PROGRAM AND SCHEDULE: Selected papers are listed above, there
are more by author
http://psych.hanover.edu/vygotsky/vygotsky.html#symp63
A Mediation Model For Dynamic Literacy Instruction
Lisbeth Dixon-Krauss
University of West Florida
Pensacola, Florida 32514
Phone: (904) 474-2859
E-Mail: LKRAUSS@UWF.CC.UWF.EDU
Jerome Bruner remarked that Vygotsky's conception of development
is at the same time a theory of education (Bruner, 1987). It is
also a dynamic theory of learning and teaching; the learning evolves
through the teaching, and at the same time the teaching evolves
through the learning. This paper presents a mediation model for
dynamic literacy instruction which applies this idea to classroom
research and makes it accessible and functional for teachers.
http://psych.hanover.edu/vygotsky/krauss.html
To subscribe to a list server of Vygotsky and BAKHTIN
http://www.rpi.edu/~zappenj/Bakhtin/Listserv/instructions.html
University of Colorado at Denver. School of Education
Constructivism, A page that focuses on the subject and links to
Vygotsky and related material
http://carbon.cudenver.edu/~mryder/itc_data/constructivism.html
Overview of constructivism:
http://www.valdosta.peachnet.edu/~whuitt/psy702/cogsys/piaget.html
Page of Huitt's Links, Valdosta State, Author of the above, good
reference.
http://www.valdosta.edu/~whuitt/wwwlinks.html
Behaviorist and constructivist Theories, a tutorial
http://www.coe.uh.edu/~srmehall/theory/theory.html
Advertisement for videos on Vygotsky
http://davidsonfilms.com/vygo.htm
LEV S. VYGOTSKY AND
CONTEMPORARY EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY
A Special Issue of Educational Psychologist
http://www.erlbaum.com/917.htm
Dialogue, Difference, and the "Third Voice" in the
Zone of Proximal Development
J. Allan Cheyne and Donato Tarulli
University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
Abstract
In recent years many similarities, especially centering on the
notion of dialogue, have been noted in the writings of Mikhail
Bakhtin and Lev Vygotsky. Although both attend to the dialogical
character of speech and its role in the social constitution and
genesis of mind, we argue that their
understandings of dialogue are different in important ways. We
then consider the implications of such differences for a broader
cultural-historical view of the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD)
by
focusing on three issues: dialogue, otherness, and the need to
consider a "third" voice. These issues lead us to consider
expanding the ZPD to incorporate Magistral, Socratic, and Menippean
dialogues. These dialogues constitute three regions on a continuum
with centripetal Vygotskian and centrifugal Bakhtinian poles and
emerge at different points of development of as well as within
the ZPD. This expanded ZPD provides a medium for cultural and
historical change as well as for individual socialization.
Key Words. Bakhtin, dialogue, Vygotsky, voice, Zone of Proximal
Development
http://watarts.uwaterloo.ca/~acheyne/ZPD.html
PowerPoint Presentation on Vygotsky and his theory
http://www.edcc.edu/wrein/PowerPoint%20Web%20Slides/ECE%20110/Vygotsky%20Slides/index.htm