The Sociocultural Perspective

• Children construct their knowledge.

• Knowledge is not transferred passively, but is personally
constructed.

• The learning is mediated.

• Cognitive development is not a direct result of activity, but it is
indirect; other people must interact with the learner, use mediatory
tools to facilitate the learning process, and then cognitive
development may occur.

• Language plays a central role in mental development.

• The most significant sociocultural tool is language, which is vital in
the process of developing higher psychological functions.
 The Sociocultural Perspective
• Learning appears twice.
First on the social level, and later, on the individual
level; first between people (inter-mental phenomena), and
then inside the child (intra-mental).

• Development cannot be separated from its social

context.
The context needed for learning is that where the
learners can interact with each other and use the new
tools. This means that the learning environment must be
authentic, that is, it must contain the type of people who
would use these types of tools such as concepts,
language, symbols in a natural way.
The Sociocultural Perspective

Key Ideas
•Mediation and Mediated Learning
•Regulation, Scaffolding and the ZPD
•Microgenesis
•Private and Inner Speech
•Activity Theory
 Mediation and Mediated Learning
• Humans rely on physical and symbolic
tools (artifacts created by human culture)
to mediate and regulate our relationships
with others and with ourselves.
• These “artifacts”(language, arithmetic
systems, music, art, etc) are modified and
passed on to future generations.
• Language = a tool for thought (a means of
mediation) in mental activity.
 Mediation and Mediated Learning
• Through language we can: rehearse
information to be learned, formulate a
plan, articulate the steps in solving a
problem, etc.
• The nature of our “mental tools” can shape
our thinking to some extent (e.g. when
writing systems were invented our
understanding of the nature of language
changed)
 Mediation and Mediated Learning
• From a SC point of view, learning is also
a mediated process. It is mediated partly
through learners’ developing use and
control of mental tools (language is the
central tool).
• Learning is seen as socially mediated
(dependent on face-to-face interaction and
shared processes, e.g., joint problem-
solving, discussion)
 Regulation, Scaffolding and the
ZPD
• Self-regulation (autonomous functioning
of the mature, skilled individual)
• Other-regulation (when an unskilled
individual, child, learns by carrying out
tasks under the guidance of other more
skilled individuals, caregivers or teachers,
initially through a process of other-
regulation, typically mediated through
language)
 Regulation, Scaffolding and the
ZPD
• The learner is inducted into a shared
understanding of how to do things
appropriately through collaborative talk
until they take over (appropriate) new
knowledge or skills into their own
individual consciousness.
• Succesful learning= a shift from
collaborative inter-mental activity to
autonomous intra-mental activity
 Regulation, Scaffolding and the
ZPD
• Scaffolding: the process of
supportive dialogue which directs
the attention of the learner to key
features of the environment, and
which prompts them through
successive steps of a problem.
 Regulation, Scaffolding and the
ZPD
The Zone of Proximal Development
• the domain where learning can most
productively take place.
• The domain of knowledge or skill where
the learner is not yet capable of
independent functioning but can achieve
the desired outcome if given relevant
scaffolded help.
 Zone of Proximal
Development (ZPD)
Distance Between Actual and Potential Knowledge
potential
knowledge
potential

ZPD actual ZPD

knowledge actual

Two children with the same actual knowledge travel different

distances to their potential knowledge; therefore different ZPDs
This is an example of how ZPD can work in the life
of a child

• Like all children, Andy

is constantly learning
and exploring the
world around him.
This is an example of how ZPD can work in the life
of a child

For our example, we will look at Andy’s love of games.

Over the years, Andy has developed skills and knowledge that
enable him to play a variety of games.
For each game, he is able to successfully strategize and solve
problems independently.
This is an example of how ZPD can work in the life
of a child

There is one game, however, that Andy has never learned. It’s the
card game Yu-Gi-Oh. Andy knows his brother plays it very well.
Andy would like to learn, but is unsure where to start.
This is an example of how ZPD can work in the life
of a child

Andy finally asks his brother Gabriel for help. Gabriel

agrees, and begins working with Andy in learning the game
of Yu-Gi-Oh.
Andy is learning in the region Vygotsky would call ZPD.
This is an example of how ZPD can work in the life
of a child

In ZPD, Andy is doing something requiring the help of someone more

capable. Without Gabriel’s help, Andy would be unable to play the
game.
Eventually, Andy will learn the game well enough to play the game by
himself.
This is an example of how ZPD can work in the life
of a child

Once Andy learns Yu-Gi-Oh, the skill moves out of the ZPD region and
is added to all the other games Andy plays independently. In
Vygotskyan terms, he has “appropriated” the necessary concepts and
should be able to regulate his own performance from now on.
In time, Andy becomes the more capable player, and begins to teach
his sister .
 Regulation, Scaffolding and the
ZPD
According to Wood et al (1976), scaffolded
help has the following functions:
• Attracting interest in the task
• Simplifying the task
• Maintaining pursuit of the goal
• Controlling frustration during problem
solving
• Demonstrating an idealized version of the
act to be performed.
 Microgenesis
The general principles of sociocultural
learning theory apply on a range of
different timescales:
• Phylogenesis: the learning that the
human race has passed through over
successive generations
• Ontogenesis: the learning that the
individual human infant passes through
during early development.
 Microgenesis
• Learning is seen as first social then individual.
• Consciousness and conceptual development are
seen first as interpersonal phenomena (shared
between individuals). Later, individuals develop
their own consciousness, which becomes an
intra-mental phenomenon.
• Language = the prime symbolic mediating tool
for the development of consciousness.
 Microgenesis
• As human beings mature they remain
capable of learning.
• New concepts continue to be acquired
through social or interactional means.
• This local, contextualized learning process
is labelled microgenesis.
 Private and Inner Speech
Private speech: seen as evidence of
children’s growing ability to regulate their
own behaviour. For Vygotsky, PS
eventually becomes…

Inner speech: a use of language to regulate

internal thought without any external
articulation.
 Private and Inner Speech
• Inner Speech reflects an advance on the
earliest uses of language, which are social
and interpersonal.
• A fully autonomous individual has
developed inner speech as a tool for
thought and normally does not feel the
need to articulate external private speech
(unless faced with a new task, when even
skilled adults may use private monologue
to regulate their efforts)
Activity Theory (Leontiev)
Activity: conceived as containing

• A subject
• An object
• Actions
• Operations
 Activity Theory
In the SL Classroom (e.g.)
Subject: a student is engaged in learning a new
language (activity).
Object: a goal held by the student and which
motivates his/her activity (e.g. participation in a
new culture, receiving a passing mark, etc)
Actions: to achieve the objective, goal-directed
actions or strategies are taken by the student
(e.g. guessing meaning from context, reading
newspapers in the SL, using a dictionary, etc.)
 Activity Theory
• Operations: the operational level of
activity is the way an action is carried out
and depends on the conditions under
which the actions are executed.
• These operational aspects can become
routinised and automatic once the
conscious goal is no longer attended to.
 The Sociocultural Perspective
Implications for SLL
• Application of the ZPD to SLL assumes
that new language knowledge is jointly
constructed through collaborative activity,
which may or may not involve formal
instruction and metal-talk, and then
appropriated by the learner
• Learner = active agent in his/her own
development
 Vygotsky and Piaget
Piaget Vygotsky

Both agree children are active learners who actively construct knowledge
Thinking develops in recognisable Development of thinking is dependent
stages which depend on natural upon language and culture
maturation

Role of teacher important but use of Use of “more-expert other” seen as

“more-expert other” not central
Readiness is a central concept in
education – children need to be ready to
progress in their learning
fundamental part of cognitive
development
Children should be actively encouraged
to move through ZPD – do not need to
be ready but should be given opportunity
to engage in problems which are beyond
current level of ability but within ZPD
 Vygotsky and Piaget

Piaget Vygotsky

Scaffolding not a key concept Scaffolding is a central concept

Language reflects level of Language helps to develop

cognitive development cognitive abilities.