Strategies to Scaffold Children’s

Learning

By Raneem Awad

Faculty of Education

November 2020
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STRATEGIES TO SCAFFOLD CHILDREN’S LEARNING

The framework for effective practice in supporting school readiness for all children is

based on two main pillars which are the research-based curricula and teaching practices, and

ongoing child assessment in order to achieve a highly individualized teaching and learning to

ensure that the children are getting the most out of every day (Framework for Effective

Practice 2020). However, these two pillars are based on a concrete foundation of nurture,

responsive and effective interactions and engaging environments. Amongst the instructional

interactions lays scaffolding, which is essentially “help”. It is a way of helping children build

on a skill, be it motor skills, knowledge and understanding among others, that they already

have by giving them enough support to get to the next step of proficiency in order to build up

block by block, next to the next to reach the top and successfully complete a learning goal.

Instructional Scaffolding is part of the education concept “zone of proximal

development, ZPD”. ZPD is the set of skills or knowledge by which a student is not able to

acquire on his own, but can do with teacher or peer assistance (Sarikas, 2020). It is important

to note that each student has a different ZPD and the role of the teacher is crucial in providing

strategic guidance in times when a student struggles with a specific topic. A teacher can

choose from a variety of facilitative methods to scaffold a child’s learning while being

mindful to avoid causing the child to reach his frustration level.

One way a teacher can scaffold a child’s learning is by providing hints or clues

without giving the entire solution (Denton, 2014). Assuming a student is having a difficulty

in indicating which process is “inhale-exhale” in a science class tackling the respiratory

system, teacher might be prompt to give a direct answer, yet a scaffolding strategy can imply

that a teacher gives clues to help the student to activate prior knowledge and build up new

information. So a scaffolding situation can be as follows:

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STRATEGIES TO SCAFFOLD CHILDREN’S LEARNING

Teacher: Can you put your hand on your chest and take a breath in and take a breath out?

Great. Can you note any change in your body while you were breathing?

Student: My chest moved up and down.

Teacher: That is right. Why do you think that happened?

Student: It might be because the air went inside and then went outside.

Teacher: This is correct, so when we breathed “IN” air and it went “IN-side”, what would we

call this process?

Student: “IN”-hale.

In this situation, a teacher succeeded in narrowing the student focus on the answer by

emphasizing on a part of speech in the keyword for the student to come up with the right

answer. Hints are a successful tool in scaffolding a child’s learning; “Hints could be verbal,

pictures, or gestures to aid a child in reaching the answer or completing the task. “(Veazey,

2018).

Offering a range of multiple answers to a question for a student to choose from is

another strategy a teacher can use. If a child is struggling with the task at hand, a teacher can

provide suggestions to build that bridge between what they already know and what they are

trying to grasp. Considering the same situation in science class tackling the respiratory

system, a student is struggling determining which type of gases are inhaled and exhaled.

Teacher: If the air has a great amount of oxygen and an itsy bitsy tiny amount of Carbon

Dioxide in it, which gas is mostly inhaled by our body?

Student: Oxygen.
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STRATEGIES TO SCAFFOLD CHILDREN’S LEARNING

Teacher: That is true. So now that we inhaled the Oxygen, does your lungs uses it or just

exhale it as it is?

Student: It processes it then exhales it?

Teacher: So if the lung does uses the oxygen, would the gas exhaled be Oxygen or Carbon

Dioxide?

Student: Carbon Dioxide.

In this example the teacher explained a new information by question-answer form in which

questions had two answers for a student to choose from in order to grasp the new idea.

A third scaffolding strategy can be using additional resources for a student to fetch

information. Additional resources can be books, hand-made crafts, visual aids such as posted

charts, or found on the internet. It is mainly any tool that a child can use to look for the

information by himself or with the aid of his teacher. When the teacher was explaining the

respiratory system to her students, she might as well ask her students to look up for a chart in

the classroom clipboard that would illustrate the whole process of respiration for instance.

Another tool that would be beneficial is by providing students some tools: balloon and a

straw, and ask them to make up a model of a lung by attaching the balloon on the straw and

blowing inside of it. Upon blowing air inside, the balloon/lung is inflating, so it is taking in

air filled with oxygen and so on. This resource can be done independently or in group work,

which might as well encourage peer to peer learning.

In conclusion, there are various strategies by which a teacher can adopt in scaffolding

a child’s learning yet only one goal a teacher should achieve and that is guiding a child

through scaffolding his own skill and understanding independently in order to complete a

task successfully. Thus a teacher’s responsibility is crucial and essential and should be taken
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STRATEGIES TO SCAFFOLD CHILDREN’S LEARNING

positively in order to be a support system for her students’ development and create a concrete

foundation for the framework of effective practice in supporting school readiness for all

children.

References
Denton, D. (2014). Characteristics of Scaffolding and Activities for Using it in Classrooms.
http://www.davidwdenton.org/characteristics-of-scaffolding-and-activities-for-using-it-in-
classrooms/

Framework for Effective Practice. (2020, July 13). Retrieved October 23, 2020, from
https://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov/teaching-practices/article/framework-effective-practice

French, V. (n.d.). Engaging Interactions: Scaffolding Children’s Learning | ECLKC.

Retrieved October 24, 2020, from https://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov/video/engaging-
interactions-scaffolding-childrens-learning

Sarikas, C. (2020). Vygotsky Scaffolding: What It Is and How to Use It. Retrieved October
24, 2020, from https://blog.prepscholar.com/vygotsky-scaffolding-zone-of-proximal-
development

Veazey, R. (2018). 9 Ideas for Better Scaffolding in the Early Years. Famly.
https://famly.co/blog/management/better-scaffolding-early-years/