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ACQUIRING MENTAL TOOLS AND HIGHER MENTAL FUNCTIONS

Acquiring Mental Tools and Higher Mental Functions

José Á. Ibáñez

Universidad del Atlántico

Language Acquisition for Children

Jairo Soto

September 13th, 2021

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ACQUIRING MENTAL TOOLS AND HIGHER MENTAL FUNCTIONS
The concept of “tools of the mind” comes from Vygotsky, who believed that just as physical

tools extend our physical abilities, mental tools extend our mental abilities, enabling us to solve

problems and create solutions in the modern world. Vygotsky differentiated between our higher

and lower mental functions conceiving our lower or elementary mental functions to be those

functions that are genetically inherited, our natural mental abilities. In contrast, he saw our

higher mental functions as developing through social interaction, being socially or culturally

mediated .

First, Vygotsky considered that higher mental processes appear first between people as they

are co-constructed during shared activities. Then the processes are internalized by the child and

become part of that child's cognitive development. For example, first, children use language in

activities with others, to regulate the behavior of the others, and then later, the child can regulate

his/her own behavior using private speech.

Second, Children begin to create a "cultural tool kit" and transform the tools given to them

into their own representations, symbols, patterns, and understandings. Vygotsky believed that

cultural tools (including real tools and symbolic tools) play very important roles in cognitive

development. He emphasized the tools that the culture provides to support thinking so that all

higher-order mental processes, such as reasoning and problem solving, are mediated by

psychological tools, such as language, signs, and symbols. Adults teach these tools to children

during day-to-day activities and the children internalize them, so later the psychological tools can

help students advance their own development. For example, children engage in activities with

adults, and they exchange ideas and ways of thinking about or representing concepts. These co-

created ideas are internalized by children; thus, children's knowledge, ideas, attitudes, and values
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ACQUIRING MENTAL TOOLS AND HIGHER MENTAL FUNCTIONS
develop through appropriating the ways of acting and thinking provided by their culture and by

the more capable members of their group.

Finally, in his cultural-historical approach to development, Vygotsky argued that community

plays a crucial role in processes of meaning-making and cognitive development. In effect,

development cannot be separated from its social context. Children begin to create a "cultural tool

kit" and transform the tools given to them into their own representations, symbols, patterns, and

understandings. In Vygotsky's theory, language is the most important symbol system in the tool

kit, and it is the one that helps to fill the kit with other tools.

In conclusion, higher mental functions allow us to move from impulsive behavior to

instrumental action. Cultural humans differ from primitive humans and other primates in that we

do not react directly to the environment. Our psychology is mediated by cultural means. From

infancy we learn through interaction with others

Sources

 Bodrova, E., & Leong, D. (2006). Tools of the mind: The vygotskian approach to

early childhood education (2nd ed.). Pearson.