[Xmca-l] Re: RES: Re: Child Development: Understanding a Cultural Perpsective

Sat May 20 17:06:39 PDT 2017

:-) Lets hear it for children's rights, Peg!
mike

On Sat, May 20, 2017 at 4:48 PM, Peg Griffin <Peg.Griffin@att.net> wrote:

> A tad tangential, but maybe interesting nevertheless:
> "4-Year-Olds Don’t Act Like Donald Trump  By ALISON GOPNIK  Comparing our
> president to a child is inaccurate and unfair to children."
> Etc. at https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/20/opinion/sunday/4-year-
> olds-children-trump-gopnik.html?action=click&pgtype=
> Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=opinion-c-col-
> top-region&region=opinion-c-col-top-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-top-region
>
> Peg
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-l-bounces@
> mailman.ucsd.edu] On Behalf Of Martin John Packer
> Sent: Saturday, May 20, 2017 6:56 PM
> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: RES: Re: Child Development: Understanding a Cultural
> Perpsective
>
> Interesting, David. I’m not sure that I agree with LSV’s answer, here, or
> in the passage you cite in your message to Andy. At least, if we are to
> equate pedology with developmental psychology, or with developmental
> science. For one thing, the situation of adulthood is certainly not always
> stable. For another, the ‘line’ of an adult's development may be different
> from that of a child, but I would have thought that Vygotsky himself would
> have agreed that there is no single line to the development of a child, or
> of children. The line of development, I think, varies from stage to stage,
> and from one developmental context to another.
>
> Martin
>
>
>
>
> On May 20, 2017, at 4:51 PM, David Kellogg <dkellogg60@gmail.com<mailto:d
> kellogg60@gmail.com>> wrote:
>
> Martin:
>
> This is from the Q&A at the Psychotechnic Conference in November 1930.
> Mikhaillov and Spielrein (Isaac, not Sabine) have just asked questions
> about the relationship of pedology to other sciences (especially lifelong
> education).
>
> Jerusalimcik: How does Comrade Vygotsky conceive of pedology: only as a
> science of the child or as a science of the development of the human being
> right to the end of his life?
>
> Vygotsky: Concerning the question of Comrade Jerusalimcik, is pedology the
> science of the child or of the development of the person right to the end
> of his life? I think--and, again, it seems to me that there is an objective
> basis for this idea--that pedology is the science of the child in
> development and not that of the person in development right to the end of
> his life. I think that those who wish to extend pedology from the cradle to
> the grave, those who want to put on the same plane the development of the
> child and the development which occurs with a child, without realizing it
> are making the same mistake that the old authors made when they said that
> the child is a small adult: that is, they deny the qualitative specificity
> of the process of development in the child compared to that processes and
> the changes that are produced in a situation that is relatively stable.
>
> On Sat, May 20, 2017 at 9:18 AM, Martin John Packer <
> mpacker@uniandes.edu.co<mailto:mpacker@uniandes.edu.co>
> wrote:
>
> Hi Alfredo,
>
> I completely agree with you. If you’ll allow me to cite myself again…
>
> Martin
>
>
> A strong case could be made that this book should have considered the
> entire human lifespan. Developmental researchers have tended to assume that
> the endpoint of development is the start of adulthood, and that development
> is the process of the child achieving adult status. However, it should now
> be clear to the reader that human psychological development involves the
> entire span of human life, the cycle of ontogenesis from birth to death.
> This cycle should be understood not solely in terms of the individual who
> lives and dies, but also in terms of the social relations of reproduction
> in a community.
>
> There has been an unprecedented increase in life expectancy (see figure
> below), and this book has told only part of the story of the human life
> cycle. As young people become parents and then grandparents, or as they
> become teachers, coaches, or recognized community figures, their lives
> intersect and interact with those of children, both their own and those of
> other people. The stages from infant to adolescent are not separate and
> distinct from later stages of the lifecycle. We have seen that parents and
> caregivers play a crucial role in a young child’s development. Even death
> has an intimate connection to birth: human life truly is a cycle, albeit
> one that extends as a helix through time.
>
> Viewed this way, the human life cycle is a process in which:
>
> persons are formed and dissolved, move between dependent impotence and
> independent authority, divide and multiply their being through relations
> with others, know more and less about the world, and acquire and lose the
> capacity to change it. (Robertson 1996, p. 591)
>
> It is worth emphasizing one more time that nature and culture are not
> opposed but operate together, and we can see this in the fact that the
> human lifespan is longer today than at many times in the past, and in many
> parts of the world it is growing even longer, probably because nutrition
> and healthcare are postponing the senescence programmed into our genes. As
> a result, many infants will interact not only with parents but grandparents
> and even great-grandparents, as never before in human existence. This
> intergenerational contact and interaction creates opportunities for a
> variety of influences on the child, including mentorship, advice,
> alliances, and a richer density of social relations.
>
>
>
> On May 19, 2017, at 5:32 PM, Alfredo Jornet Gil <a.j.gil@iped.uio.no
> <mailto:a.j.gil@iped.uio.no>
> <mailto:a.j.gil@iped.uio.no>> wrote:
>
> These seem very interesting contributions in that they bring forth
> structural aspects necessary for a *developmental* explanation. But, as
> someone educated in general psychology and the learning sciences, but who
> still has much to learn from developmental psychology, I always wonder why
> these characterisations often refer to characteristics of the child and
> tend to end in *adulthood*, as in Martin's sequence, but tend to say
> nothing about adult change in that relation. (By the way, David, can you
> clarify or refer us where we could get a better grasp of why "pre-life"
> would be an adequate label for a reformation???)
>
> I can understand that there are different disciplines within developmental
> psychology, one of which is concerned with child (and not adult)
> development, just as other disciplines may deal with adult development,
> professional development, etc. But we read in Martin's own quotations that,
> " transitions [across periods] are truly changes not only in the child but
> in the whole child-caregiver-niche system of which she is a component"
>
> If these transitions truly are transitions for the child-caregiver-niche
> system, then the issue of age periods also and at the same time brings with
> it not only the issue of niche periods (which I see can be addressed with
> the notion of Social Situation of Development and ZPD), but also the issue
> of adult development as part of that system. Does not it? But then, is it
> about "age"? I certainly feel and can recognise that I am deeply changed in
> and through educating. I am not the same person I was before I begun my
> participant ethnography as an assistant teacher at an arts-based elementary
> school. Certainly with regard to how I organise my praxis in a classroom,
> it could be said that many of the primary functions that characterise my
> behavior have been re-organised leading to new formations (e.g., of
> listening, caring, orienting, responding).
>
> If the "primitive" but also adult "Kaffir" about which Vygotsky speaks in
> his writings may possibly shift from "dreaming" to "thinking" as a means to
> achieve the same higher psychological function, namely decision making, is
> it "age" periods what should be the focus?
>
> These are not rhetorical but genuine questions from someone hoping to
> learn from/with you all.
>
> Alfredo
> ________________________________________
> From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l-bounces@
> mailman.ucsd.edu><mailto:xmca-l-bounces@
> mailman.ucsd.edu<http://mailman.ucsd.edu/>> <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.
> edu<mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu><mailto:xmca-l-bounces@
> mailman.ucsd.edu<http://mailman.ucsd.edu/>>> on behalf of Andy Blunden <
> ablunden@mira.net<mailto:ablunden@mira.net><mailto:
> ablunden@mira.net<mailto:ablunden@mira.net>>>
> Sent: 19 May 2017 18:02
> To: xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu><mailto:
> xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: RES: Re: Child Development: Understanding a Cultural
> Perpsective
>
> Like
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> Andy Blunden
> http://home.mira.net/~andy
> http://www.brill.com/products/book/origins-collective-decision-making
>
> On 20/05/2017 1:45 AM, Martin John Packer wrote:
> Hi David,
>
> Here’s how I handled the matter of the age periods: the stages and crises;
> tell me what you think.
>
> Infancy - A Practical Understanding of the World Infancy - Towards
> Biological Differentiation Toddlerhood - A World of Irresistible
> Invitations Toddlerhood - Towards Psychological Differentiation Early
> Childhood  - How Things Appear, And How They Are Early Childhood  - Towards
> Inner and Outer Middle Childhood - Understanding Institutional Reality
> Middle Childhood - Towards the Actual and the Possible The Teenage Years -
> Adolescent, or Adult?
> The Teenage Years - Towards Adulthood
>
> The “Towards” in these chapter titles reflects the fact that I needed to
> treat each stage in two chapters, and there was usually less to say about
> each crisis than about each stage, so I couldn’t dedicate a whole chapter
> to each crisis. Here’s how I described the notions of ‘stage’ and
> ‘transition’:
>
> "Stages are qualitatively distinct from one another, not only in the form
> of intelligence that the child employs (as Piaget noted), but also in the
> child’s way of being in the world. Each stage involves a specific way of
> relating to the world and relating to self, and as a result of this a new
> way of experiencing and understanding.
>
> "Transitions are those times when new properties rapidly emerge. A
> transition is a point of inflection, a crisis. In a transition there is a
> dramatic change in the child’s way of being in the world, so that she
> discovers new possibilities in that world and gains a new sense of herself:
> of her abilities, her capacities. During the stage that follows, the child
> progressively masters this new way of living in the world. These
> transitions are truly changes not only in the child but in the whole
> child-caregiver-niche system of which she is a component.”
>
> And the diagram below (if it comes through) illustrates the sequence (I
> think the third should read Appearance & Reality).
>
> Martin
>
>
> [cid:FAACC3A0-B984-4539-B8E7-05391373CD7F]
>
> On May 18, 2017, at 7:27 PM, David Kellogg <dkellogg60@gmail.com<mailto:d
> kellogg60@gmail.com>> wrote:
>
> Martin, I think if I'd written something like that I'd be pretty shameless
> too. (A propos--or by the bye--do you have a publisher for the Shpet
> schtick you are up to...?)
>
> Here's something for the revised edition. The way Vygotsky explains "Great
> We" in the Pedological Lectures is a little different and a lot wittier. He
> says it is a "Grandwe" in the sense of your Grandpa--that is, the "we" was
> there before you were even a gleam in your Daddy's eye. (Vygotsky likes to
> address the students with "You and we").
>
> I have been thinking how to "popularize" the age periods without
> vulgarizing them (you know, what Bruner says about being able to teach
> anything to anybody in some honest way).
>
> You and we (our little Grandwe) know perfectly well that Vygotsky measured
> that zone of proximal development in years (it's a "next" zone of
> development, so it doesn't make any sense to talk about it unless:
>
> a) you have the age periods and
>
> b) you have some set of problems--not the Binet problems!--that will
> correlate in some non-arbitrary way to the next age period.
>
> That means that the "next zone of development" for Vygotsky studies is not
> to try to turn him into a failed Gestaltist (pace Yasnitsky and van der
> Veer) but rather to try to figure out some way to get people to take the
> age periods seriously no matter how busy and how impatient with Vygotsky's
> discursive and apparently indecisive formulations they are.
>
> What do you think of this?
>
> Birth--Social Situation of Development: Instinct confronted by
> intersubjectivity. Central Neoformation: "Pre-we"
> Infancy--SSD: Physiologically independent but biologically dependent:
> CNF: "Grandwe"
> One--SSD: Proto-speech confronted by proper speech. CNF: "Pre-speech"
> Early Childhood--SSD: Biologically independent but interpersonally
> (interactionally) dependent. CNF: "Grandspeech"
> Three--SSD: Affect confronted by the 'antipode' of will.  CNF: "Pre-will"
> Preschool--SSD: Interpersonally independent but psychologically dependent
> ('reactive' learning). CNF: "Grandwill"
> Seven--SSD: Inner personality confronted by outer persona. CNF: "Pre-me"
> School Age: Psychologically independent but intellectually
> (academically) dependent. CNF: "Grandme"
> Thirteen: Original thinking confronted by imitation. CNF: "Pre-concepts"
> Adolescence: Intellectually independent but socioeconomically dependent.
> CNF: "Grandconcepts" (nontheoretical concepts, tinged with concrete
> thinking)
> Seventeen SSD: In the USSR, school leaving. CNF: "Pre-Life"
>
> You could write the Crises on your palm and the Stable Periods along each
> finger. (Hard to read it, though....)
>
> --
> David Kellogg
> Macquarie University
>
> "The Great Globe and All Who It Inherit:
> Narrative and Dialogue in Story-telling with Vygotsky, Halliday, and
> Shakespeare"
>
> Free Chapters Downloadable at:
>
> https://www.sensepublishers.com/media/2096-the-great-
> globe-and-all-who-it-inherit.pdf
>
> Recent Article: Thinking of feeling: Hasan, Vygotsky, and Some Ruminations
> on the Development of Narrative in Korean Children
>
> Free E-print Downloadable at:
>
> http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/8Vaq4HpJMi55DzsAyFCf/full
>
>
>
> On Thu, May 18, 2017 at 9:10 AM, Maria Judith Sucupira Costa Lins <
> mariasucupiralins@terra.com.br> wrote:
>
> Martin
> Thank you for the chapter. Maria
>
> -----Mensagem original-----
> De: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-l-bounces@
> mailman.ucsd.edu] Em nome de Martin John Packer Enviada em: quarta-feira,
> 17 de maio de 2017 20:05
> Para: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> Assunto: [Xmca-l] Re: Child Development: Understanding a Cultural
> Perpsective
>
> Thanks Alfredo. It was fun to write, and it would not have been possible
> except for what I have learned over the years from some very smart people,
> a number of whom hang out on this very discussion group.
>
> Martin
>
>
>
>
> On May 17, 2017, at 5:48 PM, Alfredo Jornet Gil <a.j.gil@iped.uio.no
> <mailto:a.j.gil@iped.uio.no>> wrote:
>
> Thanks for shamelessly sharing your work, Martin. The chapter looks great.
> I
> like the way it draws connections throughout diverse theories, emphasising
> common ground across dual systems theory, dynamic field theory, and
> cultural psychology.
>
> Alfredo
> ________________________________________
> From:
> xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>>
> on
> behalf of Martin John Packer
> <mpacker@uniandes.edu.co<mailto:mpacker@uniandes.edu.co>>
> Sent: 18 May 2017 00:10
> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> Subject: [Xmca-l]  Child Development: Understanding a Cultural Perpsective
>
> A few months ago I shamelessly promoted my new textbook, Child Development:
> Understanding a Cultural Perspective, published by Sage at only $46 for
> the paperback edition, $33 or less for the various electronic editions.
>
> There is now a sample chapter available online: Chapter 5, one of the two
> chapters on infancy:
>
> <https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/child-development/book253543%20#preview>
>
>
> Martin
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> --
> David Kellogg
> Macquarie University
>
> "The Great Globe and All Who It Inherit:
> Narrative and Dialogue in Story-telling with Vygotsky, Halliday, and
> Shakespeare"
>
> Free Chapters Downloadable at:
>
> https://www.sensepublishers.com/media/2096-the-great-
> globe-and-all-who-it-inherit.pdf
>
> Recent Article: Thinking of feeling: Hasan, Vygotsky, and Some Ruminations
> on the Development of Narrative in Korean Children
>
> Free E-print Downloadable at:
>
> http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/8Vaq4HpJMi55DzsAyFCf/full
>
>
>
>