Kathie, I agree with your point, if I understand it correctly, that ZPD is
a two-way road. It is for both the teacher and the student. In my view,
people learn from their experiences that often include other people. It
does not matter if other people are "more capable" or "less capable" --
people still learn. I think, to be a good teacher means to learn from
students how to guide them. And to be a good student means to guide the
teacher how to help the student's learning.
What do you think?
Eugene
At 08:56 AM 10/8/97 -0600, you wrote:
>xmca who-is-at weber.ucsd.edu,External writes:
>>We tend to assign dominant agency to the senior partner, and so
>>initiative
>>and well-formed goals; we then see divergence as 'resistance', but if we
>>give equal agency to the junior partner, then divergence implies an
>>active
>>impulse in another direction, not mere reaction against (though this
>>exists). It trivializes divergent projects to see them solely in terms
>>of
>>their accomodation or resistance to our own projects.
>
>The power relations (implied or otherwise) in descriptions of the ZPD
>have always bothered me. My son's first grade teacher struggled the
>entire year with trying to teach a child who was "obviously bright" but
>so unwilling to cooperate in the social activities of reading groups
>and coloring sheets and math bingo, etc. At the end of the year she
>admitted that she had learned a lot from Max. Was he the senior
>partner? Was he even aware of her learning process? What did he learn
>from their interactions? I think teaching/learning is relationship
>dependent, but I never feel comfortable with claims about what's being
>taught or who is doing the teaching and who the learning.
>
>Kathie
>
>******************************************************
>\\\\\\\\\\\\\You live you learn
>\\\\\\\\\\\You love you learn
>\\\\\\\\\You cry you learn
>\\\\\\\You lose you learn
>\\\\\You bleed you learn
>\\\You scream you learn////////alanis morissette:jagged little pill
>
>******************************************************
>Katherine_Goff who-is-at ceo.cudenver.edu
>http://ouray.cudenver.edu/~kegoff/index.html
>
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Eugene Matusov
Willard Hall Educational Bldg., Room 206G
Department of Educational Studies
University of Delaware
Newark, DE 19716-2920
Phone: (302) 831-1266
Fax: (302) 831-4445
e-mail: ematusov who-is-at udel.edu
http://www.ematusov.com
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