However, I do like your description on the ZPD, specially because you
do not try to define it as a precriptive point. I too am am trying to
examine this aspect, I will include a small passage, from a paper of I
am working on. I'm attempting introducing the ZPD with what I hope is a
slight twist on the "standard" definition
<paraindent><param>right,left</param>The ZPD is another key tenet of
Vygotsky=B9s theories. It can be simplisticly defined as: That space
between where the cognitive activity of the student can be successfully
carried out with a fair degree of ease and where the cognitive activity
can only be performed with the assistance of a teacher or skilled peer.
=46or Vygotsky it was the focused activity within the ZPD, established
and sustained by a skilled teacher, that made the student-teacher dyad
so effective. However, society tends not to invest so many resources as
to allow a dyadic environment, and given the social nature of modern
society the tutor-student dyad is not the most appropriate method .
=46or Vygotsky the most important social interactions for the acquisition
of scientific thought occurred during formal schooling, and in
particular,<italic> teacher-student</italic> and <italic>capable
peer-student</italic> interaction. It is in such dyads that students is
better able to develop cognitively because a teacher is more adept at
keeping the learning activity within each student=B9s Zone of Proximal
Development (ZPD) and maintain the requisite abstractness. A capable
peer can also maintain the ZPD, though not so consciously, simply
because the peer is more likely to be operating cognitively in a very
similar way as the learner, they are both operating within their own
ZPD.
The ZPD can also be illustrated along similar lines as the model of
dialectic interaction but with some modifications. In the
Scientific-everyday Interaction Model (SIM) the red probability cloud
(Figure 3a) would imply the unique, and not necessarily related, areas
of activity and understanding of the individual student as he or she
moves from concrete or everyday knowledge toward abstract, or
scientific thought. Scientific knowledge (represented by the blue
probability cloud) acquired in abstract or conceptual forms in the
school environment, is moving toward a concrete form. The ZPD would be
that area of greatest interaction between the two types of knowledge
(the purple area). This model also attempts to illustrate the
discontinuity of knowledge by avoiding a linear interaction and showing
that many areas of human thought can remain outside of the ZPD but that
the possibility of cognitive development still continues.=20
=20
=46ig. 3a Probability Cloud of the Scientific-everyday Interaction Model
of the ZPD.=20
Fig. 3b Space Filled Scientific-everyday Interaction Model of the ZPD.
The Scientific-everyday Interaction Model is in keeping with the
dialectical approach; it permits interactions to occur but does not
deny that other reactions can and do occur outside of the ZPD and that
those interactions can and do have an effect upon other interactions.
The ZPD is simply that area where the forms of knowledge are
<italic>more likely</italic> to interact with each other and further
the cognitive development of the student. Teachers, in the classroom
environment, attempt to maintain student activities within the ZPD in
an attempt to maximize the probability that scientific-everyday
interactions will occur. The SIM model of the ZPD attempts to combine
the conventional Westernized perception of Vygotsky=B9s ZPD (what the
student can do alone and what the student can do with help) with the
more dialectical perspective posited by Vygotsky in <italic>Development
of Scientific Concepts</italic>:
=8Awe can say that <italic>the child=B9s spontaneous concepts develop from
below to above, from the more elementary and lower characteristic to
the higher, while his scientific concepts develop from above to below,
from the more complex and higher characteristics to the more
elementary.</italic> (Vygotsky 1978 p. 219)
</paraindent>
I know illustrations are rather important to help visualize the ideas,
but my key point is that;
the ZPD is merely the "area" we create socially (ie., classroom) where
the interaction betwen concrete and abstract knowledge is more likely
to occur.=20
George
=20
>I would like to explore some of the relationships between Vygotskiian
>theory and critical pedagogy in general, and specifically as they
relate
>to the issues of conservatism, multiculturalism, and the host of
other
>issues raised in the stories recently posted.
>My interpretation of Vygotsky may not be "mainstream" on this list -
but
>I'd like to engage in a dialogue (not a polarizing debate) around some
of
>these ideas (on or off list) with anyone interested. Perhaps conflict
>may be an appropriate starting point.
>Conflict, to Vygotsky, was critical to growth. For example,I do not
see
>the ZPD as just a technique to systematically lead children from one
level
>of skill to another. The ZPD is not a "place" or a "thing." It is
not a
>technique for learning/teaching. It is a reorganization through
conflict
>to create new meaning. The ZPD works by creating a tension between
>present and future capabilities; the intersection of external needs
and
>internal possibilities. The dialectical character of the process has
been
>frequently neutralized in the West where its conflictual aspects, so
>critical to Vygotsky's conceptualization, are glossed over, leaving
no
>room for concepts like agency and resistance, which are central to
>critical pedagogy. Western views seem to have shifted Vygotsky's
notion by
>an emphasis on the interaction between a child and adult through the
>process of negotiating meaning, assuming reciprocity and positive,
>cooperative interaction.=20
>Vygotsky's strength is his unique integration of (historical)
psychology,
>Marxist philosophy, and social semiotic analysis to create a theory
based
>on, in, and of culture. Critical pedagogy shares these roots and
exploring
>this may provide insights relevant to both.
>Your thoughts?
>
>Stephanie
>
>Stephanie Urso Spina
>City University of New York
>sspina who-is-at email.gc.cuny.edu
</fontfamily>
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The philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways;
the point, however, is to change it.
Karl Marx Theses on Feuerbach, no. 11
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