RE: [xmca] The strange situation

[Colette Murphy <c.a.murphy@qub.ac.uk>]

HI Martin & Sue
Perhaps I can help a wee bit here! I was at the Golden Key summer school as well... I asked Gennadi about when children were ready to think scientifically in terms of concept formation & why so many of them find science learning so difficult (I am a scientists / science educator)? Here is his response (I have not not written it very well - I was trying to take notes as he was translating his thoughts into English, so I may have not understood everything he said as he intended!)
He explained that there is no equality between theoretical and scientific in science learning / teaching. Theoretical is reflection on how they did the activity, what they observed, etc - it is NOT scientific thinking, but is theoretical - this is characteristic of primary (elementary) science and we should encourage lots of such theorising from children so that when they are introduced to the big scientific concepts, they will be able to theorise at a higher level. The scientific has a wholeness and complexity and is aimed to understanding the whole world. There is a need to know scientific systems - he gave an example that it is impossible to understand the concept of 'force' scientifically without an understanding of the 2nd law of thermodynamics. Thus, a young child would need to understand the whole theory (not just able to reproduce individual concepts in the theory) for scientific understanding.
Even if this sounds a bit garbled (apologies) it has been REALLY helpful in my application of Vyg to primary science! An example is a child explaining why her group thought that water, when poured on top of a syrup / oil mixture, went in between the syrup and oil layers - she said that they observed bubbles in the oil which lifted it up and the water went underneath... I had never noticed such bubbles but when I tried it again, there they were! So - the child was theorising on her EXPERIENCE, as opposed to thinking 'scientifically' per se.
I hope this makes some sense!!
Best
Colette

ps - hi Sue! Are you going to Moscow this summer? I am!




Dr Colette Murphy
Senior Lecturer
School of Education
Queen's University
Belfast BT7 1NN

tel: 02890975953
________________________________________
From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu [xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu] On Behalf Of Martin Packer [packer@duq.edu]
Sent: 19 April 2010 14:47
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
Subject: Re: [xmca] The strange situation

Thanks, Sue. That makes perfect sense, doesn't it - there is indeed then a focus in the Golden Key Schools on the two neoformations that LSV emphasized: conscious awareness and mastery. One thing that puzzles me, though, is that LSV proposed that these neoformations are involved in the use of concepts, not of complexes, and Gennady Kratsova writes that the program assumes that concepts will not be used until adolescence. Yet they apparently make efforts to encourage conscious awareness and mastery in younger children.

Can you tell us more about the way moral development is viewed in the Golden Key Schools, and how the "nurturer" takes care of this?

Martin

On Apr 18, 2010, at 1:40 AM, Sue March wrote:

> Hi Martin
> I was at the summer school last year.  According to my notes the term
> Gennady used was овладение (ovladenie) which I would translate as mastery or
> mastering rather than acquiring.  I do not know if this is how it is usually
> translated though - others may be able to elaborate on this.
>
> Have just caught up with this interesting conversation over the weekend
> (perils of part-time PhD study).  The "pair pedagogy" is indeed a crucial
> part of creating the ZPD in Golden Key Schools.  There are different terms
> in Russian for the two teachers - one is a "teacher" or учитель (uchitel')
> and the other a "nurturer" or воспитатель (vospitatel') who takes care of
> the moral upbringing of the child, two aspects of development that were not
> separate in Vygotsky's time and which are reunited in the GK schools.
>
> The Golden Key School methodology (including pair pedagogy) was developed by
> Elena and Gennady together with their colleague Elena Berezhkovskaya.
>
> Elena and Gennady have also published the following chapter which may be of
> interest:
>
> Kravtsov, G. G., & Kravtsova, E. E. (2009). Cultural-historical psychology
> in the practice of education (S. March, Trans.). In M. Fleer, M. Hedegaard &
> J. Tudge (Eds.), World yearbook of education 2009:  childhood studies and
> the impact of globalization:  policies and practices at global and local
> levels. New York: Routledge.
>
> Sue March
> PhD Candidate
> Monash University, Australia
> Sue.March@education.monash.edu.au
>
>
> On 18/04/10 11:26 AM, "Martin Packer" <packer@duq.edu> wrote:
>
>> P.S. Gennadi Kravtsov writes that "Acquiring is a very important concept in
>> Vygotsky’s theory." Can any one tell me what Russian word is being used here,
>> and how it is usually translated, because I don't think 'acquire' appears as a
>> central concept in the English translations I am familiar with.
>>
>> Martin
>>
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