Zone of Proximal Development

Criticism of the use of the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) - Smagorinsky, 2018

accounts for only a few pages of Vgotsky's writing
linked to instructional scaffolding
- "...Wood, Bruner, and Ross (1976), working from the earliest, least reliable translation of Thought and Language (Vygotsky, 1962), coined the term scaffolding to provide a way to think about a process for one- to- one tutoring with young children"
- viewed as a top-down process (the teacher best serves the needs of the learner)
- does not guarantee learning

focuses on the short-term learning over long-term human development, which was not Vgotsky's intention
the limited focus on ZPD takes away from Vgotsky's his research regarding cultural, historical, and social elements
often presented in alignment with information processing/isolated cognition, although Vgotsky's was critical of this work
translation of the term tomorrow from Russian to English has changed meaning
- Russian meaning of term refers to the future rather than to short-term achievement
Intersubjectivity
- this was Vgotsky's developmental emphasis
- the degree to which different people share an understanding of their situation
- long-term process
- also addressed by Lois C. Moll
Questions to consider from Smagorinsky
- "Whose culture dominates the school? Which students are best acculturated to participate in its practices? Which ones struggle to adapt? What role do teachers have in adapting to students, rather than assuming that it is always and only the students’ task to assimilate? What are the implications of operating a school as a monoculture when its students bring diverse orientations to teaching and learning to their studies?" (p. 256).

References

Smagorinsky, P. (2018). Is instructional scaffolding actually Vygotskian, and why should it matter to literacy teachers? Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 62(3), 253–257. https://doi.org/10.1002/jaal.756

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