Module 5 Responses

Q1. Similaries between Piaget/Vgotsky:

1.       Both focus on how individuals learn at different levels

2.       External factors (i.e. environment ) can influence learning

Differences between Piaget/Vgotsky:

1.       Vygotsky focuses more on the external factors (ie. social, cultural connections) that shape an individual’s personality and behavior. His theory includes the importance of social factors that influence learning and assisted learning that can push individuals to reach their maximum potential of learning at various levels.

2.       Piaget focuses more on the individual learning to construct their own learning by themselves in a particular environment (home, school, social) without considering assisted learning from others.

Q2.

In the reading Mind in Society the commonalities I found were how students interacted in groups demonstrated more about  their abilities to perform certain task outside of what they can do by themselves.  In preschool they use to allow more free will and creative play which according to the video demonstrates a process to enhance private speech and cognitive development. Schools are more structured which can inhibit private speech and lack of free will to engage in imaginative play.

Q3. Similarities between Bruner, Piaget, and Vygotsky:

All three theorists’ are interested in how to define learning for individuals. Piaget’s constructing knowledge on their own, Vygotsky’s social and other external influences on learning for individuals, and Bruner’s evaluation of how the mind works through a student’s discovery of their environment to further develop their understanding. A school has its own culture students are required to adapt in order to succeed academically. All three contribute to cognitive development through perception, information processing, judgment/decision-making, and constructing knowledge based on external influences (i.e. social interaction, environmental exposure). Overall we try to make sense of our environment through different cognitive measures.

Below is a video that shows an example of Led Vygotsky’s social constructivism in a social studies classroom.  If you like we can post it as our example.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6pFMPSWBds