SCAFFOLDING LITERACY LEARNING: VYGOTSKY IN THE CLASSROOM

Abstract

Vygotsky's notion of the zone of proximal development, together with a number of the socio-cognitive concepts with which it inter-faces, has had a significant and widespread impact on the way we view language, literacy and learning. These ideas have yet to make any general impact in Malaysian classrooms however.

Taken up by Bruner, the idea of the zoped was developed into the associated concept of scaffolding and has been drawn upon by researchers and educationalists to support various pedagogical models and practices in literacy. In this paper, I wish to outline two curriculum models in which scaffolding plays a central role, and which colleagues and I have applied in literacy classrooms in Malaysia. The first describes the practice of 'shared reading' in preschool and primary English classes and the second outlines a genre-based teaching model applied in primary, secondary and tertiary contexts. Both models have the notions of the zone proximal development and scaffolding at their socio-cognitive cores and a functional model of language and language learning as their linguistic foundations.

Such curriculum genres hold the potential for more effective teaching and learning, and for the inclusion of non-mainstream learners in the mainstream literacy and learning practices of our schools.