Reciprocal Teaching - Vygotsky Connection

Vygotsky Connection

In "Thought and Language" Lev Vygotsky limns the profound connection between (oral) language,cognition and learning. Refer to Learning by Teaching for additional evidence. The intensive oral language component in Reciprocal Teaching is Vygotskian.

Reciprocal Teaching is a contemporary application of Vygotsky's theories; it is used to improve students' ability to learn from text. In this method, teacher and students collaborate in learning and practicing four key skills: summarizing, questioning, clarifying, and predicting. The teacher's role in the process is reduced over time. Also, reciprocal teaching is relevant to instructional concepts such as "scaffolding" and "apprenticeship", in which a teacher or more advanced peer helps to structure or arrange a task so that a novice can work on it successfully.

The design of this instructional method was influenced primarily by the work of Vygotsky and his notion of a “zone of proximal development,” which he characterized as “the distance between the actual developmental level as determined by independent problem solving and the level of potential development as determined through problem solving under adult guidance, or in collaboration with more capable peers” (Vygotsky, 1978, p. 86). The assistance provided the learner is a good example of scaffolding in that both temporary and adjusted support is provided, according to the needs of the participants. The assistance is withdrawn when it is no longer needed. The sequence of teacher modeling, coaching, and then fading also provides an excellent example of the structure of a cognitive apprenticeship as outlined by Collins, Brown, and Newman (1989).