Piaget v. Vygotsky free essay sample

Both Jean Piaget and Lev Vygotsky have had a huge impact on learning and teaching methods. Although they have different views on how children learn, they both suggest helpful methods of teaching. Piaget and Vygotsky both focus on the idea of constructivism. Constructivist theories believe learning includes real-world situations, language, interaction, and collaboration with others. Piaget believed in cognitive constructivism and Vygotsky believed in social constructivism. They both had logical ideas with some similarities, but their theories also differed. First off, Piaget was a strong believer in cognitive constructivism and offered that children learn with schemes, accommodation, and assimilation. He also suggested that learner go through stages of learning. These include the sensorimotor stage, the preoperational stage, the concrete operational stage, and the formal operational stage. The sensorimotor stage occurs before the age of 2 and includes learning through movement and senses. Towards the end of this stage, children begin to develop object permanence. We will write a custom essay sample on Piaget v. Vygotsky or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Between the ages of 2-7, the child is at the preoperational stage. At this age, children are not able to think about their actions and believe everyone has the same viewpoint as themselves. They also pick up the idea of conservation at this stage. Next is the concrete operational stage which happens between 7 to 11 years of age. By this time, children have intelligence based on logic and concrete references. Eleven years and up is considered the formal operational stage. During this stage, abstract thinking really takes off and a child can think about probabilities and analogies. An example of a classroom that involves Piaget’s cognitive constructivism theory would include challenging activities for the children such as simulations, field trips, and model building. Overall, his theory includes providing a child with knowledge that is meaningful and relatable. On the other hand, Lev Vygotsky believed in social constructivism as a means of learning. His theory suggested that children learn best in a collaborative environment involving socialization. He believed that a child must interact with the social environment on an interpersonal level. Once this has occurred, the child can internalize their experience and construct new ideas. For Vygotsky, culture and social context are critical in learning and he believed that’s when children learn the best. He came up with the ZPD, which stands for zone of proximal development. The ZPD is the distance between what a learner can do with help and what they can do without help. He thought that children learn best within this zone because it advances their learning and challenges them. Vygotsky believed that with the help of a teacher or mentor, students could understand concepts that they wouldn’t be able to know on their own. A classroom including Vygotsky’s social constructivism theory would include meaningful content and content that relates to the real-world. Teacher-student and student-student interaction are key in the classroom according to Vygotsky and will produce strategies such as questioning, summarizing, predicting, and clarifying. A similarity between Piaget and Vygotsky is that they both provided views on cognitive development using constructivism. They were both interested in furthering the learning of children using cognitive processes. Also, another similarity that they share is that they both believed that societal influences established cognitive growth in children. They agreed that learning is affected by the context in which a subject is taught. Although their contexts were different, the students’ beliefs and attitudes contributed to the way a child learns. Even though their theories differed, they both believed internalizing the information learned was important and constructivism allows the student to analyze, gather, filter, and reflect on the information they are provided. As for differences, Piaget and Vygotsky had quite a few. Obviously, their theories differed especially with social context. Vygotsky believed that development must include social context, unlike Piaget. Vygotsky focused on learning from the environment, while Piaget didn’t see the significance of this. Also, Piaget thought learning happened after development and Vygotsky proposed that learning takes place before development. While Vygotsky focused on language and socializing, Piaget viewed language as a stepping stone to development and didn’t view it as much of an importance. Another difference is that Vygotsky thought that student-student interaction is vital because of the social aspect. On the other hand, Piaget saw student-student collaboration as helpful because it could stimulate thinking, but it wasn’t nearly as important in the cognitive development of children. Also a difference is that Piaget believed in four different stages and ages of development, whereas Vygotsky didn’t believe in any set stages. As we know now, there are multiple intelligences and no two children learn the same. It is hard to choose one theory or the other because every child’s need should be implemented. Teachers should include group work along with individual work and not resort to only one. Piaget and Vygotsky both have valid suggestions for learning, but I believe that time and learning has changed over the years. They both made huge contributions to learning and development and even though their views are different, they both offer logical theories that are still important today.