the ZPD

The Zone of Proximal Development was found by Lex Vygotsky. Lex Vygotsky was a Russian Developmental Psychologist whose major contributions to the field and education occurred between the early nineteen twenties and the late nineteen thirties. Vygotsky focused a great deal on not only the development of children, but the learning process involved in developing children. According to Vygotsky, “learning happens because we interact with the environment. Furthermore, we do not learn because we have developed, we develop because we have learned. In short, learning perceives development.” Learning new things enhances our developmental level. However in order to learn we have to be presented with tasks that are just out of reach of our present ability. Tasks that are too simple or that are already in our present ability do not promote learning. On the other hand tasks that are too complex become frustrating and no learning occurs.

Vygotsky believed that those tasks, which are just beyond our present ability, exist in what he called the “Zone of Proximal Development” (ZPD). The tasks in the ZPD are the things we can almost do ourselves, but need help from others to accomplish. After receiving help from others, we will eventually be able to do them on our own, thus shifting them out of our zone of Proximal Development. In other words, we have learned something.

The factors of the ZPD fit into today’s role of teaching by teaching subjects to the students that fall in their ZPD. Students are able to learn the material, they just need guidance and encouragement from the teachers in order to do so. Teachers must be conscious of the fact that every student has a different ZPD. Therefore teachers must design lesson plans that cater to the ZPD...

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...t they should have a good understanding on what is going on and how to process the information given to them.

One other way to use ZPD to teach adult learners would be for the lecturer to explain to the learners what a lecture expects from a student when they are giving an oral presentation. Next, the lecturer would give the learners the task of giving an oral presentation on a given topic while giving them a few tips on how the presentation should be presented. Finally, the lecturer will just watch the learners as they perform their presentation to the class, without giving any tips or advice to the learners. By this point, the student will have an excellent idea on how to lay the presentation out and what is expected of them.

The focal message: “every student learns differently but, more importantly, every student can learn, they just need the help of a teacher.”