Piaget v. Vygotsky

Piaget was a constructivist theorist. He believed that people build up their own understanding of the

Jean Piaget and Lev Vygotsky both agree and disagree in the area of the Nature/Development of Intelligence. Piaget and Vygotsky agree on the idea of constructivism, the certainty that cognitive development happens by accumulation to and building from what is previously recognized and learned. Piaget was a trivial constructivist, he believed that individuals acquire knowledge by interacting with their environment and building on their knowledge and understanding of their environment. On the other hand, Lev Vygotsky was a social constructivist, believing individuals acquire knowledge through social interaction and learning from others. They also both agree that the restrictions of intellectual growth are defined by social interactions. Individuals acquire knowledge from interactions that they have already been exposed to and what other people can teach them, whether if it other children that are older than they are, adults in the life, or teachers. Jean Piaget believed that individuals acquire their knowledge by interacting in their environment, and it comes as a direct outcome of the individual’s actions on to their environment. Piaget believed that individuals must learn before they develop (Educational Psychology). According to Jean Piaget’s theory, the order of acquiring knowledge is an individual acts upon their environment, learning from the consequences of their actions, and then developing knowledge and understanding of

Unlike Piaget, who was of an academic background and didn’t apply his theories. Never the less, they both theories influenced education and empahsied the importance of assessment however Vygotsky wanted the observation of children and their abilities to be as valied as test scores.

Piaget’s theory is contrary to the behaviourist model as he believed that through observation, children ‘construct’ their own understanding of the world, based on their own experiences and prior knowledge. Piaget believed that this type of learning was more influential than instruction from a teacher or caregiver.

Piaget (Berger, 1994) is a well know cognitive theorist whose concept of cognitive development placed great importance on early childhood education. Piaget’s theory has four specific stages. He deemed that children learn by actively involving themselves in their domain. Piaget is also linked to the Constructivist Theory：children construct

Dewey and Vygotsky both believed that teachers should act as guides for students, helping students through the learning process to make meaning of their world, though Vygotsky with his zone of proximal development theory was more optimistic than Piaget or Dewey about how much a child’s learning could be helped or encouraged by the social setting of peers and adults (Gallagher).

Jean Piaget and Lev Vygotsky is psychologist that has different theories on the development of infants and young children.

Jean Piaget is best known for his theory that suggested children think differently than adults. His theory proposed that children’s cognitive development developed in

4. I relate most with cognitive theories of development. Piaget provides the foundation by explaining the distinct stages of development. His insights allow teachers and parents to have a basis of what children are capable of during each stage. If the child drastically strays from these stages, it allows the caring adults to take action to help the child to reach the appropriate stage. With an understanding of these stages, the theories of Vygotsky can then be successfully utilized. Vygotsky stresses that with the

There are many assessments of Vygotsky and Jean Piaget's work during their lifetimes and deaths. Many of their theories have gone beyond what I am sure that they had expected for them too. Teachers, researchers and parents dabble in their theories of child development, social development and other theories when going about their lives. Whether it is a job or parenting it is a must to know about these two philosophers and what they believed to be real.

Those are two fundamental categories of constructivism which encompass learning of all the sciences. The names of Piaget and Vygotsky are associated with them respectively. They differ in their emphasis on social context, though they agree in that human cognitive development begins from the

In order to support children’s growth educators try to provide a stimulating classroom environment. They implement different strategies, tools and practices to help achieve this goal. Since educators play an important role in children’s development they should be familiar with developmental psychology and know of its educational implications in the classroom. There are two major approaches of developmental psychology: (1) Cognitive development as it relates to Piaget and (2) social development as it relates to Vygotsky. An educator may find it useful to study Piaget’s theory of cognitive development to help children build on their own knowledge.

Lourenco, 2012 states “the main argument is that there are considerable resemblances between Vygotsky’s and Piaget’s theories and that their differences can be relatively ignored. Among the similarities are a genetic, developmental perspective, a dialectical approach, a non-reductionist view, a non-dualistic thesis, an emphasis on action, a primacy of processes over external contents or outcomes and a focus on the qualitative changes over the quantitative ones.” In the developmental perspective, children move through

Lev Vygotsky is one of the earliest proponents of a constructivist learning theory. Although he only lived through the early 1930s, his work was largely unknown in the West until the 1960s (Learning Theories Knowledgebase, 2012). His significant contributions to constructivist learning theory include three important distinctions. First, he purports in Mind and Society: the development of higher mental process (1978) that “social interaction between people plays the first fundamental role in the process of cognitive development” (explained in the Learning Theories Knowledgebase, 2012). This means we first learn by watching others and discussing new information with others, only then do we attempt to use our own cognitive systems for storing that new knowledge individually. “Vygotsky focused on the connections between

Lev Vygotsky believed that we base our knowledge on social interaction and this is called social constructivism. Vygotsky believed that when a student is in the “Zone of Proximal Development”, providing assistance and encouragement from a knowledgeable person; parent, teacher, peers, will give the student enough support to better achieve the task at hand. The presence of a support group