11.20.06
Vygotsky, L. (1978). Mind in Society. Intro, Ch 1-3
Vygotsky, L. (1978). Mind in Society. Intro, Ch 1-3
Introduction. – Historical background on Vygotsky including state of psychology at the time, influence of Russian revolution, and incorporating Marxism into psychology.
Ch. 1 Tool and Symbol in Child Development – Some talk on what others think and then an argument that humans are different from animals not in tool use but in language and the subsequent organization that it brings.
Ch. 2 The Development of Perception and Attention – One difference between children/humans and animals is that humans can think about things that aren’t there. There is also a discussion of the system of signs.
Ch. 3 Mastery of Memory and Thinking. This chapter talks about how sign manipulation becomes more and more sophisticated. Also, talk of interfunctional relations and how memory of different aged children is not only different in itself, it’s used differently.
In these chapters Vygotsky asserted that the use of language, specifically signs, is the basis and organization for thinking, planning, and especially higher level thinking. There also seems to be a push here both to distance man/child from animals as well as distancing Vygotsky’s ideas from what has gone before.
