Zone Of Proximal Development Theory Analysis

The interaction and usage of texts to gain meaning is known as literacy practice. It can include any form of communicative event, and as documented in part A (Appendix 1), a wide range of literacy practices occur in everyday life. According to Ivanic et al (2007), knowledge acquired outside the classroom either at home or in a community is as valuable as knowledge learned at school.

Notwithstanding the above, current debate instigated by Bennett, discipline expert in the Department for Education, says only knowledge acquired at school such as ‘learn[ing] about Vikings’ has any merit and that asking children their opinions ‘What do you think about X? (Davis, 2016) does not bring any benefit to the classroom. Widdowson, also argues that teachers

Similarly, Vygotsky emphasises the role that the community plays, where more advanced peers support learners in the process of making meaning and his Zone of Proximal Development theory provides the framework for connecting everyday life with school learning (Vygotsky, (1994 [1978]).

Therefore, by looking at learning within the sociocultural linguistic approach, taking social, cultural and historical dimensions of literacy learning into consideration, I will examine the challenges and benefits of making a link between learners’ outside literacies and those in the

The ‘Third space’, is seen as a collaborative Zone of Proximal Development where students could achieve a stronger sense of identity, and an understanding of appropriate and important forms of participation (Duff, 2004). The potential conflict between teacher’s formal language and academic knowledge, known as the ‘mainstream script’ and the students’ ‘counterscript’ constituting vernacular language and experience out of school, could become a source of innovation, where students are able to use their own language and everyday knowledge to engage with curriculum material and discourse (Gutiérrez,