When I first heard the concept of “Zone of Proximal Development” a light bulb went on. Realizing that every student has a scale of “too achievable” to “unachievable” makes it a less intimidating goal to find that sweet spot in the middle, especially if you can group by commonalities. Of course, this is not some innovative educational practice, it’s obvious really, but it’s the common sense quality of it that I connected to. Since the twenty-day count, the diversity of my CTs class has become richer and we are now strategizing how to get everybody up to speed.
Another developmental concept that had been covered by my Thursday class as well as ESOL on Friday was the acquisition of language as a cognitive development with defined stages of maturity.
Skinner, who was part of the punishment/reward movement of “behaviorism” claimed that language was learned by listening and imitating the adult, environmental language. Chomsky challenged this idea. HERE A modern-day representation of his argument.
The last and most poignant connection I made this week also involved language, specifically to how it is valued.
When reviewing literacy data from our inquiry students, Dr. Dennis reminded us to “take it with a grain of salt” in a sense. Numbers and percentiles do not make up a student, and certainly do not wholly represent their reading or language abilities. Considering that our students may not experience standard academic English “in reality”, as our ESOL instructor had put it, how can we demand and enforce it as the be all end all in our schools?
From a social justice perspective, I am looking forward to learning how to advocate for ELLs and non-standard English speakers, how to embrace their unique cultures, and how to then apply it to curriculum.