ZPD Illustration
ZPD Project Reflection
I spent a lot of time thinking about this project before I actually began constructing it. I had two different ideas that I considered. When I first heard about the project I thought of the term scaffold and immediately began picturing images of scaffolds in my mind. After all, a scaffold assists workers in reaching sites that they could not do on their own and that’s exactly what ZPD is about. I liked the idea of illustrating scaffolds because they remind me of climbing to higher and higher levels and that’s what all learners strive for – higher cognitive levels. Yet, I decided to move above from this idea because I felt it was too linear and structured and ZPD isn’t really linear or structured at all. In my mind ZPD is a very fluid and ever-changing state where you are sometimes a novice and sometimes an expert possibly within the same environment and time.
I tried to think of some situation where each member of the cadre would need ZPD achieve success. I remember that Madre loved to swing and had recently taken a trapeze lesson. She talked about working to achieve being able to reach certain goals that she had for herself. Trapeze, I thought, might be a perfect metaphor for illustrating ZPD. I had images in my mind of stick figures on the bars and helpers to “catch” and the net for safety. Sounded great, but I decided against this illustration because I really didn’t have enough knowledge of my own to appropriately address learning to trapeze. In essence, I was out of my ZPD and did have ready access to a more capable peer. If I had thought of this idea a bit sooner, I could have used Madre as my more capable peer to gain more knowledge about the process of learning to trapeze.
In the end, I choose learning to ride a bicycle for three reasons—1. Learning to ride a two-wheeled bicycle is like being a “part of the club”. As a child it is something that we want to learn to do because we want to be like our peers. Frank Smith, The Book of Learning and Forgetting, points out to us that we learn from the company we keep and that all learners want to be part of a club. 2. Learning to ride a two-wheeled bicycle is a constructivist activity rather than an activity that mirrors the “Official Learning Theory.” 3. Learning to ride a two-wheeled bicycle occurs through human interaction, but also through technology (the training wheels). This reminds me that the OMET program is about using technology to learn with. That is supplemental, not a replacement for human interaction and social activity. That technology in itself can be a scaffold that allows learners to operate in their ZPD.