Learning in Classrooms

Using Vygotsky's ideas, this book contributes to the cultural-historical study of school children's learning. The focus is not only on activities within the classroom, but on the importance of various extraneous conditions, for example educational ideology that can influence both instruction and learning. The comprehensive material is presented under five headings: 'School Traditions and Learning' which includes chapters covering the problem of gender and special-needs education; learning strategies in elementary school; and ZPD in a schooling context. 'Educational Practice that Combines Community Knowledge and Social Science Studies' offers a look into dialogic research on learning about the Kobe earthquake; the cultural identity of minority children; a description of the way children in an inner-city youth program talk and think about science, and relating how the children were responsible themselves for a project involving the growing, harvesting and marketing of herbs, flowers and vegetables; the transforming of ethnocultural traditions in a modern environment. 'Everyday Knowledge and Mathematics and Physics Learning' considers cognition in the classroom and analyses the teacher/learner interactions that take place during a mathematics class, with special focus on the cultural-historical approach; and a study of learning activity in a Japanese mathematics classroom. 'Diversity in Learning Modes' examines how students become subjects of cooperative learning activity--here the strategies developed by girls seem to sustain 'mutual support', while the traditions that characterize the learning strategies of boys do not show the same level of cooperation; teacher-student interaction; the socio-moral self-concept of 12 year old Finnish children. 'Classroom Interaction and Discourse' covers the interactions between knowledge and school environment; understanding classroom practice; knowledge through childhood memories; and different ways of organizing salient and problematic action. This is an important book for teachers, administrators and others who want to know more about how teachers teach and children learn.