Vygotsky's Sociocultural Theory Of Language And Sccaffolding

“Scaffolding refers to providing contextual supports for meaning through the use of simplified language, teacher modelling, visuals and graphics, cooperative learning and hands-on learning” (Ovando, Collier, & Combs, 2003, p. 345). Scaffolding argues that while students are assessed some interventions should be embedded in order to interpret individuals’ abilities and lead them to higher levels of functioning. Vygotsky (1984) in a research into the development of cognitive functions revealed that cognitive abilities are not innate. He considered this process as the new ways of thinking, and acting that an individual is supported by interactions with others. In an approach named Sociocultural Theory of Mind developed by Vygotsky in 1984,

Royanto (2012) conducted a study in order to investigate an intervention programme based on scaffolding to improve metacognitive strategies in reading. He used three activities named reciprocal teaching, tutoring with peers, and reading as a homework in order to improve students’ metacognitive strategies. He revealed that the intervention was effective for helping novice students to use metacognitive strategies. He added that the intervention programmes activated the strategies that the students knew but they had not been able to use them.
Teo (2012) conducted a study to investigate the effects of dynamic assessment on promoting Taiwanese EFL students’ reading strategies. He wanted to promote and assess the learners’ reading strategies in three different areas of finding main ideas, using contextual clues, and making inferences. The design of the study was pre-test, mediation treatment, and post-test. He used both implicit and explicit mediation processes to enhance these three strategies in learners. He indicated that appropriately designed mediation processes played a significant role in promoting learners’ reading

They investigated the validity of dynamic assessment on reading abilities outcomes. The study was conducted over a three-year period. The participants of the study were 78 children. Some of the participants had some reading disabilities and some were without reading disabilities. Some working memory tasks were conducted under some testing conditions namely initial, gain, and maintenance. They concluded that maintenance testing conditions could significantly predict comprehension and vocabulary growth. They further claimed that gain testing conditions significantly predict non-word fluency growth. The results of the study further suggested that the dynamic assessment of working memory tasks significantly predicts later reading