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Vygotsky's cognitive perspective is, in part, a reaction to one of the criticism of Jean Piaget's Cognitive Theory--that Piaget misjudged the influence of language and social interaction on a child's learning.

Although Piaget proposed an invariant stage sequence, some scholars assumed that he was a maturationist. He was not. Maturationists believe that stage sequences are wired into the genes and that stages unfold accordingly to an inner timetable. Piaget, however, did not think that his stages are genetically determined. They simply represent increasingly comprehensive ways of thinking. Children are constantly exploring, manipulating, and trying to make sense of the environment, and in this process they actively construct new and more elaborate structures for dealing with it. For Piaget, stages of cognitive development represent increasingly comprehensive ways of thinking, ones that differ from that of adults.

Vygotsky, on the other hand, argued that children's thinking is highly influenced by interactions and conversation with other people. If we want to know how children think and learn, he proposes, we need to observe them in natural interchanges with others. Real-life interactions influence children's problem solving.

To illustrate how real-life interactions influence children's thinking and, thus, problem solving, read the following vignette:

ILLUSTRATIVE EXAMPLE:


A kindergarten teacher has placed objects from nature, boxes, markers, and labels on a large table in the science center of his classroom. Children are invited to make a museum here by putting things that are alike together and labeling them, "just like in a real museum." Two children are hard at work, creating categories and making labels.

ANDREA: I think we should put these nests (holds up a bird's nest) and the bee things (points to a wasp's nest) together, all right, Sam?