Scaffolding+Zach

= = = = = **Scaffolding** =


 * What is Scaffolding?** Temporary supports, provided by more capable people, that permit learners to perform complex process before they are able to do so unassisted.

Russian psychologist Lev Vygotsky believed teaching must aim not at today's but tomorrow's development, or, as he called it the zone of proximal development. Learners need yo be challenged, but with support and assistance that permits them to perform at the next level. The support and assistance that permits this performance is called scaffolding. (Perogoy and Boyle 100-101)

As scaffolding is used as temporary support for workers and building structures is construction, scaffolding in education offers temporary support to students struggling with language acquisition.

**Scaffolding Strategies**
**Scaffolding Language Acquisition** - A proficient language user may take a simple cue from a novice language learner, and restates the meaning in more elaborate form.


 * Classroom Application-** An ELL student in early development makes the statement "School is good day" to which the instructor would respond "Yes, it is a great day at school, isn't it". Here the instructor takes the statement made by the ELL student and rephrase the original statement and expands upon it. In addition the restatement ends is a question, allowing for continued conversation or agreement. Hence, the instructor creates a linguistic scaffold for similar statements in the future.

**Visual Scaffolding -** An approach in which the language used by an instructor is made more understandable by the display of drawings or photographs that allow students to English words and connect them with visual images being displayed.

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 * Visual Scaffolding Demonstration**

**Routines as Scaffolds -** Using repetitive language to represent the actions throughout a daily classroom routine.


 * Classroom Application -** Routines can serve to scaffold language if as the routine repeats day by day so does the language. Repeated language coupled with physical actions such as roll call, class work schedules, and transitions create an environment where the language used is readily learned by ELL students. On a more sophisticated level one can think of the process of writing as a scaffold routine where the same language is repeated i.e. topic generation, writing, revising, and editing is a scaffolded routine for writing.

**Scaffolds for First and Second Language Reading and Writing** - Reading and writing activities that provide built in support from the instructor or peers that allows the student to participate fully at a level that would not be possible without assistance.

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 * Classroom Applications -** A simple example of a literacy scaffold is a dialogue journal. In a dialogue journal the student first records and entry. The instructor then responds to that entry restating the students entry in much the same manners as we did for scaffolding for language acquisition. The instructors entry should be encourage further conversation. This method can also be seen as an informal way to asses a students progress with each entry.

Additional Resources **