Throughout our entire stage or academic life, the role of educators is essential when it comes to promoting the acquisition of knowledge. Good educational work aims to enhance the abilities and skills of students.
One of the theories or concepts that try to explain this process is scaffolding Throughout this article we will explain what this term used in educational psychology consists of, as well as how it can be carried out and what collective scaffolding consists of.
The scaffolding process finds its theoretical basis in the scaffolding theory developed by psychologists and researchers David Wood and Jerome Bruner which in turn started from the assumption, developed by the well-known psychologist Lev Vygotsky, known as the “zone of proximal development.”
In order to better understand these concepts, first of all we will review What does the “zone of proximal development” consist of? This idea, developed by the Russian-born psychologist, attempts to explain how certain characteristics of learning can facilitate people’s intellectual development and enhance their maturation.
Specifically, the “zone of proximal development” is that area of knowledge or learning that needs to be enhanced through the help of another person. That is, the distance that exists between those skills or knowledge that the child can acquire on his or her own, and those for which he or she needs the help of another person.
Starting from the basis provided by this theory, Wood and Bruner develop their scaffolding theory, which hypothesizes that at the moment in which the teaching/learning link or interaction develops, the resources of the teacher are inversely related to the level of skills of the learner.
These means that The fewer skills or abilities the child has, the more resources the educator will need Therefore, a correct adjustment between educator and student is essential for the correct acquisition and assimilation of information.
Where does this concept of educational psychology come from?
The concept of scaffolding turns out to be a metaphor that the authors use to explain the phenomenon by which The educator serves as support for the student to acquire and develop a series of strategies that enable you to acquire certain knowledge. Therefore, thanks to this “scaffolding” or support function on the part of the educator, the child is able to acquire knowledge, perform a task or achieve academic objectives, which they would not be able to achieve without it.
However, this scaffolding process is not only carried out in schools or academic settings, but can also occur at home, with parents being the support or base that enhances the child’s learning, or even at a social level or among equals, which is known as collective scaffolding
The authors emphasize the idea that scaffolding does not consist of solving problems or carrying out the child’s tasks, but rather of increasing the resources that the child has. We could say that it is a transfer of learning strategies, which facilitates the development of more complex knowledge structures.
Thanks to this theory, we can understand how important the role of the educator is, and how active participation adjusted to the specific needs of the child serve to consolidate the construction of knowledge.
How it is performed?
In order to carry out a learning process based on scaffolding theory, educators must take into account a series of key factors or conditions so that it is carried out in the best possible way.
1. Preparation of information
The knowledge or information that the educator must explain or the student must be prepared in advance, in order to be able to present it when the student needs it.
2. Education as a challenge
Likewise, the level of difficulty of the information should be high enough to pose a small challenge to the child. This means that it should be a little above the child’s abilities, but not too much, since Otherwise it can generate a feeling of frustration in this.
3. Evaluate the student
In order to carry out a correct scaffolding process, the information must be tailored to the specific needs of the child; Therefore, it will be necessary to carry out an assessment or evaluation of his abilities, in order to maximize his learning capacity.
4. The efforts of the educator are inversely proportional to the abilities of the child
As mentioned above, scaffolding is characterized because as the child has fewer learning skills or abilities, the educator must carry out a much more intense and profound intervention.
This means that in those areas in which the student experiences difficulties the educator must show greater support which will progressively decrease as the child’s abilities increase.
At the beginning of the article it is specified that this learning process or method It does not have to occur only in the school or academic context The interaction between educator and learner can also occur within the home or even between peer groups. These cases are what we would consider collective scaffolding.
Some studies that aim to evaluate the effectiveness of this method reveal that when this process occurs between groups of equals; That is, between groups of students with quantitatively and qualitatively similar abilities, a reinforcing effect on the learning process is exerted, since a mutual consolidation of learning is carried out.
