Question

Explain how dynamic assessment is consistent with vygotsky’s zone of proximal development and with scaffolding.

Answer 1

• Dynamic assessment is a part of Lev Vygotsky's theory of education. According to Vygotsky, students learn when they are in their zone of proximal development, what we'll also refer to as ZPD. This theory states that there are three zones. One zone contains information the student has already mastered and is capable of doing on his own. A second zone is for information the student can understand with assistance or prompting from the teacher. The third and final zone contains information outside of the student's current level of understanding, even with assistance.
• Vygotsky developed the concept of the zone of proximal development in response to the
  educational practice of using IQ tests to measure students’ potential for learning.
• Vygotsky believed that educational assessment should also include measuring students’ potential development as encompassing the discrepancy between a student’s actual level of development and the higher level she can reach when her performance is supported by assistance during collaboration with an adult or capable peers. Dynamic assessment refers to measuring the student’s assisted
  performance during collaboration to assess potential development or what the student is in the process of learning.
• Dynamic assessment and Vygotsky’s idea of the zone focus on social interaction as the key to learning. Learning through social interaction is particularly true of literacy development.The key feature of the dynamic approach is that it links assessment with instruction because it occurs during instruction rather than after the fact. Dynamic assessment provides the teacher with different types of information than static assessment, and it requires different methods for obtaining and analyzing this
  information. The most important feature of dynamic assessment is that the type of information it provides can be used by teachers to address problems, issues, and concerns in classroom instruction.
• A type of dynamic assessment commonly used in the reading literature is the test-teach-retest
  method. Test-teach-retest measures a child’s ability to learn after a predesigned learning opportunity rather than assessing previous knowledge. This method begins by administering a test, considered a pretest, which establishes the child’s current performance.
• Dynamic assessment is an assessment method based on Vygotsky's model of cognitive development. A key component to this model is the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD). The ZPD is the area between what a child can do independently and what a child can do when helped by caregivers or peers. The guide serving as a collaborator/scaffolder leads the learner into awareness of basic principles and strategies of task solution in such a way that problem approach and solution become internalized by the learner. DA creates such a zone, with the assessor as guide.
• Therefore, assessment should be dynamic, involving both measures of children’s individual functioning and their functioning during/after a socially “scaffolded” session.  
• The major goal of scaffolding in teaching represents view the ZPD characteristic of transfer of responsibility for the task to the student. They emphasize the collaboration between the teacher and the learner in constructing knowledge and skill.