We Become Ourselves Because of More-Skilled Others

“… It might have appeared to go unnoticed, but I’ve got it all here in my heart. I want you to know, I know the truth, of course I know it. I would be nothing without you. Did you ever know that you’re my hero? You’re everything I wish I could be. I could fly higher than an eagle, ‘cause you are the wind beneath my wings.” - Jeff Silbar and Larry Henley, Wind Beneath My Wings (1982)

This article pays tribute to the “unsung hero of the classroom.” This is for our teachers as we celebrate National Teachers’ Month that started last September 5 and ends on World Teacher’s Day, October 5.

According to Russian psychologist Lev Semyonovich Vygotsky (1896-1934), learning is passed on to a person, through the assistance and guidance coming of a more-skilled individual. Vygotsky theorized that the skills needed to reason, understand, and remember all stem from a child’s experiences with parents, teachers, and peers.

Looking through Vygotsky’s theory

Vygotsky believed that children absorb the accumulated wisdom, values, and technical knowledge of previous generation through interactions with their caregivers, and use these ‘tools’ to learn how to conduct themselves effectively in the world. He believed that teachers (or more-skilled individuals) should play an instructive role, constantly guiding and nurturing their pupils in order to improve their attention span, concentration, and learning skills, in order for them to build up their competence.

Bringing up lifelong learners

The National Center on Parent, Family, and Community Engagement in the United States started a program called “Head Start”. This program aims to create ‘lifelong learners’ that start from the home. The program considers the family as a learning environment for a child. Thus, the mother and father, as the child’s first teachers, and the responsible “more-skilled adults” who are expected to bring up a good and morally competent and upright child to this world.

In summing up the program proposed that every family should create and develop their own programs and goals and feel ownership of their own learning and children’s learning. Setting long-term goals as well as short-term goals can help make learning a lifelong process.