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Theoretical Framework
The Fifth Dimension is a mixed activity system of education and play designed to continue the projection of a second psychology (Cahan & White, 1992) and to instantiate cultural-historical activity theory (Cole, 1995a). At the macro level, a cultural system mediates the social constitution of local Fifth Dimension sites through rules, artifacts, divisions of labor, and jointly constructed outcomes. The four overarching goals of the Fifth Dimension are to: (a) create sustainable activity systems in different institutional settings that increase our understanding of the cultural mediation of mind and the processes of cognitive and social development, (b) provide contexts for children to master knowledge and skills mediating changes in their everyday practices, (c) deepen our understanding of how the social and individual create each other, and (d) to provide a context in which undergraduates from disciplines such as teacher education, developmental psychology, and communications have opportunities to connect theory with practice and deliver services to children.
The Fifth Dimension is designed to instantiate cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT). A fundamental tenet of this theory is that mind evolves through tool-mediated activity object-oriented-activity that unites the mind with the real world of objects and events. (Cole, 1996; Ilyenkov, 1977; Lektorsky, 1980). Its philosophical roots are found in the works of Kant, Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel, along with their antogonists, Feuerbach and Marx (Raeithel, 1991). Opposing Helgel and Feuerbach, Marx framed the principle that praxis, everyday activity, produces and transforms the material and social world. Marx (1909, 1964, 1971, 1973, 1984) also put forward the claim that the interaction between human beings and the material world is dynamic, cumulative, and transformative. Thus "thinking" has a history (Engestrom, 1987; Margolis, 1988). The basic principles of CHAT, practical activity, social activity, and tool mediation, are anchored in these ideas.
The
first principle is that consciousness emerges out of socially organized
practical activity (labor), the intentional goal-directed activity of
humans who possess the ability to reflect on their plans and progress
toward attainment of their goals. Labor includes play, work, education,
governance, family life, distribution of resources, and much more.
Engaging in practical activity, human beings use instrumental and psychological
tools to transform material objects into socially valued outcomes.
In doing so, they transform their own physical and psychological processes.
A second principle is that human behavior
is social in origin. In elaborating "the general law of cultural
development," Vygotsky wrote:
Every function in the child's cultural development appears twice: first, on the social level, and later, on the individual level; first, between people (interpsychological), and then inside the child (intrapsychological). (Vygotsky, 1978, p. 57)
The zone of proximal development accounts for movement on the interpsychological and intrapsychological planes. In Vygotsky's words, the zone of proximal development is:
..the
distance between the actual developmental level as determined by independent
problem solving and the level of potential development as determined
through problem solving under adult guidance or in collaboration with
more capable peers. (Vygotsky, 1978, p. 86)
The
social principle poses that the meaning of objects and ways of doing
must be public and accessible for learners to make connections among
tools, objects, procedures, divisions of labor, and interpretations.
What is done, how it is done, what it is done with, and are components
of contexts.
The third principle is that human activity
is practical and collective (Cole & Engestrom, 1993). Human
consciousness emerges through the joint-mediated activity of people.
In this sense, mind is co-constructed and distributed among the tools,
rules and procedures, and divisions of labor of collective activity.
An individual engaged in activity is always in contact with a
community and its system of social relations through the tools that
mediate the activity.
To demonstrate the collective nature of human activity and the distributed nature of human cognition, Cole and Engestrom (1993) expanded the principles of CHAT. Elements of the new model explain that individual "subjects" are members of a "community."
.
. . the relations between subject and community are mediated,
on the one hand, by a full collection of "mediating artifacts" and,
on the other hand by "rules" (the norms and sanctions that specify and
regulate the expected correct procedures and acceptable interactions
among the participants). Communities, in turn, imply a "division
of labor," the continuously negotiated distribution of tasks,
powers, and responsibilities among the participants of the activity
system. (Cole & Engestrom, 1993, p. 7)
The
expanded model accounts for the learning and development of both the
individual and the collective activity system. Similar to the
individual, the collective activity system travels through a zone of
proximal development as it learns and transforms. Both a group within
the activity system and an individual within a group have zones of proximal
development.
The fourth principle is that human activity is
mediated through tools. Wartofsky (1979) proposes that three kinds
of tools mediate activity. From his perspective, axes, hammers,
pencils, books, telephones, microcomputers, and telecommunications
networks are examples of primary or instrumental artifacts. Primary
tools enable one to operate on the "outside," to interact with others
and to modify the environment. Our understanding of primary artifacts
such as computers and telecommunications is that they are convivial
tools, in that they have the potential to enhance children's learning
and autonomy. According to Illich:
Tools are intrinsic to social relationships. An individual relates himself to his society through the use of tools that he actively masters, or by which he is passively acted upon. To the extent that he masters his tools, he can invest the world with meaning; to the degree that he is mastered by his tools, the shape of the tool determines his own self-image. Convivial tools are those which give each person who uses them the greatest opportunity to enrich the environment which the fruit of his or her vision...Tools foster conviviality to the extent to which they can be used, by anybody, as often or as seldom as desired, for the accomplishment of a purpose chosen by the user. (Illich, 1973, pp. 22-23)
Tertiary artifacts include ways of suspending current rules to remove oneself from the present constraints through imagination and creativity. As tertiary artifacts, play and games, free the child from the current setting and provide opportunity to create imaginary worlds. In the Fifth Dimension, the Wizard is an example of a tertiary artifact.
Next is the principle of leading activity. Leont'ev (1981) proposed that there is an ordering of categories of activity, such as play, education, peer interaction, and affiliation. In his words:
Life or activity ... is not built up mechanically....Some types of activity are the leading ones at a given stage and are of greatest significance for the individual's subsequent development and others a subsidiary one....each stage of psychic development is characterized by a definite relation of the child to reality that is the leading one at that stage by a definite, leading, type of activity. Leont'ev, 1981, p. 395).
When an activity leads, new functional systems emerge and the child reorganizes the activity on the intrapsychological and interpsychological planes.
The sixth principle is that thought is completed in the "word", discourse (Vygotsky, 1900). By making "sense" subservient to "meaning," a zone of proximal development is created. When learners engage in formulation and communication, their learning is not confined to one context. They develop an understanding and mastery of tools by which knowledge is constructed (Pontecorvo (1993).
In the Fifth Dimension, when children use telecommunications and multimedia as a primary tool for formulating and communicating with others, the interaction leads to secondary tool use such as writing to formulate one's thoughts and makes explicit the relations between the key elements of what one knows. This helps children uncover elements thought to be clear that were not and formulate explanations that lead to a heightened level of consciousness about what one knows. In turn, knowledge is given a richer, more deepened structure and, therefore, may be more retrievable for transfer to other contexts.
Another important principle is that development is holistic. There is considerable debate about what constitutes desirable activity for promoting learning and development. One side argues that learning and development proceed from discrete parts to the whole, requiring lower-order or bottom-up processes. The other side, counters that learning and development are holistic processes, emphasizing meaning and higher-order or top-down processes. This is a false dichotomy. We take Hamburger's (1957, p. 51) view that "From the beginning development proceeds with the framework of the whole....integration does not require special devices." Karmiloff-Smith (1992) takes this perspective on cognitive science. On the one hand, there can be little doubt that a majority of learners engage in mastering complex systems by using both top-down and bottom-up strategies. On the other, many learners have proclivities for one or the other. Ideal learning activities should emphasize the interaction of both top-down and bottom-up processes (Griffin & Cole, 1987; Laboratory on Comparative Human Cognition, 1989).
To
the above, we add a two additional principles. The literacy principle
is that literacy is activity mediated through multi-media. The traditional
view is that literacy is activity mediated through basic skills.
Schools have focused on putting content and processes "inside" the heads
of learners. In contrast, the focus on "basic" mediated activity
in the Fifth Dimension is on social practices "outside" the heads of
learners (Padden & Ramsey, 1993). By embedding skills in basic
activities, skills are subservient to goal-oriented activity.
Children have an opportunity to master cultural tools in social contexts.
Another important principle is that diversity
enables the development and transformation of individuals in a number
of ways. First, goals must be personally meaningful and special
to the child. In being so, diversity of goals provide opportunities
for boundary crossings and explorations. Second, diversity in
objects available to transform into outcomes broaden horizons for development.
Next, success in goal attainment requires an opportunity to work in
one's "own way." For example, one child may develop a plan,
another let a plan emerge, another work alone, and others work in groups.
Last, activities for children must have diverse entry paths. As
an illustration, a child who is initially afraid of "hard tools," such
as computers, may initially engage in a non-computer game, art activity,
or reading activity, and eventually find that a computer is a useful
tool for attaining a goal.
Figure 1 imposes Cole and Engestrom's model on our local Fifth Dimension from the point of view of the subject (after-school program child). Among the many possible outcomes for children are becoming identified as a Young Wizard's Assistant (YGA), making friends, having fun, cognitive and social development and the acquisition of identity, skills, knowledge, and practices. The objects on which the children exert their effort are goals and plans, computer games, multi-media, and non-computer games. The mediating tools used to transform objects into outcomes include artifacts designed especially for the Fifth Dimension, the Wizard, computers, and the like. Rules mediating activity in the Fifth Dimension include those found in the constitution and rules for traveling through the Maze. The division of labor is organized among prospective teachers, child-intern dyads, peer collaboration, individuals in activity, and intersite collaboration. As can be seen, the community is extensive, including children, school staff, a research team, and local and distant Fifth Dimensions sites.
In other words, the Fifth Dimension is a community of practice, glued together by a set of agreed to objects. The noted American philosopher, John Dewey, described how communities affect learning. From his view:
The social environment...is truly educative in its effects in the degree
in which an individual shares or participates in some conjoint activity.
By doing his share in the associated activity, the individual appropriates
the purpose which actuates it, becomes familiar with its methods and
subject matters, acquires needed skill, and is saturated with its emotional
spirit. (Dewey, 1916, p. 26)
Children who participate in the activity of a
community of practice such as the Fifth Dimension acquire a "social
identity kit", which includes not only literacies and ways of thinking
about subject matter but also beliefs, values, and attitudes.
Like Rogoff (1994; 1995), we view learning and development as
transformation of participation in activity. Development is not
seen as simply a process of knowledge and skill mastery, but as "becoming
a different person" through participation in socially meaningful activities.
The mechanism for transformation is mediation. As children participate
in the Fifth Dimension, they mediate their activity through artifacts,
community practices, divisions of labor, and rules and procedures.
Language Translation Assistance
Fifth Dimension - University of Miami
University of Miami - School of Education
TAL 101 - TAL 103
Fifth Dimension Sections
