Mediated action, agents and tools

Over recent years, there has been a shift from content-based teaching to skills-based teaching in Norway with the new Knowledge Promotion reform in 2006. This Knowledge Promotion reform draws heavily on the learning theories that propose that learning is an active process, where learners must actively build knowledge instead of solely being seen as passive

recipients of information (Bråten I. , 1996). The approach presented in the Knowledge Promotion reform is seen as having huge benefits as it is thought to develop the skills needed

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for the modern workplace, such as problem solving, critical thinking, and independent learning.

We will attempt to discuss students’ learning activities, by describing their use of OneNote at school. According to Vygotsky the learning and development are two sides of the same coin, and most development is not possible without some form of learning (Dale, 1996). All learners have a potential for development. This potential should be the starting point for all teaching (Igland & Dysthe, 2001).

The triangle in figure 3 illustrates how the subject and the object are directly and indirectly related via the artefact or tool. The subject makes use of one or several artefacts to influence the object. This situation is true in all learning. As an example we can look at how a child creates an arrow for his bow. The child uses a knife to shape a twig. The knife is then his physical artefact or tool, which he uses to form the twig to his image. The mental picture he has of how an arrow should look like is then a mental artefact or tool, which too helps him in creating and recreating the object.

It is possible that the child is not able to recreate an arrow on his own. He is not that advanced yet. However, it is entirely possible that the child is able to create the arrow with the help of another being, either an adult or another child. This is functions that are under development and these functions that the child can do with the help of another, is what Vygotsky calls the Zone of Proximal Development (ZDP) (Igland & Dysthe, 2001).

Artefact

Object Subject

Figure 2

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Today we are surrounded by technical and physical tools. These tools help us and facilitate us in a way that was not possible only a few years ago. Examples might be the use of GPS to find your way while driving, the mobile phones that not only are used to make calls but also to organize your social life with calendars and addresses, or the personal computer where you store all your contacts. This shows how these artefacts can facilitate and make everyday tasks easier. The individual’s ability to make use of these artefacts will often be decisive for how well they do in the modern technology society. This is also true in school.

Our understanding of learning as a social cultural activity in collaboration with others is based on Vygotsky’s social cultural theory. His theory is the idea that most cognitive development happens in interaction with others and that interaction with others that are more

knowledgeable is necessary for maximum learning. This is at the core of the idea of ZDP. The range of skill that can be developed with adult guidance or peer collaboration exceeds what can be attained alone. The approach he takes to cognitive development is socio-cultural, working on the assumption that “action is mediated and cannot be separated from the milieu in which it is carried out” (Wertsch, 1998).

Vygotsky believed that the development of understanding requires the learner actively engage in making sense of the information that is available. This is a shift from knowledge as a product to knowing as a process. Learning, according to Vygotsky, is best understood in light of others within an individual's world. This continual interplay, between the individual and others, is the basis of the zone of proximal development (ZPD). The zone of proximal development is thus defined as the intellectual potential of an individual when provided with assistance from a knowledgeable adult or a more advanced child. During this assistance process, an individual is guided by another student or adult. The individual learner is by the help of the others able to later act on his own and obtain an intellectual growth. It is our beliefs that Vygotsky’s theory coincides with the way students learn how to use ICT in class.

And by using his theory we can look at the potential each student has to learn in this environment.

Cognitive development does not only happen in the interaction between students but also between students and the cultural tools they use to make sense of their world. Knowledge is not individually constructed, but in interaction with others or the cultural tools used.

Remembering, problem solving, planning, and abstract thinking have a social origin. In our

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day technical tools are used to gain mastery over the professions and computer mastery in school (Igland & Dysthe, 2001, p. 77). Cognitive development can be understood as the transformation of basic, biologically determined processes into higher psychological functions.

Another thing we are interested in looking at is how mediated action can be used in understanding students’ actions. Mediated action is defined by Wertsch as focussing on

“agents and their cultural tools” (Wertsch, 1998, p. 24). Wertsch argues that it in many situations is impossible to separate the agents and the tools, because in most instances both the skilled user and the cultural tool are needed to reach the result. What then is the doing of the individual and what are the possibilities inherent in the tool? Wertsch calls this the

“irreducible tension between agent and cultural tool” (Wertsch, 1998, p. 30). We therefore wish to look at how students, in groups or alone, use the cultural tool OneNote.

Implications for teaching and learning are amongst other that the teacher is there to facilitate the potential of the students and that learning requires the active involvement of the learner.

The teacher should direct and guide the activity. The responsibility should always be on the learner who by collaboration with other students will find how learning can be obtained in collaboration with students and teachers alike.

In this thesis we want to use Vygotsky’s concept of mediated action as a tool for analysis. We follow the clarifications of the concept as set out by Wertsch in his book “Mind as Action”.

We focus on the agent and the mediation the agent carries out with the artefact (Wertsch, 1998). This is because it seems impossible to us to analyse the agent without the mediated action. The agent is able to solve a problem with the help of the tool. However, the agent may be helpless if the tool is taken away (Wertsch, 1998, p. 29). Since mediation is often described as how humans use artefacts to understand and influence the world around them, we find that it is impossible to analyse one without the other.