Homework! Getting Started

[kellogg]

This is the REVISED homework--I think since EVERYBODY is helping with the reading next week (right, J-Kitty?) we can go a little further!

Many hands make light work. We’ve got thirteen people now, and so that works out to about four or five pages for everybody!

Remember--there are THREE questions: Existence, Essence, and Explanation. As Ms. Oh points out, the explanation questions are often too difficult even for the professor, and the existence questions are almost always too easy and not very interesting. But each provides a basis for the next!

Ms. Choe (pp. 52-56, 2-1-1~2-1-17)

Existence: Vygotsky compares Piaget to Freud (and also to Levy-Bruhl and to Blondel). Is that a compliment or a criticism? Are these new systems of psychology MONIST or DUALIST (that is, are they Mind/Body or Mind+Body)?

Essence: What is the is the DISADVANTAGE of a dualist approach to psychology? What is Piaget's GREAT STRENGTH?

Explanation: Why does every new researcher in child psychology seem to have his OWN explanation (Freud—sex, Levy-Bruhl—participation, Blondel—the death wish)? Why did Piaget want to limit his system to FACTS? Did he succeed?

Ms. Oh Sumi (Ms. Sue Pearman!) (pp. 56-60, 2-1-17~2-1-35)

Existence: Is there a single, underlying cause of ALL the different features of child thinking (according to Piaget)?

Essence: What is it?

Explanation: Why is this stage HALF WAY between autistic thinking and adult thinking? (How is it different from AUTISTIC thinking on the one hand and different from ADULT thinking on the other?)

J-Kitty (Ms. Yi Ji-eun) (pp. 61-65, 2-1-36~2-1-56): ,

Existence: Is egocentric thinking transitional structurally, functionally, or genetically?

Essence: What is “syncretism”? How is it related to egocentric thinking?

Explanation: Why does Piaget oppose egocentric thinking to realism?

Sunny (Kim Seonghi), Hong Kong (Hong Somin) (pp. 65-69, 2-1-57~2-1-71)

Vygotsky looks BACKWARDS and FORWARDS at Piaget’s system, to its CAUSES and to its CONSEQUENCES.

Existence: Is Piaget’s system linked to Freud? How?

Essence: When does egocentrism CEASE to dominate the child’s behavior? What happens then?

Explanation: The “traditional story” is that Piaget believes the child is an individualist, and Vygotsky sees the child as social from birth. Why do people think this? 

J-Monkey (pp. 74-77, 2-2-1~2-2-14) But suppose the original, primal state of child thinking is not individual? What if child autism is actually a LATE emerging tendency? That is what Vygotsky considers in this section.

Existence: Vygotsky says that the idea of egocentrism as a TRANSITION between autism and adulthood is accepted by Freud and sociologically oriented psychologists. Is it also accepted by biologically oriented psychologists like Bleuler?

Essence: What is Bleuler’s point when he compares an imaginary apple to a real one? Which does the older child prefer? What about the young child?

Explanation: Why does Vygotsky DISAGREE with Bleuler that the “realist” orientation and the “dream” mental functions develop in parallel after a certain age?

Umbrella-Koala (Eom Jihyeon), Ms. Mirror (pp. 76-81, 2-2-10~2-2-30)

Existence: Vygotsky doesn’t think that realism and dream thinking develop parallel to each other. Does Bleuler?

Essence: Bleuler thinks that dreams are a kind of rehearsal for reality, e.g. when kittens play at hunting. Does Vygotsky agree? How does Vygotsky think that the dream function of thinking develops? What is it that forms “hospitable soil” for imagination and fantasy?

Explanation: Why does Vygotsky think that true dream thinking in children can be conscious? Do Piaget and Freud agree? What about Eom Jihyeon?

Red Cherry (Yeom Jihye) (pp. 84-89, 2-3-1~2-3-21)

Piaget said he was only interested in FACTS (activity, thinking, and speech) and that he would put off theorizing until the end of his studies. Vygotsky says that Piaget DOES have a theory, and it sits in the middle of his system of facts like a spider in a web, and that we only have to shake the web for the whole system to collapse.

Existence: Is the spider in the web the child's EGOCENTRISM or the child's EGOCENTRIC SPEECH?

Essence: What is the MAIN source of actual data for Piaget’s claims about egocentrism? Is it activity, thinking, or speech?

Piaget says that HALF of what children say consists of egocentric speech. There are two reasons for this. What are they?

Explanation: Vygotsky disagrees. Why?

J-the-belle (Bak Jihye) (pp. 91-95, 2-4-1~2-4-17)

Existence: Does Piaget agree that the primary function of speech is COMMUNICATION? Does Vygotsky?

Essence: Vygotsky says that there are TWO claims about egocentric speech that can be checked experimentally. One is FUNCTIONAL and the other is GENETIC. Which is which?

Explanation: Vygotsky hides the child’s pencils as he draws. Why? What does Vygotsky conclude?

Ha-ha Smile (Ha Jiweon) (pp. 95-101, 2-4-18~2-4-41)

Existence: This section is mostly about whether children think more “egocentrically” than adults. Do they? Does the child really HAVE an “ego”?

Essence: Vygotsky calls the view that inner speech comes BEFORE egocentric speech a “monstrosity”. What is monstrous about it?

Explanation: Why does Vygotsky think it is really the other way around? What do YOU think?

(What did Piaget say later? Have a look!)

Piaget Remarks.doc

Handy Handyman (Mr. Yun Sangyeong) (pp. 105-110, 2-5-1~2-5-22)

Does Vygotsky think egocentric speech is BEFORE social speech or AFTER it? What about Piaget? Why?

Why does Vygotsky say that egocentric speech is INNER in function but OUTER in form? Which follows which? Does form follow function or does function follow form?

Vygotsky is a very excited over the idea that autistic “dream” thinking can exist without concepts and without words. Can you give TWO examples?

Mr. Hyeon (pp. 115-119, 2-6-1~2-6-22)

Existence: Is there a “necessary” connection between egocentrism and egocentric speech? How does Vygotsky show that there is no FACTUAL basis for this connection.

Essence: What is the THEORETICAL basis for Piaget’s connection between egocentric thinking and egocentric speech?

Explanation: Vygotsky quotes from Lenin’s Philosophical Notebooks. Concept formation is a kind of zig-zag between autism and realism—even in adults. Why?

Ms. Mirror (pp. 122-126, 2-7-1~2-7-16)

Existence: Vygotsky begins with a quotation about “empirical philosophy”. Does Vygotsky think empirical philosophy is a good thing or a bad thing? What about Piaget?

Essence: Who believes in causality? Vygotsky or Piaget?

Explanation: Why does Vygotsky think that denying causality deprives “development” of any real content?

Ms. Hong Sumin (pp. 127-133, 2-7-17~2-7-38)

Existence: Piaget is a biologist. Does he explain development biologically or sociologically? What about Vygotsky?

Essence: Piaget believes in something he calls “functional dependence”. He is speaking MATHEMATICALLY, in the sense of f(x) = y. Today we would call this phenomenology, because it accepts development as a fact without trying to explain it. What does Vygotsky think of this?

Explanation: Why does Claparède think the child’s thinking is woven on two looms? Which one is biological? Which one is sociological? Why does Vygotsky say that the main cause of development for Claparède and for Piaget is CONSTRAINT, CONFINEMENT, COMPULSION?  

[kellogg]

Sorry, Hongkong! I have you down TWICE. Just do the LAST bit, pp. 127-133!

[kellogg]

Ms Yi, I have you down twice too. Just do the last bit, OK?