Co-constructing conceptual domains through family conversations and activities

Constructivist theories of cognitive development have considered children as active individuals, learning about the world through observations and interactions with others; development is seen as happening in the mind of the child. Sociocultural theories, in contrast, consider development as embedded in social context, where changing patterns of participation in activities signal change. In this chapter we take seriously the notion of integrating these two approaches, with the aim of moving toward a theory of cognitive development that involves both the active mind of the child and the social embeddedness of developmental change. We discuss findings from three types of studies of development in context-learning object names, understanding symbols, and learning causal explanations for events. We conclude with some potential mechanisms for change in a new integrated theory and propose some questions for future study. (c) 2008, Elsevier Inc.