1. Lev Vygotsky's: Sociocultural Theory

2. Lev S. Vygotsky
The Soviet Russian Seminal psychologist was born in Orsha on November 5, In what it’s now called Belarus.
Also know as the “Mozart of psychology”
Vygotsky's lifelong goal was to reformulate psychological theories in accordance with Marxist thinking, and to address social and political issues confronting the new nation as it went from feudalism to socialism.

3. Lev Vygotsky’s Thoughts
He insisted on treating children as individuals, that they could under some circumstances be integrated into mainstream classes.
Vygotsky’s works laid the groundwork for what is known today as special education.
His theories of child development and his emphasis on social environment in the learning process built bridges between psychology and anthropology.
His fundamental insight was that children need social interaction with adults and older children to advance their psychological development.

4. Vygotsky as a Child
Born in to a Jewish family, and like other Jews in Russia in the pre- Revolutionary suffered from discrimination.
Both his father and mother lovers of the arts reassure their children to read books and taking them to plays and when adults discussions turned to literature they let their children join rather than banishing them from the room or trying to structure their responses; soon the children were enthusiastic participants as well.
When he was 17 years old he won the school’s academic gold medal.
According to a biography appearing on the website The Mozart of Psychology, they dubbed him "the Little Professor."

5. The Mozart of Psychology
Nevertheless, as a Jew, he found that his options for university education were limited. He was admitted to the University of Moscow in 1913 and originally studied medicine, then switched to law; but as a Jew he was barred from taking philosophy courses that seemed to lead toward a teaching career.
After graduating from the University of Moscow, Vygotsky returned to Gomel to teach literature and philosophy. Later Vygotsky set up a research laboratory at the Teacher's College of Gomel.
He never had any formal training in psychology, which was in its youth as an academic discipline.

6. Impressive Conference Speech
At the Second All-Union Congress on Psychoneurology held in St. Petersburg in 1924, he discussed and compared methods of reflexological and psychological investigation.
As a result, Vygotsky was offered a position at the Moscow Institute of Experimental Psychology where he completed no fewer than 270 scientific studies over the next nine years, all the while teaching at the institute, taking courses at a medical school that he felt were necessary to deepen his understanding, and going abroad to conferences where he encountered the works of Western researchers.

7. Vygotsky’s Last Works
In 1925 Vygotsky started special education services in Russia, and restructured the Psychological Institute of Moscow.
An area of a high priority for Vygotsky was the psychology of education and remediation, and his lifelong interest in children with learning disabilities led him to form the Laboratory of Psychology for Abnormal Childhood in Moscow.
When caring for his younger brother he contracted tuberculosis and died in 1934.
Fifty years later after his death over 180 papers wrote by him were published.

8. Some of his Books Psychology of Art (1925)
Historical Meaning of the Crisis in Psychology (1927)
The Problem of the Cultural Development of the Child (1929)
Play and Its Role in the Mental Development of the Child (1933)
Thought and Language (1934, also known as Thinking and Speaking)
Among many more papers and books written by him.

9. Key Ideas of Vygotsky
Vygotsky's scientific investigations can be divided into three essential areas that are interrelated and interconnected:
Human Development: Development of an individual human being. Vygotsky used the genetic/dialectical/developmental method in explaining human growth, developing theories on "the zone of proximal development" and "scaffolding."
Historical cultural theory: the interactions of the development of an individual as well as of the people. He also claims that human social and psychological processes are fundamentally shaped by cultural tools, or means of mediation.

10. Key Ideas of Vygotsky (Cont.)
Development of thought and language: In ontogenesis and phylogenesis, specifically, at the level of individual development and at the level of human development.
Vygotsky's theoretical perspective can be understood in three general themes that are in his writing:
Use of a genetic, or developmental, method
Higher mental functioning in the individual emerges out of social processes
Human social and psychological processes are fundamentally shaped by cultural mediation