Learning Cooperation in School Lessons

Abstract

The transition to a new age is not a natural event; every transitional period must be understood and shaped in specific cultural media in a special ritual of developmental initiation [8]. In the transition from preschool to school-age childhood, this requirement seems to be met: the simple act of embarking upon the "job of being a pupil" [6], the appearance of rank and form, the teacher, the blackboard, the school bells, homework, grades, the special attention of parents—there is perhaps no other transitional age so rich in attributes. Does this mean that the problem of the cultural shaping of the transition from preschool to school-age childhood is resolved? Alas, even the most unreflected, but purely external props to the role of pupil conceal rather than reveal for the child the meaning of his new social position: a qualitatively new system of interaction with adults, peers, and himself [5]. The superficial, and often simply fallacious, image of a pupil that a child forms has ceased to amuse us with its childlike naivete as soon as we discovered how often first-graders supplant their study lessons with some rote exercise simply because they erroneously interpret the teacher's expectations [11]. (We should note that the problem of supplanting a school lesson occurs not in every school, but only in a school where learning activity is consciously and deliberately cultivated [3].) The study lesson, which requires the search for a new mode of action that is lacking in the child's repertory, presupposes unproductive behavior on the part of the pupil; and a child who has just begun school is riding high on a wave of trust [9] and emulation [13] and is strongly inclined to reproduce any actions, words, and thoughts of the teacher (of course, to the extent that he understands them).