2.1 Scaffolding Instruction
In the past centuries, the scaffolding has developed for a long time. Recently, the meaningof scaffolding in education field has basically confirmed. And the procedures of scaffoldinginstruction as a teaching method were cleared.There are various meanings based on the context for word “scaffolding”. A commondefinition of scaffolding, as found in the OXFORD ADVANCED LEARNER’S English-ChineseDictionary is that “mental poles and wooden boards that are joined together to make a structurefor workers to stand on when they are working high up on the outside wall of a building”(2004,p1546). In everyday usage, scaffolding describes a temporary structure of brace that is employedby construction builders to help with constructing or with repairing buildings. The scaffoldingwill be removed by builders when the job was finished.In English teaching, Wood, Bruner &Ross have said that scaffolding can make the learnersovercome the difficulties in English learning, after that, the tasks or maybe the intend goals wereachieved in the end, so it was regarded as a teaching method to guide the students or learners(1976). Many scholars redefined the scaffolding in subsequent decades, and the meaning islargely identical but with slight differences.In daily teaching, language teachers may scaffold students in many ways: the teachers mayinvolve students in active learning through gestures and demonstrations, or support the lesson byusing visual and concrete material appropriate to the work at hand. Scaffolding also involveshelping students learn to reflect on their understanding of topics and processes: namely,supporting student engagement in metacognitive activity (Gerstein & Jimenez, 1998).
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2.2 The Theoretical Basis of Scaffolding Instruction
Scaffolding instruction was developed in the few decades, although the time was not long,its theoretical basis---- Zone of Proximal Development and Constructivism had deep historianorigins. Scaffolding Instruction was pullulated on the basis of Zone of Proximal Developmentand Constructivism, and constantly enriches the theoretical meaning of ZPD and Constructivism.ZPD is the abbreviation of Zone of Proximal Development. The Zone of ProximalDevelopment was put forward by the former Soviet Psychologist Vygotsky, it was designed toindicate that education had a dominant and simulative effect on children’s development. Actually,in the early 1930s, he introduced the concept of “Zone of Proximal Development” in the researchof psychology, because he found that there existed two different lays in students’ developmentlevel: one was the present development level, it referred to the children have had the ability tosolve the problems independently; the other was the potential development level, it referred tothe ability which was not formed at present, but they can use this ability to resolve the questionwith the help of the adults, some proficiency teachers or some capable classmates.
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Chapter 3 Methodology ....29
3.1 Research Questions .......29
3.2 Subjects ....29
3.3 Instruments ..
