Vygotsky biography briefly. Lev Vygotsky. Good genius

Discipline: Psychology

Topic: “Russian psychologist L.S. Vygodsky: biography, stages of activity”

1. Brief biography of L.S. Vygotsky – page 3.

2.Cultural-historical psychologist – p.5.

3.Teacher and student – p.7.

4.Vygotsky’s concept – p.9.

5.Looking Back – p.12.

6. List of used literature – page 12.

1. Brief biography

Vygotsky Lev Semenovich (1896-1934) - an outstanding Russian psychologist, creator of the concept of the development of higher mental functions was born on November 5, 1896. Lev Semenovich was born in the Belarusian town of Orsha, but a year later the Vygodskys moved to Gomel and settled there for a long time. His father, Semyon Lvovich Vygodsky graduated from the Commercial Institute in Kharkov and was a bank employee and insurance agent. Mother, Cecilia Moiseevna, devoted almost her entire life to raising her eight children (Lev was the second child). The family was considered a kind of cultural center of the city. For example, there is information that Vygodsky the father founded a public library in the city. Literature was loved and known in the house; it is no coincidence that so many famous philologists came from the Vygodsky family. In addition to Lev Semenovich, these are his sisters Zinaida and Claudia; cousin David Isaakovich, one of the prominent representatives of “Russian formalism” (somewhere in the early 20s he began to publish, and since both of them were engaged in poetics, it was natural to want to “distinguish themselves” so that they would not be confused, and therefore Lev Semenovich Vygodsky replaced the letter “d” in his last name with “t”).

Young Lev Semenovich was interested in literature and philosophy. Benedict Spinoza became his favorite philosopher and remained until the end of his life. Young Vygotsky studied mainly at home. He studied only the last two classes at the private Gomel Ratner gymnasium. He showed extraordinary abilities in all subjects. At the gymnasium he studied German, French, Latin, and at home, in addition, English, ancient Greek and Hebrew.

After graduating from high school, L.S. Vygotsky entered Moscow University, where he studied at the Faculty of Law during the First World War (1914-1917). At the same time, he became interested in literary criticism, and his reviews of books by symbolist writers - rulers of the souls of the then intelligentsia: A. Bely, V. Ivanov, D. Merezhkovsky appeared in several magazines.

During these student years, he wrote his first work - the treatise "The Tragedy of William Shakespeare's Danish Hamlet." After the victory of the revolution, Vygotsky returned to Gomel and took an active part in the construction of a new school. The beginning of his scientific career as a psychologist falls during this period, since in 1917 he began to engage in research work and organized a psychological office at the pedagogical college, where he conducted research. In 1922-1923 he conducted five studies, three of which he later reported at the II All-Russian Congress on Psychoneurology. These were: “Methodology of reflexological research as applied to the study of the psyche,” “How psychology should be taught now,” and “Results of a questionnaire about the mood of students in the graduating classes of Gomel schools in 1923.” During the Gomel period, Vygotsky imagined that the future of psychology lay in the application of reflexological techniques to the causal explanation of the phenomena of consciousness, the advantage of which was their objectivity and natural scientific rigor. The content and style of Vygotsky’s speeches, as well as his personality, literally shocked one of the congress participants, A.R. Luria.

The new director of the Moscow Institute of Psychology, N.K. Kornilov, accepted Luria’s proposal to invite Vygotsky to Moscow. Thus, in 1924, the ten-year Moscow stage of Vygotsky’s work began. This decade can be divided into three periods. First period (1924-1927). Having just arrived in Moscow and having passed the exams for the title of 2nd category researcher, Vygotsky gave three reports in six months. In terms of further development of the new psychological concept conceived in Gomel, he builds a model of behavior, which is based on the concept of speech reaction. The term “reaction” was introduced to distinguish the psychological approach from the physiological one. He introduces into it features that make it possible to correlate the behavior of an organism, regulated by consciousness, with forms of culture - language and art.

After moving to Moscow, he was attracted to a special area of practice - working with children suffering from various mental and physical disabilities. Essentially, his entire first year in Moscow can be called “defectological.” He combines classes at the Institute of Psychology with active work at the People's Commissariat of Education.

Showing brilliant organizational skills, he laid the foundations of the defectology service, and later became the scientific director of the special scientific and practical institute that still exists today. The most important direction of Vygotsky’s research in the first years of the Moscow period was the analysis of the situation in world psychology. He writes a preface to Russian translations of the works of the leaders of psychoanalysis, behaviorism, and gestaltism, trying to determine the significance of each of the directions for the development of a new picture of mental regulation.

Back in 1920, Vygotsky fell ill with tuberculosis, and since then, outbreaks of the disease more than once plunged him into a “borderline situation” between life and death. One of the most severe outbreaks hit him at the end of 1926. Then, once in the hospital, he began one of his main studies, to which he gave the name “The Meaning of the Psychological Crisis.” The epigraph to the treatise was the biblical words: “The stone that the builders despised has become the cornerstone.” He called this stone practice and philosophy.

The second period of Vygotsky's work (1927-1931) in his Moscow decade was instrumental psychology. He introduces the concept of a sign, which acts as a special psychological tool, the use of which, without changing anything in the substance of nature, serves as a powerful means of transforming the psyche from natural (biological) to cultural (historical). Thus, the didactic “stimulus-response” scheme accepted by both subjective and objective psychology was rejected. It was replaced by a triadic one - “stimulus - stimulus - reaction”, where a special stimulus - a sign - acts as an intermediary between an external object (stimulus) and the response of the body (mental reaction). This sign is a kind of instrument, when operated by an individual, from his primary natural mental processes (memory, attention, associated thinking) a special system of functions of the second sociocultural order, inherent only to man, arises. Vygotsky called them higher mental functions. The most significant achievements of Vygotsky and his group during this period were compiled into a lengthy manuscript, “The History of the Development of Higher Mental Functions.” Among the publications that preceded this generalizing manuscript, we note “Instrumental method in pedology” (1928), “The problem of the cultural development of the child” (1928), “Instrumental method in psychology” (1930), “Tool and sign in the development of the child” ( 1931).

In all cases, the center was the problem of the development of the child’s psyche, interpreted from the same angle: the creation of new cultural forms from its biopsychic natural “material”. Vygotsky becomes one of the country's main pedologists. "Pedology of School Age" (1928), "Pedology of Adolescence" (1929), "Pedology of Adolescents" (1930-1931) are published. Vygotsky strives to recreate the general picture of the development of the mental world. He moved from the study of signs as determinants of instrumental acts to the study of the evolution of the meanings of these signs, primarily speech ones, in the mental life of a child. The new research program became the main one in his third and last Moscow period (1931-1934). The results of its development were captured in the monograph “Thinking and Speech.” Having taken up global questions about the relationship between training and upbringing, Vygotsky gave it an innovative interpretation in the concept he introduced of the “zone of proximal development,” according to which only that training is effective that “runs ahead” of development. In the last period of his creative work, the leitmotif of Vygotsky’s quests, connecting into a common knot the various branches of his work (the history of the doctrine of affects, the study of the age-related dynamics of consciousness, the semantic connotation of words), became the problem of the relationship between motivation and cognitive processes.

Vygotsky worked at the limit of human capabilities. From dawn until late, his days were filled with countless lectures, clinical and laboratory work. He made many reports at various meetings and conferences, wrote theses, articles, and introductions to materials collected by his collaborators. When Vygotsky was taken to the hospital, he took his beloved Hamlet with him. In one of the entries about the Shakespearean tragedy, it was noted that Hamlet’s main state is readiness. “I’m ready” - these, according to the nurse, were Vygotsky’s last words. Although his early death did not allow Vygotsky to implement many promising programs, his ideas, which revealed the mechanisms and laws of the cultural development of the individual, the development of his mental functions (attention, speech, thinking, affects), outlined a fundamentally new approach to the fundamental issues of personality formation. Bibliography of works by L.S. Vygotsky has 191 works. Vygotsky's ideas have received wide resonance in all sciences that study humans, including linguistics, psychiatry, ethnography, and sociology. They defined a whole stage in the development of humanitarian knowledge in Russia and to this day retain their heuristic potential.

Everyone knows Freud, Jurg - the majority, Carnegie and Maslow - many. Vygotsky Lev Semenovich is a name more likely for professionals. The rest have only heard the name and, at best, can associate it with defectology. That's all. But this was one of the brightest stars of Russian psychology. It was Vygotsky who created a unique direction that has nothing in common with the interpretation of the formation of the human personality of any of the science gurus. In the 30s, everyone in the world of psychology and psychiatry knew this name - Lev Semenovich Vygotsky. The works of this man created a sensation.

Scientist, psychologist, teacher, philosopher

Time does not stand still. New discoveries are being made, science is moving forward, restoring in some ways and rediscovering in others what was lost. And if you conduct a street survey, it is unlikely that many respondents will be able to answer who Lev Semenovich Vygotsky is. The photos - old, black and white, blurry - will show us a young, handsome man with a thoroughbred, elongated face. However, Vygotsky never became old. Perhaps fortunately. His life flashed like a bright comet on the arch of Russian science, flashed and went out. The name was consigned to oblivion, the theory was declared erroneous and harmful. Meanwhile, even if we discard the originality and subtlety of Vygotsky’s general theory, the fact that his contribution to defectology, especially children’s, is invaluable is beyond doubt. He created a theory of working with children suffering from damage to the sensory organs and mental disorders.

Childhood

November 5, 1986 It was on this day that Lev Semenovich Vygotsky was born in Orsha, Mogilev province. The biography of this man did not contain any bright and surprising events. Wealthy Jews: father is a merchant and banker, mother is a teacher. The family moved to Gomel, and there a private teacher, Solomon Markovich Ashpiz, was involved in teaching the children, a rather remarkable figure in those parts. He did not practice traditional teaching methods, but Socratic dialogues, which were almost never used in educational institutions. Perhaps it was this experience that determined Vygotsky’s own unusual approach to teaching practice. His cousin, David Isaakovich Vygodsky, a translator and famous literary critic, also influenced the formation of the worldview of the future scientist.

Student years

Vygotsky knew several languages: Hebrew, Ancient Greek, Latin, English and Esperanto. He studied at Moscow University, first at the medical faculty, then transferred to law. For some time he studied science in parallel at two faculties - law and history and philosophy, at the University. Shanyavsky. Later, Lev Semenovich Vygotsky decided that he was not interested in jurisprudence and focused entirely on his passion for history and philosophy. In 1916, he wrote a two-hundred-page work devoted to the analysis of Shakespeare's drama Hamlet. He later used this work as his thesis. This work was highly appreciated by experts, since Vygotsky used a new, unexpected method of analysis, which allows one to look at a literary work from a different angle. Lev Semenovich was only 19 years old at that time.

When he was a student, Vygotsky did a lot of literary analysis and published works on the works of Lermontov and Bely.

First steps into science

After the revolution, having graduated from university, Vygotsky first left for Samara, then with his family looked for work in Kyiv and, in the end, returned to his native Gomel, where he lived until 1924. Not a psychotherapist, not a psychologist, but a teacher - this is precisely the profession that Lev Semenovich Vygotsky chose. A brief biography of those years can fit in a few lines. He worked as a teacher in schools, technical schools, and courses. First he headed the theater department of education, and then the art department, wrote and published (critical articles, reviews). For some time, Vygotsky even worked as an editor for a local publication.

In 1923, he was the leader of a group of students at the Moscow Pedological Institute. The experimental work of this group provided material for study and analysis that Lev Semenovich Vygotsky could use in his works. His activity as a serious scientist began precisely in those years. At the All-Russian Congress of Psychoneurologists in Petrograd, Vygotsky made a report based on the data obtained as a result of these experimental studies. The work of the young scientist created a sensation; for the first time words were heard about the emergence of a new direction in psychology.

Start of a career

It was with this speech that the career of the young scientist began. Vygotsky was invited to the Moscow Institute of Experimental Psychology. Outstanding psychologists of that time - Leontyev and Luria - already worked there. Vygotsky not only organically fit into this scientific team, but also became an ideological leader, as well as an initiator of research.

Soon, practically every practicing psychotherapist and defectologist knew who Lev Semenovich Vygotsky was. The main works of this outstanding scientist will be written later, but at that time he was a brilliant practitioner for everyone, personally engaged in pedagogical and therapeutic activities. Parents of sick children made incredible efforts to get an appointment with Vygotsky. And if you managed to become an “experimental sample” in the laboratory of anomalous childhood, it was considered an incredible success.

How did a teacher become a psychologist?

What is so unusual about the theory that Lev Semenovich Vygotsky proposed to the world? Psychology was not his core subject; he was, rather, a linguist, literary critic, cultural critic, and practicing teacher. Why exactly psychology? Where?

The answer lies in the theory itself. Vygotsky was the first to try to move away from reflexology; he was interested in the conscious formation of personality. Figuratively speaking, if personality is a house, then before Vygotsky, psychologists and psychiatrists were exclusively interested in the foundation. Of course it is necessary. Without this there will be no home. The foundation largely determines the building - shape, height, some design features. It can be improved, improved, strengthened and isolated. But this does not change the fact. The foundation is just the foundation. But what will be built on it is the result of the interaction of many factors.

Culture determines the psyche

If we continue the analogy, it was precisely these factors that determine the final appearance of the house that Lev Semenovich Vygotsky was interested in. The main works of the researcher: “Psychology of Art”, “Thinking and Speech”, “Psychology of Child Development”, “Pedagogical Psychology”. The scientist's range of interests clearly shaped his approach to psychological research. A person passionate about art and linguistics, a gifted teacher who loves and understands children - this is Lev Nikolaevich Vygotsky. He clearly saw that it was impossible to separate the psyche and the products it produced. Art and language are products of the activity of human consciousness. But they also determine the emerging consciousness. Children do not grow up in a vacuum, but in the context of a certain culture, in a linguistic environment that has a great influence on the psyche.

Educator and psychologist

Vygotsky understood children well. He was a wonderful teacher and a sensitive, loving father. His daughters said that they had a warm, trusting relationship not so much with their mother, a strict and reserved woman, but with their father. And they noted that the main feature of Vygotsky’s attitude towards children was a feeling of deep, sincere respect. The family lived in a small apartment, and Lev Semenovich did not have a separate place to work. But he never pulled the children back, did not forbid them to play or invite friends to visit. After all, this was a violation of the equality accepted in the family. If guests come to their parents, children have the same right to invite friends. To ask not to make noise for a while, as an equal to an equal, is the maximum that Vygotsky Lev Semenovich allowed himself. Quotes from the memoirs of the scientist’s daughter, Gita Lvovna, will allow you to look “behind the scenes” of the life of an outstanding Russian psychologist.

Vygotsky's daughter about her father

The scientist’s daughter says that there was not much separate time dedicated to her. But her father took her with him to work, to college, and there the girl could freely look at any exhibits and preparations, and her father’s colleagues always explained to her what, why and why she needed it. So, for example, she saw a unique exhibit - Lenin’s brain, stored in a jar.

Her father did not read children's poems to her - he simply did not like them, he considered them tasteless and primitive. But Vygotsky had an excellent memory, and he could recite many classical works by heart. As a result, the girl developed excellently in art and literature, without at all feeling her age inadequacy.

People around about Vygotsky

The daughter also notes that Vygotsky Lev Semenovich was extremely attentive to people. When he listened to the interlocutor, he concentrated on the conversation completely. During the dialogue with the student, it was impossible to immediately make out who was the student and who was the teacher. The same point is noted by other people who knew the scientist: janitors, servants, cleaners. They all said that Vygotsky was an exceptionally sincere and benevolent person. Moreover, this quality was not demonstrative, developed. No, it was just a character trait. Vygotsky was very easily embarrassed; he was extremely critical of himself, but at the same time he treated people with tolerance and understanding.

Working with children

Perhaps it was sincere kindness, the ability to deeply feel other people and treat their shortcomings with condescension that led Vygotsky to defectology. He always maintained that limited abilities in one thing are not a death sentence for a child. The flexible child's psyche actively seeks opportunities for successful socialization. Dumbness, deafness, blindness are just physical limitations. And the child’s consciousness instinctively tries to overcome them. The main responsibility of doctors and teachers is to help the child, push him and support him, and also provide alternative opportunities for communication and obtaining information.

Vygotsky paid special attention to the problems of mentally retarded and deaf-blind children as the most problematic socialized children, and achieved great success in organizing their education.

Psychology and culture

Vygotsky was keenly interested in the psychology of art. He believed that this particular industry is capable of exerting a critical influence on the individual, releasing affective emotions that cannot be realized in ordinary life. The scientist considered art to be the most important tool of socialization. Personal experiences form personal experience, but emotions caused by the influence of a work of art form external, public, social experience.

Vygotsky was also convinced that thinking and speech are interconnected. If developed thinking allows you to speak a rich, complex language, then there is an inverse relationship. The development of speech will lead to a qualitative leap in intelligence.

He introduced a third element into the consciousness-behavior connection familiar to psychologists - culture.

Death of a Scientist

Alas, Lev Semenovich was not a very healthy person. At the age of 19, he contracted tuberculosis. For many years the disease lay dormant. Vygotsky, although he was not healthy, still coped with his illness. But the disease progressed slowly. Perhaps the situation was aggravated by the persecution of the scientist that unfolded in the 1930s. Later, his family sadly joked that Lev Semenovich died on time. This saved him from arrest, interrogation and imprisonment, and his relatives from reprisals.

In May 1934, the scientist’s condition became so severe that he was prescribed bed rest, and within a month the body’s resources were completely exhausted. On June 11, 1934, the outstanding scientist and talented teacher Lev Semenovich Vygotsky died. 1896-1934 - only 38 years of life. Over the years, he has accomplished an incredible amount. His works were not immediately appreciated. But now many practices of working with abnormal children are based precisely on the methods developed by Vygotsky.

Scientist, psychologist, teacher, philosopher

Childhood

Student years

When he was a student, Vygotsky did a lot of literary analysis and published works on the works of Lermontov and Bely.

First steps into science

Start of a career

How did a teacher become a psychologist?

Culture determines the psyche

Educator and psychologist

Vygotsky's daughter about her father

People around about Vygotsky

Working with children

Vygotsky paid special attention to the problems of mentally retarded and deaf-blind children as the most problematic socialized children, and achieved great success in organizing their education.

Psychology and culture

He introduced a third element into the consciousness-behavior connection familiar to psychologists - culture.

Death of a Scientist

Reading mode

Defectology in the scientific biography of L.S. Vygotsky *

In the activities and creativity of Lev Semenovich, problems of defectology occupied a significant place. Throughout the entire Moscow period of his life, for all ten years, Lev Semenovich, in parallel with psychological research, conducted theoretical and experimental work in the field of defectology. The proportion of research carried out on this issue is very large...

Lev Semenovich began his scientific and practical activities in the field of defectology back in 1924, when he was appointed head of the department of abnormal childhood at the People's Commissariat for Education. We have already written about his bright and turning-point report for the development of defectology at the II Congress of SPON. I would like to note that interest in this area of knowledge turned out to be persistent and increased in subsequent years. L.S. Vygotsky not only conducted intensive scientific research, but also did a great deal of practical and organizational work in this area.

In 1926, he organized a laboratory on the psychology of abnormal childhood at the Medical-Pedagogical Station (in Moscow, on Pogodinskaya street, building 8). Over the three years of its existence, the employees of this laboratory have accumulated interesting research material and done important pedagogical work. About a year Lev Semenovich was the director of the entire station, and then became her scientific consultant.

In 1929, on the basis of the above-mentioned laboratory, the Experimental Defectology Institute of the People's Commissariat for Education (EDI) was created. I.I. was appointed director of the institute. Danyushevsky. Since the creation of EDI And until the last days of his life, L.S. Vygotsky was his scientific supervisor and consultant.

The staff of scientists gradually increased, and the base for research expanded. The institute examined an anomalous child, diagnosed and planned further correctional work with deaf and mentally retarded children.

To this day, many defectologists recall how scientific and practical workers flocked from different parts of Moscow to observe how L.S. Vygotsky examined the children and then analyzed each individual case in detail, revealing the structure of the defect and giving practical recommendations to parents and teachers.

In EDI there was a communal school for children with behavioral problems, a auxiliary school (for mentally retarded children), a school for the deaf, and a clinical diagnostic department. In 1933 L.S. Vygotsky, together with the director of the institute I.I. Danyushevsky decided to study children with speech disorders.

Conducted by L.S. Vygotsky’s research at this institute is still fundamental for the productive development of problems in defectology. Created by L.S. Vygotsky’s scientific system in this area of knowledge has not only historiographical significance, but also significantly influences the development of the theory and practice of modern defectology.

It is difficult to name work of recent years in the field of psychology and pedagogy of the anomalous child that would not have been influenced by the ideas of Lev Semenovich and would not directly or indirectly refer to his scientific heritage. His teaching still does not lose its relevance and significance.

In the field of scientific interests L.S. Vygotsky had a wide range of issues related to the study, development, training and education of abnormal children. In our opinion, the most significant problems are those that help to understand the essence and nature of the defect, the possibilities and features of its compensation and the correct organization of the study, training and upbringing of an abnormal child. Let us briefly describe some of them.

Lev Semenovich's understanding of the nature and essence of abnormal development differed from the widespread biologizing approach to the defect. L.S. Vygotsky viewed the defect as a “social dislocation” caused by a change in the child’s relationship with the environment, which leads to a violation of the social aspects of behavior. He comes to the conclusion that in understanding the essence of abnormal development, it is necessary to identify and take into account the primary defect, secondary, tertiary and subsequent layers above it. Distinguishing primary and subsequent symptoms of L.S. Vygotsky considered it extremely important when studying children with various pathologies. He wrote that elementary functions, being the primary defect arising from the very core of the defect and being directly related to it, are less amenable to correction.

The problem of defect compensation is reflected in most of the works of L.S. Vygotsky, dedicated to the problems of defectology.

The theory of compensation being developed was organically included in the problem of the development and decay of higher mental functions he studied. Already in the 20s. L.S. Vygotsky put forward and substantiated the need for social compensation for the defect as a task of paramount importance: “Probably, humanity will conquer sooner or later blindness, deafness, and dementia, but much sooner it will defeat them socially and pedagogically than medically and biologically.”

In subsequent years, Lev Semenovich deepened and specified the theory of compensation. What was put forward by L.S. was extremely important for improving the theory of compensation and the problem of teaching abnormal children. Vygotsky’s position on the creation of workarounds for the development of a pathologically developing child. In his later works L.S. Vygotsky more than once returned to the question of workarounds for development, noting their great importance for the compensation process. “In the process of cultural development,” he writes, “the child replaces some functions with others, creates workarounds, and this opens up completely new opportunities for us in the development of an abnormal child. If this child cannot achieve something in a direct way, then the development of detours becomes the basis of his compensation."

L.S. Vygotsky, in the light of the compensation problem he developed, pointed out that all defectological pedagogical practice consists of creating workarounds for the development of an anomalous child. This, in the words of L.S. Vygotsky, “alpha and omega” of special pedagogy.

So, in the works of the 20s. L.S. Vygotsky only in the most general form put forward the idea of replacing biological compensation with social compensation. In his subsequent works, this idea takes on a concrete form: the way to compensate for the defect is to form workarounds for the development of an abnormal child.

Lev Semenovich argued that a normal and abnormal child develop according to the same laws. But along with general patterns, he also noted the uniqueness of the development of an anomalous child. And as the main feature of the abnormal psyche, he singled out the divergence of biological and cultural processes of development.

It is known that in each of the categories of abnormal children, for various reasons and to varying degrees, the accumulation of life experience is delayed, therefore the role of education in their development takes on special significance. A mentally retarded, deaf and blind child needs early, properly organized training and education to a greater extent than a normally developing child who is able to independently draw knowledge from the world around him.

Characterizing defectiveness as a “social dislocation,” Lev Semenovich does not at all deny that organic defects (deafness, blindness, dementia) are biological facts. But since the educator has to deal in practice not so much with the biological facts themselves, but with their social consequences, with the conflicts that arise when an abnormal child “enters life,” L.S. Vygotsky had sufficient grounds to assert that the upbringing of a child with a defect is fundamentally social in nature. Incorrect or late upbringing of an abnormal child leads to the aggravation of deviations in the development of his personality and the appearance of behavioral disorders.

To tear an anomalous child out of a state of isolation, to open before him wide opportunities for a truly human life, to introduce him to socially useful work, to educate him as an active, conscious member of society - these are the tasks that, in the opinion of L.S. Vygotsky, the special school should first of all decide.

Having refuted the false opinion about the reduced “social impulses” of an anomalous child, Lev Semenovich raises the question of the need to raise him not as a disabled dependent or a socially neutral being, but as an active, conscious person.

In the process of pedagogical work with children with sensory or intellectual disabilities, L.S. Vygotsky considers it necessary to focus not on the “spools of illness” of the child, but on the “pounds of health” he has.

At that time, the essence of the correctional work of special schools, which boiled down to training the processes of memory, attention, observation, and sensory organs, was a system of formal isolated exercises. L.S. Vygotsky was one of the first to draw attention to the painful nature of these trainings. He did not consider it correct to isolate a system of such exercises into separate classes, to turn them into an end in itself, but advocated for such a principle of correctional and educational work, in which the correction of deficiencies in the cognitive activity of abnormal children would be part of the general educational work, would be dissolved in the entire learning process and education was carried out during play, learning and work activities.

Developing in child psychology the problem of the relationship between learning and development, L.S. Vygotsky came to the conclusion that learning should precede, run ahead and pull up, lead the development of the child.

This understanding of the relationship between these processes led him to the need to take into account both the current (“current”) level of development of the child and his potential (“zone of proximal development”). Under the “zone of proximal development” L.S. Vygotsky understood the functions “those in the process of maturation, functions that will mature tomorrow, which are now still in their infancy, functions that can be called not the fruits of development, but the buds of development, the flowers of development, i.e. something that is just ripening."

Thus, in the process of developing the concept of “zone of proximal development,” Lev Semenovich put forward an important thesis that when determining the mental development of a child, one cannot focus only on what he has achieved, i.e. into passed and completed stages, but it is necessary to take into account “the dynamic state of its development”, “those processes that are now in a state of formation.”

According to Vygotsky, the “zone of proximal development” is determined as a child solves problems that are difficult for his age with help from an adult. Thus, the assessment of a child’s mental development should be based on two indicators: receptivity to the assistance provided and the ability to solve similar problems independently in the future.

In his daily work, encountering not only normally developing children, but also conducting examinations of children with developmental disabilities, Lev Semenovich became convinced that ideas about development zones are very productive when applied to all categories of abnormal children.

The leading method of examining children by pedologists was the use of psychometric tests. In a number of cases, although interesting in themselves, they nevertheless did not provide an idea of the structure of the defect or the real capabilities of the child. Pedologists believed that abilities could and should be measured quantitatively with the aim of subsequently distributing children to different schools depending on the results of this measurement. Formal assessment of children's abilities through test trials led to errors that resulted in normal children being sent to feeder schools.

In his works L.S. Vygotsky criticized the methodological inconsistency of the quantitative approach to the study of the psyche using test tests. According to the scientist’s figurative expression, during such surveys “kilometers were added up to kilograms.”

After one of Vygotsky’s reports (December 23, 1933) he was asked to give his opinion on the tests. Vygotsky responded to this like this: “At our congresses, the smartest scientists argued about which method was better: laboratory or experimental. It's like arguing which is better: a knife or a hammer. A method is always a means, a method is always a way. Can we say that the best route is from Moscow to Leningrad? If you want to go to Leningrad, then, of course, this is so, but if you want to go to Pskov, then this is a bad way. It cannot be said that tests are always a bad or a good tool, but one general rule can be said that tests themselves are not an objective indicator of mental development. Tests always reveal signs, and signs do not directly indicate the development process, but always need to be supplemented by other signs.”

Answering the question of whether tests can serve as a criterion for current development, L.S. Vygotsky said: “I think the question is which tests and how to use them. This question can be answered in the same way as if I were asked whether a knife could be a good tool for a surgical operation. It depends which one? A knife from Narpit’s canteen, of course, will be a bad tool, but a surgical knife will be good.”

“The study of a difficult child,” wrote L.S. Vygotsky, “more than any other type of child, should be based on long-term observation of him in the process of upbringing, on pedagogical experiment, on the study of the products of creativity, play and all aspects of the child’s behavior.”

“Tests for the study of will, emotional side, fantasy, character, etc. can be used as an auxiliary and indicative tool.”

From the above statements by L.S. Vygotsky is clear: he believed that tests themselves cannot be an objective indicator of mental development. However, he did not deny the admissibility of their limited use along with other methods of studying the child. In fact, Vygotsky’s view of tests is similar to that held by psychologists and defectologists at the present time.

L.S. pays a lot of attention to his works. Vygotsky focused on the problem of studying abnormal children and their correct selection into special institutions. Modern principles of selection (comprehensive, holistic, dynamic, systematic and integrated study) of children are rooted in the concept of L.S. Vygotsky.

Ideas L.S. Vygotsky about the characteristics of a child’s mental development, the zones of actual and proximal development, the leading role of training and education, the need for a dynamic and systematic approach to the implementation of corrective influence taking into account the integrity of personality development, and a number of others were reflected and developed in theoretical and experimental research by domestic scientists, and also in the practice of different types of schools for abnormal children.

In the early 30s. L.S. Vygotsky worked fruitfully in the field of pathopsychology. One of the leading provisions of this science, which contributes to a correct understanding of the abnormal development of mental activity, according to well-known experts, is the concept of the unity of intellect and affect. L.S. Vygotsky calls it the cornerstone in the development of a child with intact intelligence and a mentally retarded child. The significance of this idea goes far beyond the problems in connection with which it was expressed. Lev Semenovich believed that “the unity of intellect and affect ensures the process of regulation and mediation of our behavior (in Vygotsky’s terminology, “changes our actions”).”

L.S. Vygotsky took a new approach to the experimental study of the basic processes of thinking and to the study of how higher mental functions are formed and how they disintegrate under pathological conditions of the brain. Thanks to the work carried out by Vygotsky and his colleagues, the processes of decay received their new scientific explanation...

The problems of speech pathology that interested Lev Semenovich began to be studied under his leadership at the EDI speech clinic school. In particular, from 1933–1934. One of Lev Semenovich’s students, Roza Evgenievna Levina, dealt with the study of alalik children.

Lev Semenovich attempted a thorough psychological analysis of the changes in speech and thinking that occur with aphasia. (These ideas were subsequently developed and worked out in detail by A.R. Luria).

Theoretical and methodological concept developed by L.S. Vygotsky, ensured the transition of defectology from empirical, descriptive positions to truly scientific foundations, contributing to the formation of defectology as a science.

Such famous defectologists as E.S. Bain, T.A. Vlasova, R.E. Levina, N.G. Morozova, Zh.I. Schiff, who was lucky enough to work with Lev Semenovich, evaluate his contribution to the development of theory and practice: “His works served as a scientific basis for the construction of special schools and a theoretical justification for the principles and methods of studying the diagnosis of difficult (abnormal) children. Vygotsky left a legacy of enduring scientific significance, included in the treasury of Soviet and world psychology, defectology, psychoneurology and other related sciences.”

Fragments of the book by G.L. Vygodskaya and T.M. Lifanova “Lev Semenovich Vygotsky. Life. Activity. Touches to the portrait." - M.: Smysl, 1996. - P. 114–126 (abbreviated).*