Customer Reviews

Tools of the Mind: The Vygotskian Approach to Early Childhood Education (2nd Edition)

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...look no further than this book. Even though reading Lev Vygotsky's own words in MIND IN SOCIETY is irreplaceable, most of us teachers have little time or patience to wade through that theoretical complexity.

Thus, Bordrova and Leong give us an excellent way to both understand V's theory and how it applies to each set of early childhood age ranges. Personally, I the infant and toddler sections are the most valuable because embellishing intersubjectivity at the earliest possible point of development will increase the child's ability to navigate and learn within an increasingly complex social setting.

Glorious text.

This is an excellent resource. I think it is a tragedy that Vygotsky's educational and developmental philosophies have taken this long to be distributed in America and taken seriously. We would have a completely different educational system and level of achievement in our public schools were the teachings in this book made the norm and mastery of it was required before anyone got ahold of our young children in schools (or in the home in the role of parents generally or homeschooling parents). There is nothing I would have wanted to know before purchasing the product because I was familiar with Vygotsky theories from graduate studies in clinical psychology. Again, an excellent book. So much more relevant and quite frankly, accurate and helpful than any methods based soley on child-led learning and/or Piaget.

I used this book as part of my professional development for the past school year. As an educator of young special needs children, I found activities based in theory which I've already implemented successfully in my classroom. It's not an easy read and will not give you "10 Easy Ways to Implement Vygotsky Into Your Classroom"; you'll need to dig a little, but it will be worth your while!

As a parent of an 11 month old, I found this book to be very insightful, and helpful for thinking of activities and interactions with my daughter. I appreciated the comparison with other approaches, including Montessori. The last chapters had some practical ideas that I could apply. By understanding the concepts, even though there are no Tools of the Mind schools in my area, I could make a more informed evaluation as to whether a preschool was taking a Vygotskian-like approach. I am attracted to this approach because it is child-centered, and tries to find the best way that an adult can support the child's learning. It focuses on enhancing a child's focus and thinking processes rather than just getting results.

As a student studying pre-school programs I've written a couple papers based on Tools of the Mind and really enjoyed this book. I am kindof unable to give a good review for laypersons however, and I am uncertain how it reads without a good background in child development. Ideally, I would have enjoyed more "how to" materials (what Tools of the Mind really looks like) and some information on how the system has worked in studies. I have read a couple such studies which showed that children exposed to a TotM curriculum at an early age showed better self-regulation and less negative behaviors than controls, and statistically insignificant (but present) improved cognitive abilities and literacy.

I would not recommend this book for a parent, but certainly for someone interested in child development and educational philosophies and systems.

See this new york times article on the system here: nytimes.com/2009/09/27/magazine/27tools-t.html?pagewanted=1

This book is incredible! it gives you a great insight of the Vygotskian approach to early childhood education. Its thoroughly well explained it doesnt have you rereading again and again until you get it but is developed in a nice format that's understandable for future educators interested in the teaching field.

Bought the book for the Pre School Director at our church. I gave her Nurture Shock earlier and she liked it so much that I purchased this as a followup. Text book style book for professionals or those wanting to go a little deeper.

Great for understanding the Vygotskian philosophy.

I liked the comparisons and contrasts to Piaget and other popular early childhood philosophies.