Scaffolding

A strategy of guided learning where the teacher continually adjusts the level of tutoring to match the pupil’s level of performance. Scaffolding derives from ideas about learning and culture put forward by Lev Vygotsky and elaborated by Jerome Bruner. They key idea is that, to learn from new experiences, young children/learners use the support of adults/teachers, who mediate to them the culture in which they live. Scaffolding is the support provided when setting pupils new, challenging work, with the intention that, in due course, they will establish independent command of the learning without the aid of the scaffolding.