ABSTRACT
This book is about learning and how individual learning is shaped by the various contexts in which it takes place, both inside educational institutions and in informal settings such as the home. It takes a creative approach to the subject of learning by bringing together ideas and research from psychology and sociocultural theory. In so doing, it argues that these two fi elds of study are complementary in certain respects and when used together provide a more complete picture of learning than has so far been achieved by either one independently. Psychology offers strong models of the mental processes involved in learning but tends to be less concerned about aspects of the social world that affect learners’ opportunities to learn. Sociocultural theories, on the other hand, have much to say about the cultural contexts in which learning takes place but tend to be less concerned with mental processes involved in different kinds of learning.
