ABSTRACT
Today, when education is intensifying its research into the role of the environment in learning and education processes, the question of life experience and the emotional experience of space brings together specialists from many different disciplines involved with educational matters – teaching, psychology, social psychology, architecture. This chapter focuses on contemporary pedagogy, with its necessary links and references to older currents of educational thought and practice. Contemporary pedagogy preserves principles of the new education, and at the same time incorporates concepts drawn from other fields, such as communication theory, systems theory, the theories of involvement and emotional experience. In Vygotsky's theory the role of communication in the constitution of the individual is designated by the term 'zone of proximal development' (ZPD) and the terms 'external/internal speech' and 'psychological tool'. The ZPD is defined as activity-in-collaboration-with-others and differs from activity with others and individualised solitary activity.
