Human Development

March 17, 2013 Lev Vygotsky was a brilliant psychologist who lived and worked in the first decades of the Soviet Union. His writings and teachings—he began very young (when only 19) and died very young (when only 38)—have been inspiring and teaching psychologists and educators for many decades. His understanding of...

January 29, 2013 A few days ago I wrote about the long lag time for reviews of academic books. Here’s an example very close to home. During my Internet searches this weekend I came across a new review of my book, Vygotsky at Work and Play. (You can click on it...

January 26, 2013 During January I’ve been writing a new introduction to Fred Newman’s and my 1993 book, Lev Vygotsky: Revolutionary Scientist  for the new “Classic Edition” Routledge’s Psychology Press will be releasing later in 2013. Part of my process has been doing a lot of searches, mostly on Google Scholar...

December 16, 2012 I was in Serbia last week. I crammed a lot into four days and it was well worth it. I’ve been going to Serbia once a year for more than a decade and each time I experience the joy of people supporting other people to develop and, at...

November 3, 2012 Far Rockaway, Queens is one of the poorest, most isolated and forgotten neghborhoods of New York City,  About  60,000 people live there on the Rockaway penisula jutting out into the Atlantic Ocean. More than 80% of them are Black and Latino, and the median income is under $28.000/year. Until...

October 17, 2012 “Schools for growth—ones where developmental learning occurs—are much more like theatrical stages than classrooms." I wrote those words, in 1997, as the opening sentence of my book, Schools for Growth: Radical Alternatives to Current Educational Models. Fifteen years later, I believe it even more strongly. As school becomes more...