Sociocultural Theory and Teacher Cognition

Abstract

This chapter reviews the theoretical underpinnings of research in teacher cognition and education and highlights the contribution of sociocultural perspective in understanding what teachers know, believe and think in classroom practice. Specifically, this chapter offers an up-to-date overview of research in language teacher cognition by comparing and contrasting different theoretical perspective of teacher cognition, such as cognitive perspective, interactional perspective and discursive psychological perspective. Key constructs of sociocultural theory, such as mediation, zone of proximal development and internalisation, are briefly introduced and discussed in order to justify the appropriateness of sociocultural theoretical perspective towards teacher cognition research.