Lev Vygotsky

"In play a child always behaves above his average age, above his daily behavior."

"A child's life is like a piece of paper on which every person leaves a mark."

"The development of personality is only possible through participation in cultural life."

"Internalization is the internal reconstruction of an external operation."

"The word is the most important means of controlling behavior."

"We learn through activity, through doing something about and with the things in the environment."

"Human memory is a fundamentally cultural process."

"The alphabet is humanity's greatest tool for change."

"Emotional experience is not found in the content of the work but in how the work is performed."

"The understanding of self comes through understanding others."

"Signs and symbols are the psychological tools that mediate human activity."

"Development cannot follow learning in the way that learning follows teaching, but development must follow learning."

"Culture is the legacy of emotionally and socially developed people."

"The child's development is viewed not only as an unfolding of innate predispositions but as the formation of new psychological formations."

"Human learning presupposes a specific social nature and a process by which children grow into the intellectual life of those around them."

"The meaning of a word is inseparable from the way people use it to mediate their actions."

"Child development and education cannot be separated; they are intertwined processes."

"To be human means to have goals, to reach for something, and to pursue something."

"Imitation is one of the mechanisms by which we acquire experience; it is the most powerful mechanism in human experience."

"The mind emerges out of social interaction and shared activity."

"What the child can do in cooperation today he can do alone tomorrow."

"The development of abstract thought requires the mastery of cultural tools like writing and mathematics."

"Play creates a zone of proximal development of the child."

"Art is the social technique of emotion."

"Understanding comes not from the word but from the reality behind the word."

"The key to understanding development is understanding the social nature of human behavior."

"Children construct their own understanding through social interaction and cultural tools."

"The development of higher psychological functions is mediated by cultural tools and social interaction."

"A child does not learn to think by thinking, but by acting."

"The essence of learning is that it awakens internal developmental processes."