'Scaffolding' methods and the long shadow of Ramist formalism: A call for correction in teacher education

Modern Anglophone pedagogy is characterised by some distinctive approaches to teaching and learning that set it apart from earlier instructional traditions. Among these are certain forms of scaffolding that emphasise students' construction of knowledge. Such methods are consistent with a trend toward visible activity and display in pedagogical practice, in place of dialogue and inner contemplation. In ITE courses, scaffolding strategies are promoted to beginning teachers as novel and effective products of modern cognitive psychology and constructivist theories of learning. Here I offer a historical correction to that view, demonstrating that today's popular scaffolding strategies have a much longer history, and that current practices echo aspects of Ramist formalism, which emerged in the context of a sixteenth-century assault on European scholasticism. Our modern tools, I argue, reflect both the strengths and the pitfalls of that inheritance. It is hoped that this review of the topic might lead to more accurate treatment of the history and theory of scaffolding in ITE courses, and might thereby encourage a more nuanced application of scaffolding strategies by beginning teachers.