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This article discusses the practice of documentation in the early years education services of Pistoia, Italy. The findings, arising from a research study visit in May 2014, provide insights into the values and principles implicit in early childhood practice in the Pistoian "nidi d'infanzia" [nurseries] (for children from 3 months to 3 years of age) and "scuole d'infanzia" [kindergartens] (for children from 3 to 6 years of age). Documentation plays an important role in Pistoia: it provides a window (for multiple audiences) into children's learning journeys, and also a mirror that reflects children's and teachers' experiences and constitutes an important element in a reflective pedagogy. The analysis of group interviews with both teachers and parents during the research visit identified four main themes. Firstly, documentation in Pistoia provides a graphic representation of the guiding threads that run through long-term projects and also identifies key moments in children's learning. Secondly, documentation makes visible an educational approach in which emotion and affect are seen as central to young children's learning. Thirdly, the regular inclusion of families in documentation illustrates the collaborative partnerships between schools and homes that are the bedrock of early education in Pistoia. Fourthly, documentation expresses the highly developed aesthetic of Pistoian early years practice; the beautiful and cared-for environments in these preschools constitute an invitation to children to explore and create.

This article describes the responses of academic researchers and teachers to Vygotsky's paper on play, published in Russian in 1966 and, in a new translation, in the present issue of this journal. That paper has had a major influence on research in play both in Russia and in the West. Its cultural-historical view of the development of play, and its key theoretical and methodological ideas, have continued to reverberate and to generate and influence a huge body of work. The article identifies the key trends in these responses to Vygotsky's paper, reviewing the work by major scholars in this field, such as Elkonin, Leonte'ev, and Zaporozhets. The article also describes how Vygotsky's ideas in this paper became the foundation of the national curriculum for early childhood in the Soviet Union in the 1960s and 1970s. The article critiques some of the research which, using the 1978 translation of Vygotsky's paper, presented his approach as that of a cognitivist or as a social constructivist and argues that these reflect a tradition in the West of simplifying Vygotsky's cultural-historical theory and methodology. It also reviews some contemporary studies by researchers working within the cultural-historical approach to play. These are making original contributions to the cultural-historical conception of play or bringing new insights into play as a leading activity in children's development.

This article is a critique of current approaches to the teaching and assessment of writing in schools in the UK. Successive government initiatives, most particularly the latest (impoverished) version of the English curriculum, are seen as having led to a situation in which pupils are taught in a way that does not improve the quality of their writing, and often results in writing which is inflated and unconvincing. The national curriculum and assessment scheme for writing prioritises form over content; it makes grammatical complexity and ostentatious vocabulary the success criteria for assessment, to the detriment of children's writing and learning, and of teachers' practice.

This article introduces the new translation by Stanley Mitchell of a very well-known Vygotskyan text, which has become the locus classicus for Vygotsky's concept of the "zone of proximal development" (ZPD). It outlines the history of Vygotsky's text and compares Mitchell's new translation with the version found in Chapter 6 of "Mind in Society" (a collection of Vygotsky's articles edited by Cole, John-Steiner, Scribner, and Souberman in 1978). It indicates the main points of difference between the two translations and considers their significance for our reading of this key text. Chief among these points of difference is the emphasis given to pedagogy in Mitchell's translation; it is clear from this version that the role of pedagogy in the mental development of children is a major focus for Vygotsky throughout the paper. Mitchell's translation is nearly 2000 words longer than the 1978 translation and includes several passages which were cut from the original text; in particular, a section relating to "pedology," an interdisciplinary movement sometimes called "child science." This article discusses some of these cuts and finally considers Vygotsky's vision of the potential of the ZPD concept for the study of teaching and learning, and its value in the sciences of pedagogy and pedology.

The last chapter of Vygotsky's last book, "Thinking and Speech," is a compressed argument about the construction of consciousness through the internalisation of language. This article comments on Vygotsky's analysis of the "voyage into the interior" undertaken by oral speech as it is internalised and abbreviated into "inner speech," and then further concentrated as non-verbal thought. The article focuses on the part that literature and especially poetry play in Vygotsky's argument in this chapter, and suggests that in exploring the condensed semantics of inner speech Vygotsky is implicitly describing how poets turn private thoughts into "symbols for others." It concludes with a commentary on Vygotsky's use of Mandelshtam's poem "The Swallow," from which he draws his epigraph.

Differs with those who respond to boys lagging behind girls in literacy by making more space in literacy curricula for reading and writing practices favored by boys. Looks at patterns of gender differentiation. Argues that, since reading gives access to other, wider ways of being, educators need curricula and assessment procedures that enable all children to achieve optimally. (SR)

Discusses several observation-based methods of student assessment that are recommended in the "Primary Language Record," a book developed by schools in the Inner London Educational Authority. (MM)

Discusses how role-taking can provide a viewpoint for a writer and a real audience for children's writing. Argues that role-taking offers a more accessible route to certain kinds of language uses, particularly impersonal genres and written standard forms that are educationally valued, than direct instruction. (SRT)

The article focuses on the changes introduced into the education system since the 1980s in the U.S. It highlights the underlying ideas that drove the changes and various educational reforms introduced. Steps in neoliberal program for education are also described that transformed the post-war schools system.