Brain-Compatible Learning

Right/Left brain concept

Specialized functions but always work together

Inaccurate to state a preference for one side over another

False that we only use 10% of brain

Teachers forced to use intuition

Lacks scientific knowledge

Creates a folklore profession

At whim of boards and politicians

May make decisions unrelated to education

Should wait for clinical trials and testing before accepting strategies

Media can exaggerate or fabricate results

Example 1: Music increases IQ

False: Increased spatial temporal reasoning

Example 2: Sugar improves alertness and memory

Misconstrued: Worked on the elderly

Did not work on college students, K-12 not tested

Teachers who accept untested data at risk of pseudoscience

Focus on studies with student learning in mind and implications for teachers

Example 1: Reading difficulty from auditory processing delay

Study by Tallal, Merzenich, and Sooy

Computer corrected this delay by speeding up processing of sounds that make up the written word

Program called Fast ForWord

Example 2: Attempt at improving ability to read

Study by Shaywitz, Shaywitz, and Pugh

Brain with dyslexia functions differently then typical brain processing phonemes

Combining brain imaging with cognitive-behavioral work

Example 3: Connection between music and math

Study by Shaw

Combined a piano and a computer program with elementary school-age children

Exceptional gains in math skills that require good temporal spatial reasoning

Become literate in the general structure and function of the brain

Learn terminology

Learn how to determine whether a study is valid or not

Questions to determine validity of study

How many subjects in the study?

What were the ages and characteristics?

Was there a control group?

What was the methodology used?

Has the study been replicated?

Are there similar studies with contradictory findings?

Teachers should ask

Will it work in the classroom?

What specific benefit will be realized?

Marry the findings from neuroscience with other fields

Include other fields like behavioral and cognitive psychology and educational research

Intensify our collaboration with the researchers

Teachers and scientists should work together

Begin to incorporate in our classroom and schools what we have learned about the brain

Do not wait for everything to be complete

Experience shapes the brain

Only organ that shapes itself from interactions with environment

Learning experiences change and reorganize brain’s structure/physiology

Learning is making connections between brain cells

Strongest connections from concrete experience

Memory is not stored in a single location in the brain

Experience enters brain and is deconstructed and distributed

The affect (emotions) in the amygdala

Visual images in the occipital lobes

Source memory in the frontal lobes

Location in the parietal lobes

When you recall, you must reconstruct

Memory is not static

Memory decays over time as new experiences take over old ones

Minimized by using rehearsal strategies

Visualizing, writing, symbolizing, singing, semantic mapping, mnemonics

Memory is not unitary

Two types of memory

Declarative

Everyday memory, information you can declare

Elaborative rehearsal

Procedural

Skills and habits you engage in with conscious recall

Requires many repetitions (not best for declarative)

Role rehearsal

Emotion is a primary catalyst in the learning process

Brain hard-wired to remember experience with an emotional component

Brain works differently if threatened

Amygdala starts fight/flight responses

Emotion is dominant over cognition

Environment must be physically and psychologically safe for learning to occur