Engaging Brains: How to Enhance Learning by Teaching Kids About Neuroplasticity Editor's note: This post is co-authored by Marcus Conyers who, with Donna Wilson, is co-developer of the M.S. and Ed.S. Brain-Based Teaching degree programs at Nova Southeastern University. They have written several books, including Five Big Ideas for Effective Teaching: Connecting Mind, Brain, and Education Research to Classroom Practice. Enhancing Student Commitment Explicitly teaching students about neuroplasticity can have a transformative impact in the classroom. Lessons on discoveries that learning changes the structure and function of the brain can engage students, especially when combined with explicit instruction on the use of cognitive and metacognitive strategies that guide them to learn how to learn (Wilson & Conyers, 2013). The force behind this cycle is students' belief that they can get smarter through study and practice, which enhances their commitment to persist in the hard work that learning sometimes requires. Strategies for Engagement License to Drive Going BIG Notes
The Problem with the Data-Information-Knowledge-Wisdom Hierarchy - David Weinberger by David Weinberger | 9:00 AM February 2, 2010 The data-information-knowledge-wisdom hierarchy seemed like a really great idea when it was first proposed. But its rapid acceptance was in fact a sign of how worried we were about the real value of the information systems we had built at such great expense. What looks like a logical progression is actually a desperate cry for help. The DIKW hierarchy (as it came to be known) was brought to prominence by Russell Ackoff in his address accepting the presidency of the International Society for General Systems Research in 1989. But the actual first recorded instance of it was in 1934: Where is the Life we have lost in living? Those lines come from the poem “The Rock” by T.S. The DIKW sequence made immediate sense because it extends what every Computer Science 101 class learns: information is a refinement of mere data. But, the info-to-knowledge move is far more problematic than the data-to-info one. So, what is “knowledge” in the DIKW pyramid?
The Science of Fear What are you afraid of? Snakes? Turbulence? Spiders? All of us get scared, and all of us have different thresholds for what makes us afraid. Whatever it is that scares you, what we can agree on is that fear causes our bodies to react. Well, if you are experiencing these symptoms, you have your amygdala to thank. Consider the amygdala as your own onboard 911 operator. We can learn quite a lot from animals about how we respond when we are frightened. Parts of Our Body's Fear System Amygdala: scans for threats and signals body to respond Brain Stem: triggers the freeze response Hippocampus: turns on the fight-or-flight response Hypothalamus: signals the adrenal glands to pump hormones Pre-Frontal Cortex: interprets the event and compares it to past experiences Thalamus: receives input from the senses and "decides" to send information to either the sensory cortex (conscious fear) or the amygdala (defense mechanism) Your Amygdala at Work: A STEM Activity Fear and Learning Don't Mix Oil and water.
How stress affects your brain - Madhumita Murgia To learn about some of the most seminal experiments that show how stress changes your brain, read this interesting story in Psychology Today. This interactive explains how mom rats impact the adult personalities of their pups, based on how much they lick them. You get to be a rat mom yourself, to see how you've changed your pup's genes! Watch this TED Talk about how we are thinking about stress all wrong: believing stress is bad for you may actually be worse than the stress itself! This cool Radiolab podcast explores the science of stress, including coping strategies seen all around the animal kingdom.
My Favorite WSQ Please see the "revisited" version of this post, published in July of 2016, by clicking here.*Please read my WSQing page for more details, descriptions, and workflow* A "WSQ" (pronounced wisk) in my class is what we call "homework" in my flipped classroom. It stands for this: [read an update on the WSQ after using it for several weeks in my classroom here] W - Watch Students must watch the video for the assigned lesson and take notes in their SSS packets (this stands for "Student Success Sheets" and I have them for each unit/chapter) I have created for them. Some of my very high achieving students have asked "Do I have to watch the video" and under certain circumstances, I say "no", but you still have to complete the notes on the SSS packet. A few issues I am already noticing with this is that there are still important things that I say about the concepts that students miss if they don't watch the video. S - Summary Students have to write a summary of what they watched in the video.
Métacognition et réussite des élèves Suffit-il de mettre les élèves en activités en classe pour qu’ils s’approprient les savoirs, savoirs faire sur lesquels est construite la séance qui leur est proposée ? L’analyse ergonomique des situations d’apprentissage scolaire amène à être très réservé dans la réponse. En effet, quels que soient les modalités pédagogiques, les supports didactiques prévus, un constat s’impose : les enseignants n’arrivent pas toujours à atteindre les objectifs visés. Les objectifs de cette réflexion sont : de participer à l’évolution des représentations des enseignants, des parents et des responsables de l’institution sur les compétences que l’élève doit construire pour faire avec efficacité son parcours scolaire,de repenser donc les activités en classe,avec l’ambition que tous les élèves arrivent à apprendre. La définition du concept d’activité 1 Dans la communauté éducative Activités scolaires. Qu’est-ce que la métacognition ? 1 La métamémoire “ Savoir ce que je sais de ce que je ne sais pas ”.
DIKW Pyramid The DIKW Pyramid, also known variously as the "DIKW Hierarchy", "Wisdom Hierarchy", the "Knowledge Hierarchy", the "Information Hierarchy", and the "Knowledge Pyramid",[1] refers loosely to a class of models[2] for representing purported structural and/or functional relationships between data, information, knowledge, and wisdom. "Typically information is defined in terms of data, knowledge in terms of information, and wisdom in terms of knowledge".[1] History[edit] "The presentation of the relationships among data, information, knowledge, and sometimes wisdom in a hierarchical arrangement has been part of the language of information science for many years. Data, Information, Knowledge, Wisdom[edit] In the same year as Ackoff presented his address, information scientist Anthony Debons and colleagues introduced an extended hierarchy, with "events", "symbols", and "rules and formulations" tiers ahead of data.[7][16] Data, Information, Knowledge[edit] Description[edit] Data[edit] Structural vs.
Addressing Our Needs: Maslow Comes to Life for Educators and Students In the mid-1950s, humanistic psychologist Abraham Maslow created a theory of basic, psychological and self-fulfillment needs that motivate individuals to move consciously or subconsciously through levels or tiers based on our inner and outer satisfaction of those met or unmet needs. As a parent and educator, I find this theory eternally relevant for students and adults, especially in our classrooms. After studying it over the past couple of years, my graduate and undergraduate students have decided that every classroom should display a wall-sized diagram of the pyramid, as students and teachers alike place pins and post-its on the varying tiers based on their own feelings, behaviors and needs. What do actual brain-compatible strategies look like on this pyramid? Tier One Meeting Physiological Needs in the Classroom These elements contribute to brain-compatible learning by creating a physical environment that is inviting, warm and friendly! Questions to Ask Myself What do I need? Tier Two
The Nightmare Is Over: Researchers Discover the Switch for REM Sleep University of California scientists have found a powerful on-off "switch" that sends dozing mice into a full-fledged, eye-twitching, cheese-chasing mousy dreamworld. Sleep is one of those funny things about being a human being -- you just have to do it. Have you ever wondered why? Check out our HowStuffWorks article to learn more about the importance of sleep. That "switch" seems to be a particular group of neurons in the brain that, when stimulated in sleeping mice, immediately pushes the rodents into REM sleep. "It was already known for many decades, the neurons necessary for REM sleep. There are other regions in the brain that relate to REM sleep. But what Weber, lead author Yang Dan and their team showed was that the region and the group of neurons they were exploring were not just "into" that part of REM. When they flipped their "switch" — done by an optical device that triggered certain neurons — 94 percent of the test mice fell deeply into REM sleep almost immediately.
Five academic papers all teachers need to read This blog post is a quick summary of five of the academic papers that have most influenced me in my development as a teacher, and I would heartily recommend all five to other teachers. I do not always agree with every single thing written in these papers (although I generally do agree with the overall thrust of their argument), but I have found these papers useful springboards to further thought, and, for those of you who read my blog regularly, you will no doubt see how my posts resonate with the ideas in these five papers. All of these papers are behind pay-walls, but most (if not all) can be found for free online with a little searching. (1) P. Hirst, ‘What is teaching?’ I like this paper for its clarity, setting out on a conceptual analysis of the term ‘teaching’. (2) S. (3) P.A. (4) E. (5) H. Like this: (1) P.
Des sciences cognitives à la classe : Entretien avec Olivier Houdé Les sciences cognitives frappent à la porte de la classe. Mais les concepts et outils développés dans les laboratoires ont-ils une pertinence dans les classes ? Les enseignants s’interrogent sur les apports de la psychologie expérimentale et des neurosciences et sur la possible articulation entre les résultats scientifiques et les pratiques de classe. Suite à la semaine du cerveau, pour poursuivre cette exploration, nous avons interrogé Olivier Houdé, instituteur de formation initiale, professeur de psychologie à l’Université Paris Descartes, directeur du Laboratoire de Psychologie du Développement et de l’Éducation de l’enfant (LaPsyDÉ) et membre senior de l’Institut Universitaire de France. "L'enseignement repose toujours sur l'idée qu'il faut accumuler et activer des fonctions cognitives, et jamais sur l'idée de travailler sur les capacités d'inhibition." (O. Olivier Houdé : « La pédagogie, c’est la science des apprentissages. La focale semble bien lointaine. Pour aller plus loin :