Janet Fulks, Bakersfield College

Why didn’t my students learn that important concept we went over and over and over and over in class?

Perpetuating the learning cycle:1. Understanding How the Brain Works2. Active Learning – The Learning Environment –

a. Using all of the brainb. Many inputsc. Many chemicalsd. Many outputs

3. Deep learning – Scaffolding – Neural Netsa. Patterning and organization content (chunking

info)b. Concrete words and abstract words versus

nonsense wordsc. Visualizing to make concrete patterns

4. Ownership/metacognition

The Art of Changing the Brain by Zull

How People Learn by the National Research Council

Scientific Teaching by Jo Handelsman et al.

HHMI & PBS online resources

Harvard https://www.testmybrain.org/index.html?page=home

Learning and memory require physical changes in the neurons of the brain

Primitive Brain controlling survival functions-

Breathing Consciousness Heart Rate and Blood

Pressure Relaying informationDigestionAlertnessThink vegetable

Center for movement control

Voluntary muscle movements

Fine motor skills Posture, balance,

and coordinationThink repetitive

movements – dancing, bicycling

The Surface of the Brain –

Touch Vision Hearing Judgment Reasoning Problem solving Emotions LearningThink HUMAN

Frontal lobes = personality, speech, and motor development

Temporal lobes = memory, language and speech

Parietal lobes = sensation

Occipital lobes =primary vision centers

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/imagepages/9549.htm

Each lobe of the brain has a different set of functions, so damage to a particular lobe may determine the type of problems that could be expected.

Learning = modification, growth, and pruning neurons, Learning =connections (synapses) & neural networks

Four stages of Kolb’s Learning Cycle.

1) Concrete experience,2) Reflective observation and Connections,3) Abstract hypothesis,4) Active testing

http://sharpbrains.wordpress.com/2006/10/12/an-ape-can-do-this-can-we-not/

PET Scan fMRIOther new

technologies

Discrete physical areas -http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aso/tryit/brain/probe.html

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/brain/

Right side controls the left side of the body, creativity and artistic abilities

Think – non-verbal Left cerebral

hemisphere controls the right side of the body, logic and rational thinking.

Think - Language

The Girl from Volga. Zull, p 143Paying attention is not focusing on a single focal point.

HHMI – Howard Hughes Medical Institute http://www.hhmi.org/senses/e110.html

Brain function when listening

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/brain/

Learning and memory require physical changes in the neurons of the brain – electrical rewiring

I will read some numbers, you remember them

Image of actual neurons firing in a monkey’s brain and the image he is staring at creating a physical image in the brain. Zull, p 144

Note that as we go down the pyramid, we are engaging additional areas of the brain, creating deeper learning.

Washington Crossing the Delaware by Emanuel Leutze 1816-1868

Multiple Inputs = Multiple Pathways

http://www.cs.stir.ac.uk/~lss/NNIntro/InvSlides.html#what

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwUn64d5Ddk&feature=fvwrel

Patterning and organization Concrete words and abstract words

versus nonsense words

Infection Syphilis Treponema pallidum

Visualization – metrics and real life How do you create patterning in

your teaching?

Requires organizing and linking knowledge for later retrieval – deep learning

through Scaffolding

Figure 1.1 - Functions of the Communal Scaffold

Patterning and organization content (chunking info)

Concrete words and abstract words versus nonsense words

Visualizing to make concrete patterns Infection

Syphilis Treponema pallidum

Visualizing content – metrics and real life How do you create patterning in your

teaching?

http://www.ccsse.org/publications/2008_Executive_Summary.pdf

Definition Two simultaneous processes:

Monitoring your progress as

you learn and

Making changes and adapting your strategies if you perceive

you are not doing so well

“The most shocking finding of all is that if students aren’t aware of these skills and have not found ways to master them, they cannot learn discipline content.” National Research Council – How People Learn (2003)

Students with Basic Skills needs arrive without metacognitive experience – they don’t know how to be successful students, therefore……

1. Taking conscious control of learning

2. Planning and selecting strategies

3. Monitoring the progress of learning

4. Correcting errors

5. Analyzing the effectiveness of learning strategies

6. Changing learning behaviors and strategies, when necessary

CATs

Exam Post Mortem

Self Evaluations

Student Self Assessment

Learning Styles Assessment

Create outcomesDevelop scaffolded contentEmbed metacognition activitiesCreate feedback-heavy learning activities Manage the environment & consider

teamworkAssessment – See article chapter 5 Appendix

Write down one thing you

will do in response to

this information.

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