The Distracted Classroom - The Chronicle of Higher Education - 1 views
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Distraction occurs, the authors argue, when we are pursuing a goal that really matters and something blocks our efforts to achieve it.
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They argue that distraction actually arises from a conflict between two fundamental features of our brain: our ability to create and plan high-level goals versus our ability to control our minds and our environment as we take steps to complete those goals.
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Our cognitive control is really quite limited: We have a restricted ability to distribute, divide, and sustain attention; actively hold detailed information in mind; and concurrently manage or even rapidly switch between competing goals."
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while older adults can fully retain their ability to focus their attention, their capacity to block out irrelevant distractions diminishes with age.
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That’s one reason why older adults may have more trouble concentrating on a conversation in a crowded restaurant than younger people.
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What goal had I established for Kate’s learning that day? How had I created an environment that supported her ability to achieve that goal? And perhaps most important — assuming that the class had a learning goal that mattered for her — did she know about it?
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The more powerful the goals we establish for ourselves, and the more we feel ownership over those goals, the more we are able to pursue them in the face of both internal and external distractions.