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Facts about the human brain that will help with education.

Loonyhiker has a MUST read post about a child who was in gifted programs and had a brain trauma and then, was treated by his teachers as being lazy because they couldn't see on the outside that any thing was different. It breaks my heart but is a story to share with people to understand the brain. Don't automatically assume a child is lazy, understand that the brain is something you cannot see and learning disabilities, ADHD, and brain issues are tough to understand.

Great thoughts from Pat (loony hiker) about a child that helps us better understand learningdisabilities.

Great post on the brain and learning.

And the price is this: facts learned in this way, and especially by rote, and especially at a younger age, take a direct route into the mind, and bypass a person's critical and reflective capacities, and indeed, become a part of those capacities in the future.

while it is necessary (and possible) to teach facts to people, it comes with a price. And the price is this: facts learned in this way, and especially by rote, and especially at a younger age, take a direct root into the mind, and bypass a person's critical and reflective capacities, and indeed, become a part of those capacities in the future.\n\nWhen you teach children facts as facts, and when you do it through a process of study and drill, it doesn't occur to children to question whether or not those facts are true, or appropriate, or moral, or legal, or anything else. Rote learning is a short circuit into the brain. It's direct programming. People who study, and learn, that 2+2=4, know that 2+2=4, not because they understand the theory of mathematics, not because they have read Hilbert and understand formalism, or can refute Brouwer and reject intuitionism, but because they know (full stop) 2+2=4.\n\nI used the phrase "it's direct programming" deliberately. This is an analogy we can wrap our minds around. We can think of direct instruction as being similar to direct programming. It is, effectively, a mechanism of putting content into a learner's mind as effectively and efficiently as possible, so that when the time comes later (as it will) that the learner needs to use that fact, it is instantly and easily accessible.

Brain Based Education

Who would have thought??? ;-) The brain can still learn new concepts after various ages, and that every student can be taught many different ways. In a sense, the brain can be rewired.

Surprising new research may rewrite learning theory as Brown University scientists contend that distractions do not necessarily impede the learning process of a motor task. Investigators discovered that if attention was as divided during recall of a motor task as it was during learning the task, people performed as if there were no distractions at either stage. Thus, the real issue is that inconsistent distraction can impair our recollection of the task. As long as our attention is as divided when we have to recall a motor skill as it was when we learned it, we'll do just fine, say the researchers.

Great website for application to learning.

Very interesting article from Newsweek about how creativity works in the brain, and how it can be trained in an educational setting. It describes a "crisis" trend where creativity scores in America are decreasing.

Researchers found sleep appears to have a dramatic impact on the way the brain functions the next day. It appears to strengthen connections between nerve cells in the brain - a process key to both learning and memory.

Great post w/ new take on "Brain Rules"

Site is dedicated to bringing the insights of brain science to the classroom. A laudable goal, it seems to me.

Brain Rules meets presentation zen! Great tips and reminders for presentation perfection!

via http://www.freetech4teachers.com/2009/04/fun-4-brain-great-educational-games.html

All games here were made by Exuberant Games. Each game goes through important information for a certain subject matter for grades Kindergarten through 6th grade. The math games are great if you need to review your math facts for addition, subtraction , or division. Be sure to check out our new games for other subjects. * English games to review parts of speech * Reading games to help learn sight words * Science tutorials and games are coming soon! via http://www.freetech4teachers.com/2009/04/fun-4-brain-great-educational-games.html

"It is often claimed that people who are bilingual are better than monolinguals at learning languages. Now, the first study to examine bilingual and monolingual brains as they learn an additional language offers new evidence that supports this hypothesis, researchers say. The study, conducted at Georgetown University Medical Center and published in the journal Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, suggests that early bilingualism helps with learning languages later in life."

*Need a free NYT account. For much of the last century, educators and many scientists believed that children could not learn math at all before the age of five, that their brains simply were not ready. But recent research has turned that assumption on its head - that, and a host of other conventional wisdom about geometry, reading, language and self-control in class.

A great way to get started with technology is to join in an exciting project. this project by Susan Silverman was designed using the principles of Universal Design for Learning. I've heard her present and she is a pro. (Along with my friend Jennifer Wagner.)

Susan Silverman creates excellent projects for global collaboration among elementary students.