Ten ways neuroscience helped me design better learning experiences
Everything we know about ourselves and the world around us is thanks to our amazing brain. Our brain holds all of our hopes, thoughts, memories, emotions and personality.
Our brains regulate our bodily functions, control our most primitive behaviours like eating, sleeping, keeping warm; and is responsible for our most sophisticated activities such as the creation of civilisation, music, art and language.
Our brains help us to decide what is significant at any point in time.
“The human brain is the most powerful, staggeringly complex electro-biochemical machine ever created. Above and behind our eyes are 100 billion neurons in a small calcium shell, laced with organic pumps, channels, and switches. ”
Ten ways neuroscience has helped me to design better learning experiences
1. Understand how learning brains work
It’s not about trying to become a neuroscientist (unless you want to, in which case go for it!), it's about learning from neuroscience to create brain-friendly learning experiences that lead to optimal learning.
In this video, Robert Sapolsky, an American neuroendocrinology researcher and author discusses 3 Brain Systems That Control Your Behavior: Reptilian, Limbic, Neo Cortex.
2. Learning uses a lot of high brain energy
Our Executive Brain (pre-frontal cortex) plays a critical role in learning. The pre-frontal cortex is the part of our brain that we use for high-order functions such as thinking, short-term memory, paying attention, making decisions, planning, controlling our impulses and managing our emotions and behaviours.
Just one hour of active work by our pre-frontal cortex can use up all our metabolic reserves. Our resources for generating qualitative thinking, making decisions or controlling our impulses become truly limited - if we waste them, we will have no energy left for the next task.
“Conscious mental activities chew up metabolic resources, the fuel in your blood, significantly faster than automatic brain functions such as keeping your heart beating or your lungs breathing”
3. People remember what they pay attention to
Attention and working memory are both critical for learning - attention brings the information in, working memory helps our brain make sense of it. Paying attention provides focus, encourages creativity, and expands perspectives.
4. Learning involves changing the brain
Our brains change throughout our lives. Every experience we have will impact the structure of our brain. A changing brain enables us to learn, remember and adapt to our surroundings. Linking different systems in the brain during the learning process improves the transfer of knowledge into long term memory.
“The most effective learning involves recruiting multiple regions of the brain for the learning task. These regions are associated with such functions as memory, the various senses, volitional control, and higher levels of cognitive functioning”
5. Keep the learning active
Active learning is any learning activity where the learner participates or interacts with the learning process, Active learning takes advantage of processes that stimulate multiple neural connections in the brain and promote memory. More complex thought processes are more beneficial for learning because they involve a greater number of neural connections and more neurological ‘cross-talk’. Getting learners actively involved (rather than just passively listening) accesses different parts of the human brain and increases retention.
6. Less is more, don’t drown your learners in content!
Working memory has capacity limits that shouldn’t be exceeded by trying to cram in more content. Optimal learning involves minimising irrelevant cognitive load and giving learners time to digest what they’re learning. For example, build in more breaks so they can come up for air. A break might consist of a cartoon, a video clip, a raise-your-hand poll. Breaking up the rhythm helps aid retention.
7. Distribute the practice
Real learning doesn’t usually happen in a one-time event. It is better to distribute learning over a period of time rather than in a single block of learning, Hebb's Rule tells us that connections are strengthened when two neurons fire together regularly or fire once with significant intensity and are more likely to fire together in future to the detriment of connections with other neurons. This action forms the basis of learning. To form lasting memories, learners need to repeat practice or study over extended periods of time. Smaller chunks of learning, spaced out over time, reinforce memory networks as learners repeatedly retrieve the material. Their brains begin to create stronger neural pathways that are easier to access while implanting that information into long-term memory.
8. Make it achievable but not 'easy’
Moderate stress is beneficial for learning, while mild and extreme stress are detrimental. Stimulation to learn requires a moderate amount of stress (measured in the level of cortisol). A low level of stress is associated with low performance, as is high stress, which can set our brains into fight-or-flight mode, so there is less brain activity in the cortical areas where higher-level learning happens. Moderate stress can be introduced in different ways, e.g. changing the discussion format or introducing a learning activity that requires individual participation or movement. It's important to note that not everyone reacts the same to an event. Cortisol production in response to an event can vary significantly between people; what one person might find moderately stressful might constitute mild or extreme stress for another.
9. Get your learners off their brain!
The human brain is a muscle and will start to slow down after sitting for about 45 minutes. Human brains need a constant supply of fresh blood and oxygen to work at their best. Moving muscles keep the fresh blood and oxygen your brain needs pumping through; it also triggers the release of brain- and mood-enhancing chemicals. Extensive sitting can undermine our emotional wellbeing and increase the risk of glitches in brain functioning.
10. Bring nature into the learning environment
Spending time in nature improves people ability and capacity to learn, reduces stress and anxiety, promotes happiness and empath, and increases physical and mental energy. Being outside in nature can improve memory and attention span by up to 20%, being able to see nature through a window increases productivity and reduces sickness rates, and hearing birdsong through open windows promotes a sense of wellbeing and happiness.
“ …being in nature allows the prefrontal cortex, the brain’s command centre, to dial down and rest, like an overused muscle...Research shows that even brief interactions with nature can soothe our brains”
Bibliography
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Chapman, S.B. (2014), 7 Secrets to Turbocharging Your Brain. Research-based tips to flex your cortex and improve cognitive performance, https://www.psychologytoday.com/au/blog/make-your-brain-smarter/201412/7-secrets-turbocharging-your-brain.
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