Neuroscience Insights for Teachers

In this article in Educational Researcher, Janet Dubinsky and Sashank Varma (University of Minnesota/Minneapolis) and Gillian Roehrig (University of Minnesota/St. Paul) propose a set of neuroscience concepts that can directly inform teaching and learning. From their success working with K-12 teachers in a summer PD institute called BrainU, the authors are convinced that these concepts “have the potential to transform teacher preparation and professional development and to ultimately affect how students think about their own learning.” Their goal is to get teachers to see themselves “as designers of experiences that ultimately change students’ brains.” 

Putting together the 160-hour curriculum for BrainU, the authors avoided getting into too much technical detail on neuroscience; instead, they focused on the proven plasticity of the human brain and how a few core concepts can help teachers understand learning, memory, and the best pedagogy for getting across classroom concepts. Follow-up assessments and observations confirmed that teachers were successfully putting their new insights to work in their classrooms: there were increases in students’ higher-order thinking, depth of knowledge, substantive conversations, and connections to real-world contexts. 

Drawing on a 2008 paper on neuroscience concepts, Dubinsky, Varma, and Roehrig suggest that the following points are most helpful for K-12 teachers:

• The brain is the body’s most complex organ; it has more than 100 billion neurons and well over a trillion synapses. The brain’s wiring is remarkably similar among all humans, with individuality coming from variations at the synaptic level.
• The brain’s neurons use both electrical and chemical signals as they respond to stimuli from the five senses. All perceptions, thoughts, behaviors, and memories result from combinations of signals among neurons.
• Life experiences – a teacher’s lesson, a movie, dancing, talking to a friend, texting, feeling stressed, using a drug – change the brain, growing new synapses and circuits and turning on nervous-system genes. 
• Early-childhood experiences – behaviors, thoughts, and memories – shape different sets of associated synapses and neural pathways, which continue to change throughout life in response to every interaction.
• Synaptic pathways are loosely grouped into sensory, motor, emotive, homeostatic, attentional, and decision-making systems (among others) in the central nervous system.
• The brain is the foundation of the mind; intelligence arises as the brain reasons, plans, and solves problems. Intelligence is the accumulated history of synaptic activation among the myriad brain pathways. 
• Using language to communicate with others enhances communication skills by exercising neural pathways.
• The brain is naturally curious as it tries to make sense of all incoming sensory information. It recognizes conflicts, makes predictions, and guides behavior.
• The salience of experiences determines how well they are retained; only experiences with an emotional stamp are committed to long-term memory.
• Communication among neurons is strengthened or weakened by patterns of use – the more stimuli, the more learning; the fewer stimuli, the less learning. The act of remembering something strengthens that specific memory.
• Learning strengthens a set of electrical and chemical imprints distributed throughout the brain. Mastery comes from repetition, rehearsal, application, and self-evaluation.
• Our physiological state – nutritional, hormonal, emotional, level of stress, adequacy of sleep, oxygen intake – will influence how well we learn, remember, and make decisions.
• Structured learning environments – schools, for example – provide opportunities to build our mental capacity and capabilities.

“Infusing Neuroscience Into Teacher Professional Development” by Janet Dubinsky, Sashank Varma, and Gillian Roehrig, in Educational Researcher, August/September 2013 (Vol. 42, #6, p. 317-329), http://edr.sagepub.com/content/42/6/317.abstract; the authors can be reached at dubin001@umn.edu, roehr013@umn.edu, and sashank@umn.edu. 

From the Marshall Memo #501