Can We Improve Our Ability To Learn? (3)

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Can We Improve Our Ability To Learn? (3)
It Is Better to Understand New Material Than Simply to Memorize It By Rote

Information is consolidated from short-term memory into long-term memory by rehearsal. Rehearsal can take form of reading over class notes (try reading them aloud) or it can take form of describing significant concepts in new words. The traditional hour-long lecture may effectively fill up working memory so that if no effort is made to consolidate material into long-term memory quickly it may all be forgotten. It is more difficult to hold material in short-term memory, so material that is not moved into long-term memory is more likely to be lost.

A good teacher can help students by refraining from pointless digressions, such digressions maybe interesting but they also fill up short-term memory with unrelated facts. Information loss seems to occur when new data actually interferes with data that is already in working memory.





It is better to understand new material than simply to memorize it by rote. If new material is well understood, then a few forgotten details can be derived from the context of what has been remembered. In contrast, if rote-memorized material is forgotten, it's gone.

The brain strives to make connections and to make sense of new information. This is why it can be helpful to fit new concepts into the context of previously well-learned concepts. If you already have a related memory, typing new material to that memory will strengthen the old memory and help to consolidate the new material. This may amount to filling in mortar around existing bricks rather than laying an entirely new row of bricks.



A wise teacher will also help students by pointing out some of the interesting associations. This can be done by asking questions or by presenting material in way those foster connections. A new student of biology, for instance will probably spend some time defining the properties of living organism. This can be a fairly dry exercise unless the teacher asks questions to make the material more relevant. One way to make the properties of a living organism more compelling is to ask students to consider whether a virus alive. Does a virus satisfy the properties of a living organism or are there features that we would all agree define life that are lacking in a virus?

"THE EVOLVING BRAIN", The known and Unknown, R. Grant Steen, 2007, pages 135 - 136

Can We Improve Our Ability To Learn? (2)

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Can We Improve Our Ability To Learn? (2)
It Would Be Good To Figure Out Your Particular Learning Style !

When learning new material, it is crucial to use your strengths. For example, most people learn things that they hear more efficiently than things than they see. Yet this is not true for everybody, and it is useful to learn your own strengths and weaknesses. Indeed, there are some students who learn best if they are allowed to touch and play with objects that are related to a lecture, this may be why laboratory classes are so often popular with students.

It would be good to figure out your particular learning style so that you can better utilize your strengths. If you learn best by seeing, make sure that you draw out new ideas or that you find good illustrations for concepts that you find difficult.



It is also helpful to involve as many sensory modalities as possible when learning new information. An oral presentation supplemented with visual material will be understood and remembered better than oral presentation alone. A lecture that is well illustrated engages two modalities of sensory input, whereas a lecture alone engages only the ears. This strategy is consistent with the idea that words and pictures a processed in different way by the brain and that engaging both processes makes it more likely that the material will be remembered.



In the past, children were often taught to read by listening to a teacher say the sound that each letter makes so that these sounds could be learned and combined. Now, children may be given plastic letters and encouraged to play with them as they hear the sounds. Memory can be augmented if use motor skills concurrently; this is perhaps why reading is enhanced by note taking. The process of distilling knowledge into a few simple sentences and the act of writing out those sentences can improve comprehension and retention of new ideas.

"THE EVOLVING BRAIN", The known and Unknown, R. Grant Steen, 2007, pages 134 - 135

Can We Improve Our Ability To Learn? (1)

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Can We Improve Our Ability To Learn? (1)
Is Essential To Pay Attention!

Given what we know about learning and memory, is it possible to optimize the human ability to learn? Is learning simply IQ in action or it a skill that can be honed? Are limited by our innate abilities or is there a chance that we can intellectually better ourselves?

Recent evidence shows that there are memory-enhancing strategies that rely upon an increased understanding of the way the human brain works. Some strategies are based on common sense and are already in wide use, but some of them are less intuitive.

Since there is a multi-million-dollar market for brain-boosting vitamins, seminars about memory enhancement, and especial foods meant to increase brain power, it maybe worthwhile to review what is actually known.

Perhaps the most important lesson is that it is essential to pay attention. Attention is quite selective, it filters incoming information and allows only relevant information to gain access to working memory. Intense concentration is proven to increase the speed at which a person can learn new facts and ideas, whereas attention has little impact on learning of new motor skills. Explicit memory is therefore more vulnerable to inattention than is implicit memory. Skillful teacher can use this feature of the human mind by helping student to focus on concepts or ideas that are particularly difficult.

"THE EVOLVING BRAIN", The known and Unknown, R. Grant Steen, 2007, pages 133 - 134

Types of Memory

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Types of Memory
What Is Learning?

Learning comes in many forms and has many definitions, but learning can be thought of as the retention of explicit and implicit memories. An explicit memory is an image in the mind or something that can be described in words; it is constituted by an object, a place, or an event, and it has a certain concreteness to it. An implicit memory is harder to define, as it may not even enter conscious awareness; it can be a bias or habit of thought, or it can even be an improvement in the ability to discriminate between stimuli that were initially perceived as being identical.

In any case, it is clear that learning is not just building a collection of facts: it has more to do with establishing new patterns of thought.

Learning has been defined as behavioral plasticity, although this definition ignores any form of learning that has no effect on behavior.

A better definition of learning would acknowledge that learning is memory and that memories persist over multiple time scales. Short-term memory may last only a few seconds; you glance at your watch to answer a question about the time then a moment later you do not what time is any more. If memory last longer, say from seconds to hours, this is called work memory. If you take a message for someone, you may forget the message as soon as it has been passed on, even if you remember the message for hours before conveying it. If memory last longer still, from hours to months, this is called long-term memory. An example could be your home telephone number, which you are able to recall without effort. A distinction has been made between long-term and long-lasting memory. Long-lasting memory may represent long-term has somehow fossilized; an example could be the telephone number that you remember from your childhood home many year ago.

It is possible that working memory, long-term memory and long lasting memory are simply different phases of long-term memory although there maybe a legitimate distinction among these entities.

"THE EVOLVING BRAIN", The known and Unknown, R. Grant Steen, 2007, pages 128 - 129

Conclusions: The "Brain-based Learner"

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Conclusions: The "Brain-based Learner"
Sonoma County Department of Education

The "brain-based learner" downshifts under threat, learns via peripheral events, has a unique brain, learns via conscious and unconscious processes, has various types of memory, and learns best when content is embedded in experience. This is the person who is in our classrooms.

If this is true, what is learning? We came up with the notion that learning is the expansion of natural knowledge. We wanted to make the point that we are always expanding from what we know. Natural knowledge is what we use to make sense of our lives. It is what we know deeply and meaningfully. Learning as the expansion of natural knowledge means not just information that we memorize; it means something we can use.



Then we asked, "What is involved?" We looked at meaning because we saw meaning as the most critical issue in learning. There are three elements: surface knowledge consists of information and procedures. This is what education has been pretty much limited to. If we have enough of this stuff put into the learner, the learner will somehow process it and retain it. Deep meaning includes the drives, purposes, values and beliefs of the learner -- their ways of patterning and seeing the world. When this "deep meaning" connects with "surface knowledge," you have what we call felt meaning, which is this "Aha!" experience that we now define as learning.

Real learning as seen from the point of view of the brain in operation is to see the hemispheres synchronize. The brain waves synchronize at that aha! moment: what I am feeling, what I am thinking, what is my hypothesis -- all this connects with the information and I say, "Ah, I get it."



This is what is involved in the expansion of natural knowledge. It's ok for the child to memorize certain things, but until that connects with their meaning and their predisposition, the real shift in learning doesn't happen. The child can study all kinds of things about science, but until they make sense, it is memorized stuff and you really can't generalize from there to other experiences.

Then we looked at what has to happen in the learning environment, in the classroom, for the expansion of natural knowledge to take place. How do you maximize the conditions for learning? We identified three key factors: immersion in complex experiences; low threat/high challenge; and active processing.



Orchestrated immersion in complex experiences means that I, as a teacher, sit down ahead of time and work out the lesson. I have to think about it beforehand and put together the materials in order to create the kind of natural learning environment that allows my students to make the most of the connections and construct their own meanings. I also prepare the instructions beforehand so I will not interfere with the group. Once I do that, the lesson takes care of itself and feels natural. Why is it "complex"? Complex means that they go through all kinds of levels. In terms of the brain principles, students' emotions are involved as they remember something; they are patterning in their own way; they are making multiple connections. So "complex experiences" means that they are interacting, the learning is activity-oriented; they are globally searching for meaning and using the library for resources. This is a different way of teaching.

The other thing that is needed in order to make maximum use of the brain is what we relaxed alertness. There is low threat involved in the activity. You don't announce that a test will follow. You don't have to make a list which will be right or wrong. The results of the activity are open-ended, whatever you come up with is valuable. But just removing the threat is not good enough; you must also provide a challenge.



Active processing is metacognition -- sitting back and saying, "What did I learn and how did I learn that? What other connections are there? How else can I do this?" This is very important to consolidating learning, expanding on it and making additional connections. This is what the critical thinking advocates are developing. We go beyond that to include reflection and analyzing interpersonal issues as well.

There is no one way to do Brain-Based Instruction. There are rules, however. The very nature of teaching for the expansion of natural knowledge means that the learner is at the center of any teaching that makes genuine connections.



In the years to come, all of us -- teachers, researchers, administrators, parents, and communities -- will have to alter our view of learning. This means going beyond our own experiences as learners in school and literally "inventing" or orchestrating learning environments that finally capitalize on our brains' immense capacity to learn.

"http://www.talkingpage.org/artic011.html"