Over the past few decades, we have experienced a revolution in brain studies. Thanks to ever-advancing technologies, such as MRI, fMRI amongst many others that allow us to image the thinking brain, we gained a better understanding of complex human behaviour. These advances in neuroscience expose how the brain changes as learning takes place, or as a result of learning. This new field of scientific inquiry called Educational Neuroscience (EN) or the Science of Learning (also referred to as Neuroeducation and Mind, Brain & Education) arose out of the shift of neuroscience into education because anything that affects learning will ultimately involve the brain (Cui & Zhang, 2021).
Applying neuroscientific research to the classroom is a new and exciting venture but there are still a lot of unknowns. And it’s not easy to translate these findings to the classroom. Neuroscientists and teachers can collaborate in a collective effort to meet this challenge by the former contributing their scientific expertise and the teachers their pedagogical knowledge, creating a common language. It is educators with a strong foundation in the science of learning who will be able to evaluate the effectiveness and possible educational implications of neuroscience research. These educators will be at the forefront of identifying how neuroscience research can be applied to their classrooms and developing strategies so that their students can benefit from it. Their expertise in pedagogy and their experience in the teaching field make the teachers’ contribution to this effort instrumental.
A neuroscience course can benefit and can have a profound effect on the teachers in many ways, especially if it is customised to their needs as well as relevant to their work in the classroom. In support of the notion that brain structure and function are interconnected, the scientific study of the brain identifies the possibility that differences in these two aspects may affect behaviour, ability, and the needs of individual teachers and students. As educators, we have a unique opportunity to help students change their brains by teaching them, for example, about the brain’s neuroplasticity. Educators, as well as their future students, will be left behind if they fail to understand the implications of brain-changing neuroplasticity.
In sharing with students their knowledge of how brains appear to process, recognise, recall, and transfer information, educators enrich and empower their students, resulting in success and enhanced self-confidence. When teachers utilise neuroscience knowledge in the classroom, students are provided with the tools they need to learn with, resulting in increased motivation and improved performance. Dubinsky and colleagues (2019) note the potential benefits of EN and state that in addition to improving cognitive engagement in classrooms, EN training also promotes the development of social and emotional support for students as well as knowledge of neuroscience among both students and teachers. Reflecting upon their new understanding of how learning occurs in the brain, teachers recognise their job is to design activities or lessons where students have the space and the time to consolidate their own learning through a combination of space encoding, deliberate retrieval, and multiple representations.
Parents, too, have a lasting impact on their children’s learning, together with significant others or professionals who are involved in or contribute to the children’s or adolescents’ education. They too should be aware of the innovative practices in EN to enable the education of the future generations to be based on supportive interaction between home and school. Having a better understanding of how learning happens could assist most individuals in becoming more resilient and productive members of society who can adapt to changing circumstances. In addition to children who are learning literacy, science, and mathematics education in school, this applies to adolescents who are determining their career choices, and to adults who contribute to the economy through their work skills. Additionally, it can benefit the elderly who wish to keep up with their current skills while learning new ones to mitigate the effects of aging.
On an international basis, EN has become more widely known and a growing number of educators are modifying their instructional methods, curriculums, and assessments to reflect this new research. Several universities and colleges have recognised and established programmes dedicated to this effort, all aimed at alerting pre-service and professional development sessions for educators in this innovative area about how we learn.
All this will help accelerate the wave of change that EN will make to teaching and learning. Locally, we must seek to encourage schools to build an evidence-based system for teacher preparation so teachers can select instructional strategies more likely to succeed with today’s students!
A teacher’s ability to understand how the brain works and how they can influence students’ learning should be at the very heart of education!
References
Cui, y. & Zhang, H. (2021). Educational Neuroscience Training for Teachers’ Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge Construction. Frontiers in Psychology, Vol. 12, pp. 1 – 12.
Dubinsky, J. M., Guzey, S. S., Schwartz, M. S., Roehrig, G., MacNabb, C., Schmied, A., Hinesley, V., Hoelscher, M., Michlin, M., Schmitt, L., Ellingson, C., Chang, Z. & Cooper, J. L. (2019). Contributions of Neuroscience Knowledge to Teachers and Their Practice, The Neuroscientist, Vol. 25(4), pp. 394 – 407.