Should you be in to Brainwashing?

Brainwashing Students

Let’s focus on how to get off to a fresh start…by brainwashing others. Whether you work with adults or younger students directly, this month’s issue may change your approach forever. You’ll learn why you should be in the business of brainwashing. Here’s what the research tells us…

The Research

Brainwashing is the altering of beliefs, knowledge or attitudes in the mind of another. The first of your two questions is, “Should I do brainwashing?” The answer is an emphatic, “Yes!” Second, “Why?” Humans live their lives and take actions based on their narratives. Our own narrative is the aggregate of our daily routines, habits and predictive decisions, actions, values and conversations we engage in. Humans are remarkably true to their own “story”. At school, the story that students create and identify with is especially important. Read more

Extreme Schools: Miracles Happen Every Day

Roosevelt Elementary School

Our featured “Extreme School” is…Well, let a staff member tell her story…

“We needed help; our socio-economically deprived children were not progressing as we wished that they would. About 77% of our students are served by free lunch and free breakfast, and we knew that those students specifically needed to be able to read to realize their maximum success.

Many people thought that this school out in the rural cotton fields probably could not do much differently or much better. After all, we serve the local Children’s Home and the local Boys’ Ranch. These students also had some stumbling blocks in their way toward success.”

What did they do and how did it turn out? Read more

What About Your School’s Test Results?

Let’s address HOW to deal with the test scores that you get.

Why?

It turns out that the way school leadership, as well as the staff, thinks about, discusses, and frames the conversations about test scores actually affects future scores.

How does this happen and how should a staff debrief the testing?

The Research

The way that your staff frames their results and frames their work is critical to the ongoing success at your school.

A “framing effect” is usually said to occur when varied, but usually equivalent descriptions (of a product/experience/decision or problem) lead to very different decisions. We’ve all known this as, “It’s not what you say, but how you say it.”

New research done at the University of Michigan by Juth and Helgesson (2012) suggests that your expectations and predictions shape your future efforts via the “framing effect.”

If we started a hypothetical group of elementary children, all earning the same letter grades (ex. A, B, … F), here is how their expectations matter. In those children expecting to become a teacher, an engineer, or a nurse when they grew up, this study successfully predicted that they’d work harder in school.

In this same study, nine out of ten children expected they would attend at least a two-year college, but less than half saw themselves as having an educational degree-dependent job. This is why it is so important to tie their dreams to an actual job, not just to college.

At the secondary level, researchers presented two different options of information to two groups of students. They heard about either: Read more

How Are You Coping Right Now?

Risk and Reward

Reducing Risk and Building Resilience

Studies in positive psychology have shown that resilience rates high among attitude-based protective factors that help children achieve academic success in environments where, statistically speaking, the odds are against them.

In 2006, researchers at the University of Michigan’s Center for Human Growth and Development showed that preschoolers facing eight or more environmental risk factors such as maternal mental illness or single parenthood, minority status or stressful life events, scored more than 30 points below children with no risk factors on tests of IQ. Yet, they consistently found that groups of high resilient children in high-risk environments still outperformed their peers.

But how do we develop high resilience in our kids and ourselves?
Read more

Exploding Common Myths in Education

brain based teaching strategy

Myth: Kids Talk Too Much At School

Do your students talk too much? Some teachers think kids talk TOO much at school, and they spend a portion of their day trying to “manage the noise”.

Actually, that’s false! It seems we are social before we are born and that some schools artificially suppress our social side. Researchers believe that brains may be hard-wired to be social (autism is an exception, of course). We know newborns come into the world wired to socially interact. But is this a propensity to socially oriented action already present before birth? Twin pregnancies provide a unique opportunity to investigate the social pre-wiring hypothesis.

A new study shows that by the 14th week of gestation twin fetuses do not only display movements directed towards the uterine wall and self-directed movements, but also movements specifically aimed at the co-twin, the proportion of which increases between the 14th and 18th gestational week. These inter-twin responses are not coincidental, the research shows. The intra-pair contact is the result of motor planning rather then the accidental outcome of bumping each other due to spatial proximity. By the 14th week of gestation twin fetuses clearly execute movements specifically aimed at purposeful (vs. random) interacting with the co-twin. This supports a large body of postnatal evidence for a relational bias. Read more

Visiting China’s Best Kept Secret

Diane and I traveled to Guilin, China following the International Mind and Brain EXPO in Hong Kong this February, and I thought I’d share a few pictures of the trip…

One of the best-kept secrets in the travel world is the city of Guilin in mainland China. It’s about 325 miles NW of Hong Kong. In Guilin, there is a fabulous panda enclosure. We were the only visitors that morning.”

Guilan China

This is an amazing natural park in Guilin. It’s has waterfalls, epic scenery, beautiful walkways, monkeys running around and places to be at one with your thoughts. Here we are on the bridge, about to cross into the park.”

Eric and Diane Jensen in China

This remote city is Yangshu, as beautiful as it gets. A few hotels, but mostly bustling shops and restaurants. We took our class in cooking school here and learned how to make some very tasty Chinese treats.

Yangshu, China

Understanding Brain-Based Learning

brain based teaching explained

What is Brain-Based Teaching?

I get asked this question a lot… so  I am going to provide an explanation of what Brain-Based teaching is, as well as clear up any myths or misconceptions about it.

Brain-Based education is the active engagement of practical strategies based on learning and behavioral principles derived from neuroscience.

All teachers use strategies; the difference here is that you’re using strategies based on real science, not because someone said that they work.

An example of a principle would be…”Brains change based on experience.” The science tells us HOW they change in response to experience. The strategies are based on what we’ve learned from studies on how brains change.

Questions are often raised about the reliability of brain research for training or classroom applications. Cautious, conservative skeptics will, by nature, be hesitant to embrace new things. Overzealous or impulsive risk-takers will, by nature, try almost anything, founded or not.

Our position is let the science do the talking

A better-informed educator usually makes better decisions. We collect the research, form conclusions and make suggestions. Every effort is made to select from reliable sources with supporting data. If the studies are conflicting, we’ll either say so or not present it to you. You’ll need to be the ultimate judge as to whether and how the research fits in your particular learning climate.

One must be cautious and prudent in how research is interpreted and ultimately used. Our policy is to look for both the basic neuroscience research and match it with data from applied psychology or cognitive science. When there are multiple studies, with good samples and clear evidence, you’ll hear about it.

We will never say, “Brain research proves….” because it does not prove anything. It may however suggest the value of a particular pathway. We have heard five basic criticisms about brain-based education. Here’s what they are and our answers to them. Read more

Ideas for Getting Better Buy-In and Learning

Student Buy in

1. Constantly make something important to their brain (say, “Wow, this is so good that…” Or, “If you learn nothing else all day, listen closely and remember this…”)

2. Get students out of their seats for a quick energizer every 8-15 minutes (it bumps up Cortisol, Dopamine and Norepinephrine, all of which help strengthen memory formation)

3. Every single key idea, repeat after me (“Now we just learned there are four seasons. How many seasons are there?”)

4. Use acronyms

5. Use priming ALL Day long (“Earlier I said we have 4 seasons and the coldest one is W-I-N________?”) They spell out the rest of the word.

6. Use partners more often. (“We just learned the four seasons. Now, please stand up. Great. Find a neighbor and point to him or her say, “You’re it!. Great. Now, between you and your neighbor, see if you can remember all four seasons.”) Then do error correction.

7. Use their body more often, like every 15-30 minutes to connect with content. (“We just learned the four seasons. Now, let’s burn them into our brain in a fun way. Please stand up. Great. With your body, show your neighbor, you wiping sweat off your forehead. That’s summer. Great. Now show your neighbor raking up leaves. That’s fall. Etc.”)

8. Put key ideas up on posters around the room. Ask kids to stand up, find a partner and take them to the poster. Then they review the material using the poster as a helper.

9. Use peg systems

10. Use spatial learning and associate concepts to places in the room. Take a key idea like cumulus clouds and go to a corner of the room with the kids. Ask them to look up in the corner and imaging HUGE rain clouds in the ceiling corner. Imaging the rain. Repeat after me: “Cumulous clouds means.. rain (or whatever).”

Knowing these are good. Actually doing them-all day long, every day of the week, is how you get miracles.

Make it happen.

Creative Commons License photo credit: Justin Shearer

Tomorrow’s World In Education

Education challenges ahead

“There’s a big front coming in this weekend. Expect temperatures to drop to well below freezing. There will be icy and dangerous conditions. Winds will be near gale force. Please take all necessary cautions to protect life and property.”

Sometimes being right is just as bad as being wrong. Just ask any weatherman or weatherperson. Nobody likes to hear the messenger when the news is bad. It’s no different when the news is about our own lives.

Today, we take a look ahead. That’s always a bit dangerous. Today’s world has so many complex variables that any predictions beyond the next few weeks seem far too tenuous to “bank on.” Who would have predicted interest rates would fall to record lows in 2011? Few would have predicted the Columbia Space Shuttle disaster, which set back the space program by years (and maybe put it out of business). The events following 9/11 changed many things in politics, economics and even tourism. The point here is simple; general timelines are easier to predict, high impact events are, well, unpredictable. We’ll have to exclude in this chapter those catastrophic events (sorry, even psychics get them wrong) and stick with the likely stream of events. Based on the trends so far, there are three possible trajectories. One is the nightmare, where all that can go bad, does. Another is the dream, where most important decisions and events are positive. And finally, there’s the most likely scenario of all. That I’ll leave to the end. Read more

What Matters Most in School Data on Teacher Quality

Better Teaching Quality

Researchers Discover the Most Visible Ingredient that Matters Most in School Data on Teacher Quality (and how it ties in with brain research)

In September, I shared the research that told you that feedback was the top achievement-boosting variable. in learning. This month, we’ll tie together some brain research and student achievement data to reveal the most VISIBLE ingredient in better teaching.

First, the hint: It is consistently correlated with high achievement gains and it is one of the single biggest variables in teacher quality.

What The Research Tells Us

For years, realtors have tried to help sell prospective home buyers on the neighborhood with “good schools.” You may have had parents that fixate on picking the right school for their child. But the research shows it matters far more which teacher the child gets.

Teachers had THREE times as much influence on students’ academic development as the school they attended.

Many of the factors commonly assumed to be important to teachers’ effectiveness are NOT causal or even strongly correlated with student achievement. Although teachers are paid more for experience, education and training, those are not a guarantee of better student performance. Read more