Tag Archive for: Skill Set

Teaching with the Brain in Mind Workshop

We recently finished the “Teaching with the Brain in Mind” program. Wow! What an amazing event.

Some came to it concerned about the challenges of brain-based learning. Others wanted brain-based strategies. Only a few were brain-skeptics. Most just wanted to deepen or widen their skill set and knowledge base. Suffice it to say, all left the program excited and ready to make changes.

“This is the best professional development experience I’ve had in 27 years of teaching. I will use so much of what I learned here and I am eager to return to my students and work with them in a more enlightened approach.” Patricia Gefert, Ohio.

Student learned the most critical brain principles. By the way, these are NOT the principles you’ll find in any book. These are the most updated, cutting edge principles anywhere. Every principle is illustrated, unpacked, debriefed and role-modeled. On top of that, there are the demonstrations, interactions and, yes, even a “field trip.”

One of the highlights was the visit to Dr. Daniel Amen’s Brain Clinic, where participants got to see inside the actual patient clinic that has been grabbing headlines for years. Amen has been “ahead of the crowd”, just as Eric Jensen has been.

Spect scans of the author's brain taken at Amen Clinic in Newport Beach, California. In the four surface views on the left, the less active regions of the brain show up as holes or dents. The scans on the right show the most active 15 percent of the brain in red and white. Photo: Daniel Amen

At the end, when asked for suggestions to others, who might be considering the program, one participant said, “Do it! It will change your teaching forever.” Kelly Small, Alberta, CA

Another highlight was the appearance, in person, of Dr. Larry Cahill, a pioneer in memory, emotions and gender. His lab has made not one, but three breakthroughs in neuroscience. Everyone was riveted to his talk on how emotions and gender influence our memory. Everyone was spellbound!

“Every single concept, activity and interaction was of great value to me.” Lois Cameron. Shaker Heights, OH.

The “Teaching with the Brain in Mind” program gives you the scientific background, the strategies that can transform the classroom and once again, the actual demonstration of the strategy. This way, you can see it, hear and feel how it works. This makes it the most practical, and yet, research-based program on the brain anywhere.

The next “Teaching with the Brain in Mind” program happens in San Antonio, Texas. The content will be awesome, the guest speaker is riveting and the field trip is over the top good.

If you have not yet taken the “Teaching with the Brain in Mind” program, this is your only chance. Find out how to meet the challenges of brain-based learning and teaching. Meet other like-minded participants. And, most of get inspired and rocket-propelled to teach smarter, with less stress.

See you in San Antonio!

Click here for details.

Teaching Strategies: The Use of Social and Emotional Activities


Valentines, Feelings and Affect: The Use of Social and Emotional Activities

Here’s how they work together: The emotions research always starts with the classics. An older, brilliant study done was done by emotions pioneer Paul Ekman. You may know the Fox TV series “Lie to Me” is based on his skill set and life’s work. Ekman found that when we artificially generated certain facial expressions, it induced the corresponding ‘genuine’ feelings (Levenson, et al. 1990). Act a certain way, and the emotions will follow.

But this door goes both ways. This means, getting kids emotionally aroused can enhance their physical effort (Schmidt, et al, 2009). And when we enhance both, like combine the emotions of social contact with shaking hands, we remember the event better (Nielson and Jensen, 1994). Emotions and physiology are fully linked.

Translated, when we arouse emotions in our kids, they are more likely to get off their ‘you know what’ and start engaging more. Even when seated, emotional responses enhance our memory of the details of the event. But wait; it gets better. If you can focus on engaging the class leaders (the ones that others follow), you have a good chance of bringing on board the rest of the students. Why? Have you ever noticed that when one person yawns, others around often yawn? Actually, some research suggests that emotions are contagious (Wild, et al.2001).

Now, when you put all this together (mind, body, emotions, class leaders and peer pressure), you can get classroom miracles. How?

There’s a whole new field developing. It’s called cultural neuroscience. It’s the field of how cultures change our brain. Your school creates a culture. A classroom will have a culture whether you orchestrate it or not. Many teachers actively shape their culture, while those that struggle complain about their class culture.

Successful schools consciously shape their cultures while the schools that struggle complain about “how the kids are these days.” A great primer on this field was Wexler’s book Brain and Culture (2006).

Recent studies show that when you use rituals well, you can shape behaviors. In fact, rituals can activate students to do things that require personal sacrifice (wow) because of the peer-power and social effects. This allows teachers to erase problems with task activation, socializing and discipline. The bottom line is that anthropology is now being influenced by neuroscience. Well, you know I love the research, so here it is on our emotional, social and physical states, and the brain’s activation for functionality and organizing dynamics.

REFERENCES Brown RA, Seligman R. Anthropology and cultural neuroscience: creating productive intersections in parallel fields. Prog Brain Res. 2009;178:31-42. Cahill L, Haier RJ, Fallon J, Alkire MT, Tang C, Keator D, Wu J, McGaugh JL. (1996) Amygdala activity at encoding correlated with long-term, free recall of emotional information. Proc Natl Acad Science U S A. Jul 23;93(15):8016-2. Levenson, RW, Ekman P, Friesen WV. (1990) Voluntary facial action generates emotion-specific autonomic nervous system activity. Psychophysiology. Jul;27(4):363-84. Nielson KA, Jensen RA. (1994) Beta-adrenergic receptor antagonist antihypertensive medications impair arousal-induced modulation of working memory in elderly humans. Behav Neural Biol. 1994 Nov;62(3):190-200. Phan, KL, Wagner T., Taylor, SF, Liberzon, I (2002) Functional neuroanatomy of emotion: A meta-analysis of emotion activation studies in PET and fMRI. Neuroimage 16: 331-348. Schmidt L, Cléry-Melin ML, Lafargue G, Valabrègue R, Fossati P, Dubois B, Pessiglione M. (2009) Get aroused and be stronger: emotional facilitation of physical effort in the human brain. J Neurosci. Jul 29;29(30):9450-7. Wild B, Erb M, Bartels M. (2001) Are emotions contagious? Evoked emotions while viewing emotionally expressive faces: quality, quantity, time course and gender differences. Psychiatry Res. Jun 1;102(2):109-24. Wiltermuth SS, Heath C. (2009)Synchrony and cooperation. Psychol Sci. Jan;20(1):1-5.

Creative Commons License photo credit: krystal.pritchett

Don’t Miss Our Upcoming Teacher Workshop

“Teaching with the Brain in Mind” workshop

Feb 15-20 (Newport Beach-CA)

You might have experienced some very cold temps in the last few weeks. Cognitively, brains work best in cooler (but not cold) temperatures. But the rest of our body sure likes it a bit warmer.

If you were thinking of “warming up” to some “very hot” learning, I’ve got something pretty amazing for you, and it’s in a warm place!

In fact, you can get a huge savings on your hotel where the winter rates are slashed-but not for long.

Our Amazing, Newly Revised 6-Day Program:

You Get 1st Class Brain-Based Teaching, Plus…
Astonishing Student Achievement, 100% Scientific,
100% Research Based, and Guaranteed.

And, it’s Classroom-Proven!

I do this amazing course only twice a year. It’s the world’s “gold standard” for brain-based learning. Fortunately, you can add exciting, fresh new content (AND MAXIMUM STRATEGIES) into your skill set.

This workshop is an enriching, high energy, research-based, team-working experience. The heart and soul of this program is joyful immersion. Learn with like-minded people, in an optimal environment, with state-of-the-art resources and a first-class facilitator.

You can expect inspiration, camaraderie and potent, roll-up your sleeves ideas that will last for years.

Oh wait… Did I mention you’ll get to ask questions of a world-renowned neuroscientist in person? You will. But it gets even better… but first:

What is Brain-Based Learning? You may be shocked to find out! Not 1 in 1000 Educators REALLY Knows!

Unfortunately, most educators think brain-based learning is simply knowing about axons, dendrites and synapses. That’s “old school” and it’s ridiculous! Brain-based learning is the process of thoughtfully implementing purposeful strategies based on research derived from a synergy of sizzling cutting-edge disciplines. They include, but are not limited to: cognitive neuroscience, chemistry, nutrition, social neurosciences, biology, pharmacology, computational sciences, quantum systems thinking, and artificial intelligence modeling.

More has been discovered about the brain and mind in the last 20 years than in all of recorded history. Yet, most teachers have no clear understanding of how the brain learns, remembers and behaves except on a superficial basis. Sadly, this lack of knowledge leaves the average educator with an education formulated in, and designed for, the last century. But there’s hope.

When you attend a Jensen Learning program, you’ll discover the genuine “Brain-based Learning” in a completely new way.

Your presenter, Eric Jensen is a twenty-year veteran of the brain-based field. He’s trained more people, written more books and innovated more than anyone in the field. Every principle, every idea and strategy is role-modeled so you can see it, hear it and feel HOW it works.

“(This workshop is) way better, more useful than most graduate courses.” -R.Z. Vernon, NJ

This program is literally, teaching with the brain in mind. It is purposeful, dynamic and easy to implement. The scientific, research-based teaching that BBL advocates involves the use of ten fundamental brain-mind principles. Each of these has been well supported by rigorous, quality scientific studies. These principles are revealed to you through activities, case study, lectures, video and discussion. Each of these principles is so powerful, that implementing even half of them will make a mind-blowing difference in your work.

But don’t take my word for it. Listen to what one of our participants has said…

“I took your workshop a couple of years ago and have been training other teachers. I had just turned around another group of skeptical teachers. As we were packing up, my new training partner said, “OK, it works. I was skeptical and didn’t agree with all the things you were doing, but I’m convinced that it makes a huge difference.” She never questioned what I was doing after that. She just began questioning why so she could understand it better too.” B. Felip, Trenton, NJ

This program is a dynamic overview of Eric Jensen’s revised book Teaching with the Brain in Mind. This course provides specific, practical brain-compatible strategies for all educators. All teachers influence their students. Now you can discover what it takes for students to acquire complex learning and achieve their best. You’ll want to learn these essential rules for how our brain works.

>>>> CLICK HERE TO REGISTER<<<<

Here’s what you can expect… Read more