B: Therefore, teachers might benefit from knowing more about the brain and the mind.<\/p>\n
C: Therefore, we should hang out with people who study brains (neuroscientists) and who study minds (psychologists). We can learn from them, and they can learn from us.<\/p>\n
So far, so good.<\/p>\n
That seemingly simple logic, however, gets complicated quickly.<\/p>\n
First<\/strong> — as I argue frequently<\/a> — we benefit MUCH MORE from studying psychology than neuroscience.<\/p>\n Second<\/strong> — again, a refrain here on the blog<\/a> — we need always to remember context and nuance.<\/p>\n For example:<\/p>\n Teaching 1st graders might require different skills and techniques than teaching 8th graders, or college students.<\/p>\n Sometimes neurotypical students benefit from different teaching strategies than non-neurotypical students.<\/p>\n Cultural differences shape classroom expectations, and might thus require or forbid various teaching strategies.<\/p>\n In other words, my simple idea — “improve my teaching by learning brainy stuff!!” — quickly requires all sorts of subtleties.<\/p>\n In fact, I’ve just stumbled across a new one<\/em>. Let me try to explain.<\/p>\n As an English teacher, I live in a wordy<\/em> world.<\/p>\n We study poems and write essays and read Zora Neale Hurston and revel in grammar. (Well, I revel. My students graciously put up with me.)<\/p>\n As the Prince of Denmark once said: “Words, words, words.”<\/p>\n To teach these English-y topics, I’ve got lots of strategies:<\/p>\n Retrieval practice: “What’s the difference between a direct object and a predicate nominative…Sylvia?”<\/p>\n Managing alertness: “Alistair and Yazmeen, please write your answers on the board.”<\/p>\n Working memory load reduction: “What’s our acronym for the 4 key verbs?”<\/p>\n Research suggests all this wordiness will help my students learn.<\/p>\n HOWEVER, not everything that students learn boils down to words<\/em>.<\/p>\n Yes, SOME knowledge is “declarative<\/strong>“: I can say it out loud.<\/p>\n Yet OTHER knowledge is “procedural<\/strong>“: something I do<\/em>, not something I can say<\/em>.<\/p>\n Imagine, then, that I’m teaching someone how to play golf.\u00a0As they practice, should I use those same teaching strategies? Will my players benefit from translating their physical activity into words<\/em>?<\/p>\n For instance:<\/p>\n Retrieval practice: “Describe the best stance for a putt…Sylvia.”<\/p>\n Working memory load reduction: “What’s our acronym for the ideal golf swing?”<\/p>\n Will words, words, words help golfers?<\/p>\n Just this last week I’ve started finding research raising intriguing doubts.<\/p>\n The research suggests:<\/p>\n Some kinds of knowledge aren’t really verbal: say, for example, a golf swing<\/em>.<\/p>\n Asking students to put not-verbal knowledge into words <\/em>as they learn\u00a0actually gets in the way of learning<\/em>.<\/p>\n In other words, if I ask a golfer to\u00a0describe her swing<\/em> while learning, I’m asking her to cram\u00a0procedural<\/strong>\u00a0knowledge into\u00a0declarative<\/strong> form.<\/p>\n That translation — put “not words” into “words” — makes learning harder.<\/p>\n I’ve been using golf as an example because the studies I’ve found focus on golf skills.<\/p>\n In this study<\/a>, novice golfers learned less when asked to describe their golf strokes.<\/p>\nTo The Classroom, and Beyond<\/h2>\n
Plot Twist<\/h2>\n
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