Learning and the Brain Conference Notes Saturday 11/18

These are raw notes as I take them during presentations.  They have not been edited, but they will be in the next few weeks as I turn them into blog posts.  They will not only be notes on the presentations, but they will be mixed with my own thoughts and reflections.  I will try to note that so as not to misrepresent any speaker.

Keynote I: The Science of Learning: Building Memories and Effective Learners - Barbara A. Oakley, PhD, PE

Full disclosure:  I LOVE BARBARA OAKLEY!  She was a keynote speaker at my second Learning and the Brain conference, and she is one of the reasons I fell in love with the science of learning.  

What is learning?  Creating a set of neuron links through the growth of dendritic spines.

You need to have foundational connections in your brain in order to think.  To do that, you must have practiced skills and memorized information in your long-term memory.  The reason metaphor is a powerful teaching technique is because it uses the underlying neuron structure of what we already know to make the learning sticky.

Retrieval strengthens the dendrites.  Without it, the links are broken.

Working memory pulls things from long-term memory and helps us manipulate conscious information so we can work with it.  It manipulates a mental model.

What is a schema?  It is a mental model of connected information.  And the schema for one thing can overlap with other schemas and support each other.  Small changes in the schema will add up to big results.  Putting all of the schema together becomes your identity schema (how you think about yourself and your strengths and weaknesses and place in the world).

When a student is puzzled and trying to figure something out, they are creating a mental model.  This makes it easier to pull from long-term memory.  Teaching means getting a student's schema synchronized with your schema.  Activating their schema might mean they pull a different metaphor from long-term memory.  They can also synchronize their schema with that of the person next to them.

A student with high working memory can pull a lot from long-term memory and make more connections between them.  

Having a smaller working memory doesn't have to be limiting.  It may take longer to relate the "chunks," but the chunks can be handled by each arm of the working memory.  The schema will still build.  

A good schema can serve as the equivalent of a bigger working memory capacity.  (Prior knowledge is critical to learning.)

The size of working memory capacity doesn't matter if there are already links in long-term memory.  Learning becomes easier as the schema expands. (My thought:  Weights become easier to lift with the arms as you strengthen the core.  Kickboxing moves become easier to combine in different ways after you have learned them in multiple routines.)

The people who have struggled know how to study and how to overcome challenges when they meet them.  Those who have had high working memory sometimes don't know how to get around obstacles when they inevitably meet them.

When learning art styles, you create an art schema from learning about the individual styles.  Each new one you learn adds to the schema, allowing comparison and contrast.  You cannot get to the complex and interesting and creative schema without building it from the individual parts.  You cannot answer the high levels of Bloom's taxonomy until the schema is built.  Don't jump straight to it.

People who cannot frown (because of Botox) were found to be happier.  What you do with your face influences your emotional state as much as your emotional state influences your face.  You also pick up on the facial expressions of others, so the teacher's facial expression can affect the motivation and emotional states of the students.  Then, everyone's mirror neurons get in sync.  Gesturing also activates mirror neurons.  The more they see your face, the more trusted you will be.

Sometimes, reducing stress too much is bad for learning.  There is a sweet spot of stress that helps you remember better.  

Mice with dopamine systems de-activated cannot learn anything new.  Hook students with a challenging problem they will want to solve.  Getting to the solution after a few failed attempts distributes dopamine around the successful pathway.  Tell them a story at the beginning that makes them a little curious to have dopamine hanging around to help with memory. 

We used to think you had all the neurons you were ever going to have.  We now know that new ones grow throughout our lives.  The newer ones help you learn better, and they also make you feel better about the new learning.  

Keynote II: What Makes a Good Life: Lessons From the World’s Longest Study on Happiness and Wellbeing - Robert J. Waldinger, MD

The study of happiness was not considered a legitimate field of scientific inquiry when he started tracking this study.  The assumption was that successful people who were making money were happy.  Then, they started seeing happiness flatlining in developed countries.

The World Happiness Report shows that economic security is important to happiness (in that your basic needs for food and housing must be met).  This levels out when you achieve the level that pays your bills.  (A person making 75 million a year is not substantially happier than one making 75 thousand.)  Other needs are:

• social support 
• freedom to make life choices 
• the opportunity to be generous with time, money, effort, or expertise
• high trust level in those around them.  

Yet, surveys of people's goals remain getting rich, famous, and/or attaining career achievement.  

What is the disconnect?  

• Mixed messaging from advertising defines "the good life" for us rather than by ourselves.
• We compare our insides (knowledge of ourselves) to other people's outsides (what they post on social media)
• We are told what we are "supposed to" look like.

Most research is done by asking people about the past, but our memories are too malleable for that method to give us accurate data.  Taking snapshots of people of different ages can lead to false conclusions about the progression of life.  

The Harvard Study of Adult Development is the longest-running study of humans.  The subjects were separately studied.  One group was young mean recommended by their deans from Harvard.  The other was a group of juvenile delinquents with multiple police interactions.  Because it started in Boston in 1938, every subject is white and male.  Spouses and children were added later, so there is slightly more diversity now.

The Harvard men almost all served in WWII.  The other group was too young.  They were interviewed and followed for the rest of their lives.  The 30 that are still alive are in their late 90s, so now they are studying their children.  They studied mental and physical health, work life, family life, etc.  Methods have changed as science has progressed (they can study DNA now and put them in MRIs, and they couldn't in 1938).

Conclusions: 

• Eating well, sleeping well, and getting health care (essentially taking care of yourself) are predictive of happiness.
• People who were more connected to others stayed healthier and lived longer.  They were not just happier.  They had better blood pressure, better cholesterol levels, less diabetes, lower rates of obesity, etc.  It wasn't about the number of people they were connected to but how they rated the warmth of those connections that proved to be predictive.

People who are more socially connected have later onsets of slower rates of cognitive decline.

The loneliest groups are ages 16-24 and people with incomes below $24 thousand per year.  

How does social connection get into your body and affect your health?  Stress and loneliness hormones cause

• heightened cardiovascular reactivity.
• decreased immune function.
• chronic inflammation.

Does what we spend discretionary income on influence our happiness?  People who spend money on experiences are happier (and have more durable happiness) than those who spend money on things.  So spend money on a concert rather than a TV, a basketball game rather than a new outfit.  

In the last 25 years, people's social interactions have dropped significantly (58% drop in clubs, 43% drop in family dinners, 35% drop in having friends over).  As many as 25% of people say they have no one to confide in.

Because of screens, we have continual partial attention to our surroundings.  Our closest relationships are easy to neglect.  It takes our attention away from the natural world.  

Loneliness at work is a huge problem.  Only 30% of people said they have a best friend at work (someone they can talk to about their personal lives).  People with a work friend are better employees.  Half of CEOs report feeling lonely.  

Leaning into relationships requires giving undivided attention.  Have face-to-face meetings; eat meals with people; volunteer time; engage in the community.

"Attention is the most basic form of love." - John Tarrant

Small repeated actions of connection will do more than infrequent big ones.  Just text someone and tell them you are thinking of them.

Social and emotional skills can be taught (to kids in SEL programs but also to adults).  We can structure our lives to combat isolation.

Session:  Teaching Students to Teach Themselves: Empowering Children to Get the Most From Schooling - Daniel T. Willingham, PhD

Full disclosure:  I LOVE DANIEL WILLINGHAM!  This was the person I was most excited to see added to the schedule, and I am hoping to meet him today.  I read Why Don't Students Like School? a little over a year ago, and it has turned my world upside down.  I used it and his book Outsmart Your Brain and Barbara Oakley's Learning How to Learn to create my study skills class.

We don't expect pre-schoolers to bring any skills to the table about how to learn.  By high school, we have high expectations about a student's ability to regulate their own learning.

We expect them to learn from reading, take notes, avoid distractions, set priorities, study efficiently, take assessments, know whether they actually know something, etc. 

Avoiding Distraction

Situation -> Attention -> Appraisal -> Response

It is easier to intervene early in the cycle.

People overestimate the effect of their own willpower.

Tip:  Select your place.  If you can't, arrange your space.  Turn off phone notifications.  Where noise-canceling headphones or wear earplugs, face a wall.

Tip:  Don't choose distraction.  Turn off attention-draining options (TV, music, phone).

Tip:  Plan breaks.  You can stay on task better after a break.  

Reading to Learn

Learning to read involves choice and pleasure, and the writer is trying to entertain you with a narrative structure.

Reading to learn involves no choice.  The purpose isn't pleasure but understanding.  Authors are concerned about getting the school to adopt their book and whether it aligns with standards, not whether the student likes the book.  The structure is hierarchical rather than narrative.

The structure makes it difficult to make connections.  Children evaluate their own understanding one sentence at a time.  They won't notice conflicts between sentences.  The linear experience of reading makes it difficult for them to know what to look for.

Tip:  Be explicit about the structure.

Tip:  Pose questions to yourself every few paragraphs.

Tip:  Think about the structure after you have read.  Rebuild the tree diagram.

Intent to learn something is not important.  There is a lot of stuff in your memory that you did not intend to learn.  And there are many things you wanted to remember that you do not.

We remember what we focus on in the way we focused on it.  Pulling out the memory the same way it went in is very beneficial.  If you want them to commit the sound to memory, focus on the sound (foreign language pronunciation).  If you want them to think about meaning, focus on meaning.

"Memory is the residue of thought."

Not all repetition is created equal. Repetition of deep thinking about meaning works.  Just parroting does not.  Delay between repetitions if you want to remember it later.  The amount of delay is hard to optimize, but don't worry about that.  Just have some delay.  You want kids to sleep between sessions.

• 90% of students study for what is next.  If you are going to use spacing, you have to plan.
• 66% reread the chapter.  This does not help them remember.  "Blurting" isn't bad, but you can make it better by organizing it for meaning.
• Students should be taught to use a calendar with all of the claims on their time, but that involves teachers, students, and parents.  Plan around the things you know you cannot change.  "I won't be available to study on this date" means you can plan when you will be available.

How Do You Know Whether or Not You Know Something?

- Students are shocked to find that they might not know whether or not they know something.

- Familiarity is not the same as recollection.  Familiarity happens immediately but has no depth.  Recollection may take longer to construct, but it involves a story or context.

- Partial access is the belief that you know some part of it, so if you thought about it for a while, you could come up with the answer.  That feeling is not reliable.  This is the second reason why rereading the chapter or notes is a terrible way of studying.  

- Self-testing is the only way to overcome these, but students believe they have self-tested when they have just looked up from the book and answered while it was still in working memory.  Wait at least 30 minutes.

- What does "knowing" mean?  It should mean being able to explain, not just understanding it when someone else explains it or when they read it.

Keynote III: The Psychology and Ingredients for Great Teaching - Pedro De Bruyckere, PhD 

The problem with the psychology of teaching is that there is a replication crisis.  Some results from fraudulent research, but it is also due to publication bias.  They only publish studies where the hypothesis is confirmed.

My note:  Much of teaching is so complex that it is difficult to replicate results even if everything were done well.  

Growth Mindset is an example of a study that was difficult to replicate.  Some studies showed a small effect; others showed no effect.  But these are averages.  There is nuance, and that matters because we shouldn't throw out something without analyzing why the results are what they are.  (My note:  Again, teaching is complex.)

Phonics is the most replicated practice in educational history, and we spent years going the other way, which shows that we do no show respect for highly replicated studies.

Babies know the difference between 5 and 10 at 5 months old.  Piaget was wrong about many things (but to be fair, he didn't have the technology he would have needed).

He's giving a lot of good examples, but they won't translate to text.

By teaching kids to recognize cognitive biases, you can help them deal with fake news and misinformation.

Resilience does not mean never being sad or hurt.  It means being self-managing.  You can recognize your own feelings and deal with them in appropriate ways at appropriate times with social awareness.  Teach them to recognize fallacies and to seek help.

Keynote IV: The Science of Teaching - David B. Daniel, PhD

I love David Daniel.  He is a fixture of Learning and the Brain, and we have communicated through email a few times.  Friday was the first time I got to talk to him in person.  As I introduced myself, he said, "I know who you are."  I'm not sure how that is, but I'll take it.  

Teaching is under assault from politicians.  Be careful not to swing back the other way and think teachers are all angels either.

What is evidence?  How do we know if something is working?  

Studies that are carried out in a lab may not generalize to the classroom.  Be careful just swallowing advice wholesale.  Studies are greenhouses with lots of control and isolated variables.  Classrooms are gardens where the principles still apply, but there are a lot more variables.

Research needs to be carried out in classrooms.  They are not the same as labs.  

- The idea of needing skin to skin contact right after birth comes from observations of goats.  It was assumed that, since we were mammals, it worked the same.  It is dangerous to believe it and damaging to adoptive parents and those whose children are rushed to the NICU immediately.

Just because research is true doesn't mean it will work in the context in which you want to apply it.  It may work in the classroom next door and not work in yours.  You are being presented with hypotheses here, not guarantees.  

How the data is presented depends on the observer's biases and theoretical models.

We have a science of learning, but we don't have a science of teaching.  And we need one.  What if we evaluated our own practice, generated our own data, and developed our profession around our own findings?

What is our system of proof?

Evidence Generating Teaching

• Question
• Thing to Try
• Operational Definitions (How do you define your variable)
• Design for Context
• Pre-test/Measure
• Try it
• Measure impact
• Look for side effects.
• Keep, Toss, Adjust

It doesn't matter where the idea comes from.  What matters is how it is vetted.

Teaching and learning is messy, but that's okay when studying teaching because that's part of the design.  We can all identify the side effects of curriculum to bend it around the parts that don't work.  We can redesign.

This doesn't have to add substantially to the workload of the teacher.  In fact, it might make them happier because they know what works or what they need to work on instead of it being nebulous feelings.

Questions to Ask Yourself

Does this address a problem I actually have?  

Is it better than what I am already doing?

Is it worth the amount of workload?

Do I have the resources to implement it?

What is the likelihood that it will work in my specific context?

Does it work with who I am?  If not, can I adapt it without losing the benefit?

What do I want them to do or learn?

What am I doing now?  Is it working?  How do I know?

What am I going to try?

How will I implement it?

How will I measure it?

Did it work?

Was it worth it?

It is a dynamic system, so there is going to be a lot of change that results from any change you make.  

My thought:  There is a butterfly effect to how what we do changes things.

If you are a reflective practitioner, you are always a work in progress.

Session:  Mental Models: How Cognitive Science Can Transform the Way You Learn and Teach - Jim Heal, EdLD

I saw Him Heal last year, and I liked him very much.  He is part of Deans for Impact, always a good source of evidence-based information.  His lovely British accent doesn't hurt either.

Mental Models

• The picture you build in your mind of what it means to do something well (whether making a ham sandwich or playing the piano or teaching or doing math)
• It involves paying attention to what you are doing and what is happening around you.
• Mental models are built in real-time and over time.
• You move from understanding that is low resolution to high resolution.

Non-Examples

• Non-examples set the boundary terms.  How do we know what something is not?
• (My thought:  Craig Barton podcast "Show me a fraction that people might mistake for 1/4)
• They help stop incorrect assumptions
• They highlight critical features
• Is this a . . .?  Why or why not?

Prior Knowledge is Critical

• New knowledge is a puzzle piece that doesn't have anything to connect to if there is no relevant prior knowledge.
• We cannot engage students in learning without connecting to their prior knowledge.  
• The prior knowledge we activate must be accurate and relevant to the new information.
• Pitfall 1:  Entirely irrelevant prior knowledge
• Pitfall 2:  Partially relevant prior knowledge (knowing just enough to be dangerous)
• Pitfall 3:  Relevant prior knowledge that remains iNactivated
• It's like rock climbing.  Prior knowledge is a foothold.  new knowledge is a handhold.
• Where do you want students to go?  Be precise.
• Where are students starting from?  What can I reliably determine my students already know that is relevant to this concept?
• How do you plan to get from the start point to the endpoint?

Move from "Are they picking up what I'm putting down?" to "What do they already know that will enable them to pick up what I'm putting down?"

Session:  The Science of Learning - John T. Almarode, PhD

If you don't know that I love John Almarode, you just aren't paying attention.  I consider John a friend, and am always thrilled to attend his sessions.  However, there may not be a ton of notes because he always makes us get up and go across the room so we are nowhere near our notes.

• Select accurately what goes in
• Make it stick
• Store it in a way they can get it out

Attention, emotion, acquisition, retrieval, cognitive load are principles, but what matters most are the practices we use to implement the principles.

Lesson Design (effect size of 0.70) - Doing the right things at the right time.  Doing something that works well at one stage can be detrimental at another stage.

1. Procedural Information - the information we lay out for students that helps them lay out what they are supposed to do.  It helps reduce cognitive load for learning.
2. Essential Information - necessary background and prior knowledge needed to navigate the task.  If prior knowledge isn't there, students can't make it stick.
3. The Task - What are you asking them to do?  Give it meaning to what you want them to learn.
4. Practice - Getting it out after you have stored it makes it store more permanently. 

The only way to make teaching sustainable is to integrate findings with what we do.  

Learning and the Brain Conference Notes Friday 11/17

These are raw notes as I take them during presentations.  They have not been edited, but they will be in the next few weeks as I turn them into blog posts.  They will not only be notes on the presentations, but they will be mixed with my own thoughts and reflections.  I will try to note that so as not to misrepresent any speaker.

Keynote I: The Science of Wellbeing: Teaching and Training for Healthy Minds, Brains, and Bodies - Richard J. Davidson, PhD

Bad news:

- Our well-being is in rapid decline.

- Loneliness and isolation are now classified as an epidemic by the US Surgeon General, tracked between 2003 and 2020; so the trends began before Covid, but they have been increased by Covid.

- Lacking social connection is more of a risk factor for dying prematurely than smoking 15 cigarettes a day and obesity.

- Increased social media use is a risk factor for multiple mental health disorders.  The average social media usage of teenagers is 3.5 hours per day.

- Teacher mental health is declining.  The majority of symptoms of modern to severe stress, anxiety, and depression.

Good news:

- Having a dream of a different way of being is a powerful part of creating a solution.  (There is a reason Martin Luther King's speech was not "I have a nightmare.")

- Well-being is a skill that can be learned.

- The same mechanisms that encode suffering can be harnessed for good.

Pillars of a Healthy Mind (that can be trained)

1.  Awareness (Being Present) - Mindfulness, attention, and self-awareness

    - Most of us have little knowledge of what our mind is doing at every moment.  

    - Meta-awareness can be trained.

2.  Connections (Feeling Connected to Other People and to Our Place) - Appreciation, kindness

3.  Insight (Accurate Self Narrative) - Get curious about yourself and what your mind is doing.

4.  Purpose (Staying Motivated) - Clarifying our sense of direction.  How can we find meaning and purpose in what we are doing (no matter whether it is big or small, big activities or daily chores)

Awareness

- In The Principles of Psychology, Williams James extols the value of voluntarily bring back our wandering attention, calling it an act of character.

- Attention is the building block of all other forms of learning.

- EEGs during meditation show high levels of gamma wave activity

Connection

- In a randomized controlled study, some people brought to mind various categories of people (love one, associate, person who pushes my buttons) and thought about a challenging time. They then repeated affirming words ("You'll get through this," etc.) to that person in their mind.  The control group was taught basic behavioral modification techniques.

- The experimental group had higher compassion and were more pro-social and more likely to act in helpful or altruistic ways.  They also had more connectivity in the parts of the brain associated with altruistic behavior.

- Connection training has also been shown to decrease implicit bias in school teachers substantially.

Insight

- When you say something like "I am sad," what is your understanding of the "I"?  Is it your entire self?

- Resilience (the rapidity of recovery from negative events) is increased by those who train in self-insight.

- A tone is played 10 seconds before a painful stimulus.  A non-meditator begins to show pain activity in the brain with the tone and takes a long time to recover after the stimulus.  The long-term meditator shows no reaction to the tone, has an equal or higher response to the pain initially but comes back down very quickly.

Purpose

- In people 75 and older, mortality risk is lowest in people with a high sense of purpose in life.

Healthy Minds Program showed dramatic improvement even when participants used it for 5 minutes per day and with activities that didn't require active meditation.  (My question:  Do people who pray get the same kind of benefit?)

Meditation should not be about stopping our thoughts.  If we become more aware of our thoughts, we can make better use of them.  

How we recover from stress is more important than reducing stress.

Keynote II: Building Meaning Builds Brains: The Science of Emotions, Brain Development, and Effective Teaching - Mary Helen Immordino-Yang

Teaching and learning is more complex than laboratory science.  Lab science is super technical, but the real world is dynamic, which creates a different set of challenges.

The ways kids make meaning out of the things they witness enables processes of adaptive change for them to grow, make more meaning, and show up as adults.  We can predict it via the steps of the work they are doing while their brain is growing.  It influences the actual fiber connections, not just the psychology.  (My summary:  Adapting grows the brain, and brain growth makes us better adapters.)

"Aqueous" by Margaret Lazzari attempts to communicate the interdependence of biology and self and the world around us.  The white lines are the white matter fiber tracks from an MRI brain scan.  

Meaning-making shapes the networks of the physical brain.  

Teaching and learning cannot be separated from the relational context in which we learn.  

Infants come with innate inborn capacities, starting as reflexes.  The biology is set for helping the mother (or other adult) know what to do to optimize the learning environment.  (e.g. The baby engages at a specific distance and not others.)

"Emotions may be automatic, but we need to learn how to feel."  

Feeling emotions involves brain systems for feeling and regulating the body and for constructing a sense of self.  Everyone CAN do it.  The more interesting question is DO YOU?  Reacting to the here and now has value, but it doesn't grow the brain over time.  Engaging purposefully and making meaning does.

We are whole people, not carved-up pieces.  We cannot separate physical, mental, and emotional.  When we hold an infant, our digestion calms, our heart rate lowers, and our blood pressure lowers.  The baby senses those changes and responds to the relaxed state differently.  How can we do that in a classroom?  Can we make math FEEL different?  As we build the skill, we understand the world differently, and the skill will feel different.

The brain and mind are not organized in the leveled way we learned in the 60s.  It is all interconnected from top to bottom.  

"Teddy, we love you more than the whole earth size."  I don't understand the size of my love for Teddy.  It feels the same as not understanding when my parents told me that I live on a giant spinning ball of dirt.  I can't wrap my head around either of them, so they are connected.

If the medulla (just above the brain stem) is damaged, you can't even be kept alive on life support.  Brain scans show that it is repurposed to process emotional engagement.  The same part of the brain that tells you your heart is pumping faster when you run up the stairs is engaged when your heart beats faster because of your attraction to the guy across the room.  The same part of the brain that makes you feel unsettled if your lunch isn't digesting properly makes you feel butterflies when you are nervous about your math test.  The "Salience Network" relates the physical with the emotional/mental.

Training in this involves connecting what you are thinking about to the meaning of being you learning and feeling about what you are thinking about.  Thinking deeply involves telling complex, emotional stories to yourself.  Transcendent thinking predicts future development of tracts that allow efficient communication across the brain.  (Ask kids how they feel about what they are learning more frequently.  Ask them questions that cause them to make meaning.)

What "kind of brain" you have is not predictive.  How much change your brain shows is predictive.  What matters is that the brain is growing.

Teachers show the same activity described here when grading their own students, but they don't show it when grading the work of students they don't know.  

Whatever you have emotion about, you are thinking about.  Whatever you are thinking about, you will learn about.

Session A:  The Science of Memory: Why We Forget and How to Remember Better - Elizabeth Kensinger

Ways we forget

1. We can have an intention set without it leading to action that we follow through on.  (I meant to put my adapter in my bag, but I forgot to actually bring it.)

2.  Recognizing a face without remembering who that person is or remembering their name.

3.  A slide comes up that we are supposed to teach, and we forget what it means or what we are supposed to say. 

Memory is not one thing.  It is a constellation of abilities.  One system might be working well in a moment while another is not.  It could be dependent on nutrition, time of day, and how much caffeine you have had (or not had).  There can be obstacles to some parts of memory but not others (Alzheimer's patients who can still play the piano but can't remember people or scenarios.

Short-Term Memory

- Sensory memory lasts about two seconds.  You heard words, but you only hang on to a snippet for a few seconds.  You look around the room and hold on to what you just saw for just long enough to make it seem like you are seeing the entire room at the same time.

- Working Memory - When you pay attention to something long enough to hold it in your consciousness and work with it.  Can stay in your mind for as long as you are actively thinking about it (Repeating a phone number over and over until you have a chance to write it down).

Long-Term Memory

- Episodic memory - a story, reliant on the learning experience, includes all of the sensory information and feelings associated with it.  In the hippocampus.

- Semantic memory - facts that we know independent of the learning episode.  Doesn't rely on the hippocampus, so it can be retrieved faster.

- Implicit memory (We aren't aware of it) - how to ride a bike, the well-practiced path to work, most motor skills, tying shoes, conditioned triggers 

It takes effort to build memories.  Memories have to go through an encoding cycle to move from short-term to long-term memory.  Every time you retrieve a memory, you rebuild the structure by going through that cycle again.  It is an effortful, active process.  Because of this, a memory isn't static; every time you rebuild it, it can be embellished with new information.  

This also gives the opportunity for errors to creep in.  A person then actually remembers it that way, even if it is not true.  

Memory exists as a source of data to help us deal with the current moment and make plans for the future.  It is a shortcut our brains use to avoid thinking.  

Remembering Better (FOUR)

Focus attention

Organize

Understand

Relate

To do this, you constantly use the prefrontal cortex, providing a rich scaffold for encoding the memory.

- Spaced rehearsal of information in different places and at different times helps because it becomes less context-dependent.  

- Sleep is critical to memory.  It helps with storage.  You must go through both slow-wave sleep and REM sleep to rehearse and connect your memories.  It helps transfer them from episodic to semantic memories.

- Exercise causes cellular and molecular changes that create functional brain changes that lead to better cognitive functioning.  Wendy Suzuki's studies show that people who engage in cardiovascular exercise immediately after a class help them remember what they learned in that class better.

- Retrieval is harder during stress, and the stress then makes a vivid memory of the inability to retrieve.  Breathing control helps; so does thinking back to a time when you successfully retrieved.  Don't try to think of all the possible answers because your brain will inhibit all of the similar answers, meaning if you pulled up a close answer, you will have a much harder time getting to the right answer.

Keynote III: Making Schools Work: Bringing the Science of Learning to Active “Minds-On” and Playful Classrooms - Roberta Michnick Golinkoff, PhD and Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, PhD

These are very fun women, but they are losing me a little in talking about "the factory model."  That's not quite an accurate representation of the history of education.  Also, I get a little lost when people use "21st century" as an adjective.  These notes might be shorter than the others.

It is possible to have joyful teaching again and at the same time get deeper learning.

Education is a surround sound endeavor that happens everywhere.

What is success in education?  Do we want them to be able to do reading, writing, and math?  Do we want them to be happy, healthy, thinking, caring collaborative thinkers?  

Play for learning should be active, engaging, meaningful, social, interactive, and joyful.

Providing a goal turns free play into guided play.

Play and social regulation lead to more executive function.

Children choose more difficult options when playing for fun than when they are in "work mode."

Look at your lesson plan and ask yourself, "Can I make it more active, more engaging, more social, more meaningful, more interactive, more joyful?

I like what they are doing in public spaces.  I'm on board with that.

Some of My Favorite Teachers (They Don't Teach in School)

When I joined the YMCA in March, I knew I was going to be a novice learner in a way I had not been in quite some time.  I've been teaching the same things for 25 years, and even the learning I've been doing about cognitive science was a form of learning with which I am quite familiar (academic learning from reading and listening).  Learning about physical things was going to be very different, and it's not an area in which my klutzy self has ever had much confidence.  I was excited to try new things and learn, but I also knew I was going to be pretty bad at things for quite a while.  (I will talk more about this in my  Thanksgiving post, but one of the great things was the first time I walked into Cardio Kickboxing and asked Matt if there was anything I needed to know.  His answer was "First of all, don't take yourself too seriously.  That was very helpful.)  

So, I knew this would be a learning challenge.  What I did not know was what an exceptional group of educators I was about to meet.  

As a person who reads educational research, listens to evidence-based education podcasts, attends Learning and the Brain conferences about cognitive science, and then teaches teachers how to improve their teaching, my brain is always noticing HOW I am being taught, not just WHAT I am being taught.  Seeing these concepts applied to non-academic teaching has been especially interesting, so let me tell you about those whose classes I take regularly.

 

Liz K - Meet the Queen of Clarity.  According to my friend John Amarode's book, Clarity for Learning, students should know three things at the outset of a learning activity - what they are doing, why they are doing it, and how they will know when they have achieved success.  I take Liz's spin class on Monday nights, and she tells us what each challenge will involve and how it will help us.  She gives feedback as we do it, so we know exactly where we are.  She explains where the pace is most important and where the tension is most important.  She uses the tools on the bikes to help us set a standard for ourselves and then match or beat it on the next challenge.  I always know exactly what benefit I will get from each thing Liz asks us to do, which is motivating because what she is asking us to do, climbing a hill on high tension or sprinting at over 100rpm, is usually kind of painful.

Liz also exhibits and instills a Growth Mindset.  Most of the instructors at the YMCA do, but I have noticed it in Liz's class at a particularly high level.  I even have her quoted on my classroom bulletin board.  She says, "Don't say, 'No, I can't,' until you have said, 'Yes, I'll try.'"  (By the way, teachers, if you want a great book on growth mindset, please pick up Andrew Watson's Learning Grows. He does a great job of making a readable summary of the history of this research;  it is more than just Carol Dweck.). Liz gives us a chance to beat our own best during each class, but she supports us even if we don't. She'll say, "Did you meet your goal?  If not, did you stay motivated the whole time?  That's what the goal is for."  Every class starts with the same speech, "If you've got something to sweat about, go ahead and crank up that level. Go for a PR. If, however, just getting here was a workout, guess what? You are already cycling. You've achieved that just by being here."  

I frequently think back to a day in May when I had experienced a particularly rough day as a yearbook advisor, and I came to Liz's class feeling pretty low. I beat the crap out of the bike that night, putting every frustration of my day into the pedals.  When I met her 4-minute challenge, I got to end a day where I felt like I had not done anything right with a serious win.  Since then, I have pushed myself harder in spin classes than I previously had because I realized what I could do when I really wanted to.  I think about that day frequently because it was so helpful to me, so I try to think of ways to provide my students with a way to win as well.   

Jay C - I don't have a book to recommend on the Communication of Care, not because there isn't a lot of research on this very human aspect of education, but because no one has written a very readable book on the subject.  We all know that it is important for teachers to care about their students, but not all teachers (particularly teachers of older students) know how to communicate it that well.  Those teachers should come to the Y and watch Jay. When Jay starts teaching, we know that he cares about us. We know it even more than we know what speed we should be pedaling. He calls us by name and asks about our lives.  I ran into him at the water fountain a couple of days ago, and he said "I've been thinking about you this week" and told me how glad he was that I was in his class.  He frequently tells the class, "You all inspire me."  He shares stories about the music he is playing, and the stories are all about the humanity of the artists.  While you are in the toughest part of the workout, he shouts, "You are strong.  You are healthy.  You are a gift."  I have often thought that people walking by in the hall would get contact encouragement from this man.  

In April, I was still experimenting with classes and trying to figure out whose I wanted to take regularly.  I had taken Jay's classes 3 or 4 times when I came one evening feeling a little emotionally raw from the events of the week.  Near the end of the class, Jay told us an incredibly touching story about his son, who had witnessed a car accident that week.  He then played "Bridge Over Troubled Water," a song that has a 97% likelihood of making me cry on a normal day.  So, I am pedaling and sobbing and wiping sweat and tears from my face simultaneously.  Then (I'm not done), he said, "You know, there are a lot of people who feel like they don't have a bridge.  If that's you and you need a bridge, come up after class and we'll exchange numbers.  I'll be honored to be a bridge for you."  I knew then this was someone whose class I would never leave.  One evening, I asked him if he would pray for me about something, and he said, "Yes, let's do it right now" and pulled me aside to pray with me. I'm not the only one he has this effect on; a couple walked into class one afternoon with t-shirts that said "Jay's Jammers" and said they had taken his class when he taught in another city.  Imagine loving your exercise instructor so much that you have shirts made and then, when you happen to be in his town, you come to his class.  That doesn't just happen because an instructor teaches the technical aspects well or plays good music.  That happens because he communicates how much he cares in a genuine way.

Stacey A - Stacey is an exercise machine.  I take her outdoor spin class every Saturday, but I have also taken her cardio step class a few times, and she teaches a strength training class.  Although she says this isn't true, I feel like she would work out in the red zone for an hour if she weren't teaching.  She is a force to be reckoned with, and so is her class.  Whether it is an endurance ride or a challenge ride, I know she is going take me right to my maximum ability.  Just when I think I can't take one more minute at this pace, she'll say, "20 more seconds until recovery."  To educators, this is known as Desirable Difficulty - keeping people in the sweet spot where it is difficult enough to be worth doing but not so difficult that they give up.

For those who take her class regularly, Stacey remembers what we have said and checks in.  If she knows a person's dog has been sick, she will ask about it the next time she sees them.  If they've been on a trip, she asks about it.  One day, I told her I would leave 5 minutes early because I was going to experiment with taking two classes back to back.  The next time I saw her, she asked me how it went and whether I thought I would do it again.  Two months later, she asked me how it was going.

Stacey's great strength as a teacher is, not only pushing us to a place of "desirable difficulty," but giving us an intuitive sense of what that is.  (Teachers, if you want to know more about desirable difficulties in the classroom, see this list of research articles by Robert and Elizbeth Bjork on Google Scholar.) Our bikes come with color zones that are meant to let us know how hard we are working out, but if we haven't set the numbers accurately or don't know what it should be, the colors won't mean anything.  She describes what we should be feeling at each stage.  Because of Stacey's descriptions (Green should feel like work, but you can still breathe; at yellow, your mouth will be open.  Red is all you've got; if you don't feel the need for a break, you weren't in your red zone), I could know how hard I was working on any bike, choreograph my own workout, or adjust my input number if I don't feel the way I should feel in each zone.  I have adjusted my input number twice as I've gotten stronger based on her descriptions.

Matt M - I don't have words to describe what an incredible teacher Matt is.  He has an extraordinary ability to accept me exactly where I am with whatever I have the ability to do (or not do) while simultaneously challenging me to do more.  That's a pretty special gift.  I also just enjoy watching him teach because he gets all lit up inside in a way that shines through his eyes, so it makes me feel happy, like I'm sitting in a window with sunlight coming through it.

I assume Matt doesn't spend his free time reading books about Cognitive Load and working memory (teachers, the best one you can read is Learning Begins by my friend, Andrew Watson), yet he manages cognitive load like a professional educator by teaching each part of a move in slow steps before speeding it up.  I'm willing to bet he hasn't studied up on the last decade of research into Modeling and Scaffolding, yet every kickboxing and weightlifting class is filled with those exact techniques. Every week, in his Cardio Kickboxing class, Matt stops and watches us do a combination without his cues, joking that we won't need him anymore.  He doesn't know it, but this is our most powerful educational tool, Active Retrieval Practice (teachers, pick up Pooja Agarwal's book Powerful Teaching or go to her website, for more on this important concept).  Matt is a joy to learn from, so I take his classes whenever I can, hoping he doesn't get tired of seeing me.

These four aren't the only teachers I have had at the YMCA who use sound educational practices.  Gwen tells us "Get your mind right" to remind us of the purpose of what we are doing.  Greg uses imagery like "your feet should feel like you're scraping gum off your shoe" and "it should feel like you've got half a Snickers bar under your tire" to make these abstract concepts into concrete thoughts in our minds.  Julie takes up space in our working memories by telling dad jokes, so we don't have room in it for thoughts of quitting (distraction is just filling working memory).  Thomas gets off his bike and walks around, an act of formative assessment. There are more, but I didn't want this post to be a mile long, so I only thoroughly discussed those whose classes I take every week.  These outstanding educators may not teach in school, but they are amazing and impactful teachers nonetheless.  

Want to Grow? Do the Harder Thing Now

In his excellent book, Why Don't Students Like School, Daniel Willingham discusses the difference between performance and growth.  A lot of students use study techniques that are ineffective for learning because they seem good at the moment.  As teachers, we all know that cramming is not good for keeping things in long-term memory, but students feel that it is effective because they do well in the short term (even though they know they have forgotten that information a few days later if you press them on it).  Parents have sometimes told me they didn't understand how their student performed poorly on a test because they went over their flashcards many times the night before, and they knew them by the end of the study session.  They don't realize that the student has recognized the material from seeing it a few minutes ago, and that they suffer from the "Illusion of Knowing." 

You can learn more about recognition/familiarity vs. knowing in Willingham's book Outsmart Your Brain.  In it, he uses an analogy from the world of fitness.  He asks the reader to consider a situation where your goal is to do as many pushups as possible.  He suggests that most people would be inclined to do the easiest pushups possible.  After all, you can do them relatively quickly, so it seems like you are reaching your goal, at least from a short-term performance standpoint.  What is not happening, however, is growth.  If you want to get stronger, you have to do the hardest pushups you can accomplish and then slowly make them even harder.  It will feel ineffective because you will end the session with jello arms, but it will help you accomplish your long-term goals in a way the easy thing won't.  You should do the harder thing.

I am in a class called Group Power at the YMCA.  It is a choreographed group weightlifting class, and I love it.  The first night I took it, I was afraid of injury, so I used the lightest weights I could, but for some of the moves, I realized I could do a lot more.  Over the next few weeks, I added more and now have "a normal weight factor" for each muscle group.  The instructor changes up the routine every six weeks or so, giving me the opportunity to experiment.  Right now, we are using an inclined bench.  During the core portion of the routine, we have the option to fight gravity or let it help us.  I thought of Daniel Willingham and chose to do situps and crunches against gravity, knowing it would help in the long run.  That long-run mindset is important because the first week, I looked like a dying cockroach, legs flailing everywhere.  Another member of the class showed me how to grip the bench risers with my feet, which helped a lot.  I still run out of core and leg strength a few reps before the end, but I feel stronger and can feel that I have improved.  Next week, I will talk about ways in which an understanding of cognitive science has helped me in group fitness classes, but the idea of doing the harder thing despite the feeling of ineffectiveness is definitely one of them.  I wouldn't be pushing myself as hard if not for Willingham's analogy.

Two weeks ago, in a parent-teacher conference, a mom came in and said, "My daughter has changed how she studies because of your advice."  I have spent a lot of time explaining effective study methods to my 8th graders.  Some of them neglect the advice, believing that they know what works for them in the face of contrary evidence.  ("No, listening to music doesn't affect my working memory," said one young lady as though she was qualified to know that.)  I want students to understand the reason for the advice we give them, so I have explained the difference between performance and learning.  Some continue with the ineffective strategies that make them comfortable, and some only care about performance (which is hard to change in our current culture).  But those who care about learning adapt, and I know they will find it satisfying at some point if they stick with it through the times when it feels ineffective.  

As teachers, it is easy to send mixed messages.  I know have been guilty of talking to them about keeping a long-term perspective on learning while also communicating with them more about their performance when grading them.  It's a tension I don't know we will ever fully reconcile, but we should be aware of it and try to keep them focused on growth over grades, learning over performance, and the important over the immediate.