How Does the Teenage Brain Learn?

1. How Does the Teenage Brain Learn? Carol Landa Sept , 2012

2. Objectives • Identify • Basic needs for learning • Role of brain structures in learning • Describe • Learning through social interaction • Hierarchy of learning skills

3. Objectives Identify: • Role of recognition, strategic and affective systems in learning • Eight neurodevelopmental constructs that interact to enable students to acquire knowledge, skills or to accomplish certain tasks • Possible strategies to cope with construct weaknesses (leveraging strengths and affinities)

4. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs Cognitive Level (the more you learn, the more youwant to learn) D-needs Deficit Needs

5. Brain Structure Exterior (Lobes) Interior (Brain Stem, Limbic System, Cerebrum, Cerebellum)

6. Brain Structure • Represents 2% of our body weight, but consumes nearly 20% of our calories • Four lobes on each side • Temporal • Occipital • Parietal • Frontal

7. Lobes of the brain • Temporal • Sound, music, face/object recognition, parts of LT memory • Occipital • Visual • Parietal • Spatial orientation, calculation, some types of recognition • Frontal • Executive Control Center, planning and thinking

8. Frontal Lobe • Monitors Higher Order Thinking skills, directs problem solving, regulates “excess” emotion • BUT IT DOES NOT FULLY MATURE UNTIL MID 20s

9. Limbic System • Limbic system generates emotions and processes emotional memories

10. Emotions Rule in Adolescent Brains • Maslow’s 1st 4 levels are emotional and physiological – LIVE, SAFE, LOVE, RESPECT • Adolescents are ruled by emotions due to “immaturity” of the frontal lobe • (high risk behaviors are seen too!)

11. What gets stored in long term memory is determined by the limbic (EMOTIONAL) not RATIONAL system Fact 1

12. How Does Information Get to the Brain • Your senses • Sight • Sound • Touch • Smell • Taste

13. Learning Requires “New Roads” • Neurons (nerve cells) form information pathways by connecting to other neurons (synapses)

14. Neural Pathways • Learning creates new pathways or strengthens existing ones. Neural pathways can be prunedor become neural highways! How many pathways?

15. Fact 2 Source: How the Brain Learns, David Sousa, p.15 When we learn, brain connections are thin and fragile. They must be “reused” or “revisited” to become strong and faster

16. 100 Billion neurons X 10,000 connections = 1 quadrillion (15 zeros) possible connections

17. Repeated use of the same pathways  myelin sheaths  Superhighways

18. Neurons only connect “chemically” Synapse

19. Building requires ENERGY! • The brain utilizes nearly 20% of the calories we eat • The more challenging the task, the more ATP is needed by the cells.

20. Fact 3 Source: How the Brain Learns, David Sousa, p.15 Breakfast (especially water and glucose) help the brain to function well. 8 oz of WATER for each 25 lbs of child PER DAY. Water is needed for all chemical reactions in the body!

21. Sleep…enough? Learning occurs best: Inadequate sleep Can be caused by caffeine in soda Decreases ability to store information in the brain (decreased REM cycles) Increases irritability (emotion) Increases risk of errors • When degree of focus is high (8am -1 pm for high school students) • When a student averages 8.5 hours of sleep per night • When study is done immediately prior to sleep. Source: Millman, 2005;Acebo, Wolfson,& Carskadon, 1997; Schacter, 1996

22. Students getting C's, D's and F's got about 25 minutes less sleep and went to bed about 40 minutes later than students who reported they were getting A's and B's. Source: Mary A. Carskadon, PhD Brown University Medical School

23. Fact 4 Source: How the Brain Learns, David Sousa, p.15 Teens need AT LEAST 8.5 hours of sleep per night

24. Excess stress can inhibit brain growth Studies at University of Wisconsin show that exposure to “intense and lasting stress” affected short term spatial working memory. It is unknown whether this effect is reversible.

25. Aerobic exercise increases memory and executive functioning - Castelli, Hillman et al. 2007

26. Exercise improves classroom behavior and academic performance

27. Exercise triggers the release of chemicals that improve communication between neurons

28. Fact 5 Source: How the Brain Learns, David Sousa, p.15 Exercise can increase memory and executive functioning (when done in moderation)

29. A caution • Organized competitive sports generally require huge amounts of energy (mentally and physically). • A child who is “exhausted” cannot study with the same success as one who is “well-rested” (See BRAIN FUEL, SLEEP and STRESS on previous slides)

30. If physiological needs are met.. • Cognitive learning can begin!

31. So… how do teenagers learn? Children Learn …

32. Sometimes, it depends on time

33. Learning Occurs With Purposeful Interaction with Others • Learning theories of Bronfenbrenner and Vygotsky

34. Jay Giedd, NIH neuroscientist “The brain is largely wired for social interaction and for bonding with caretakers” “ Sometimes it's disappointing to people that, with all the science and all the advances, the best advice we can give is things that our grandmother could have told us generations ago… to spend loving, quality time with our children.

35. Urie Bronfenbrenner Community School Family Individual and Peers Development and Learning Depends On Interactionsand Experiences

36. Varied Life Experience Provides Links for New Learning • Varied experiences gardening, going to the zoo, trips to the museums summer camp Volunteer work Travelling • These provide a foundation to which students can “link” or associate new information.

37. Lev Vygotsky Unknown(Danger) (Risk) LEARNING ZPD Known (Safety) The range of skill that can be developed with adult guidance or peer collaboration exceeds what can be attained alone.

38. We learn through modeling • Communication with any knowledgeable adult or peers helps to develop higher “cognitive” processes.

39. Fact 7 Source: How the Brain Learns, David Sousa, p.15 The brain exhibits plasticity. It changes with each experience. Teenagers (and all children) who interact with others, and have a wide variety of experiences, have an easier time learning and developing higher order thinking skills

40. What thinking and analysis skills are needed by high school students or developed in high school? AKA: I studied, butI got a C or… I couldn’t rememberwhen I got to the test.

41. Behaviors (skills) important in learning Bloom’s Taxonomy assemble, construct, create, design, develop, formulate, write appraise, argue, defend, judge, select, support, value, evaluate appraise, compare, contrast, criticize, differentiate, discriminate, distinguish, examine, experiment, question, test choose, demonstrate, dramatize, employ, illustrate, interpret, operate, schedule, sketch, solve, use, write classify, describe, discuss, explain, identify, locate, recognize, report, select, translate, paraphrase define, duplicate, list, memorize, recall, repeat, reproduce state HIGH SCHOOL

42. Bloom’s Taxonomy • A set of learning objectives • Increase in complexity. Learning at the higher levels is dependent upon mastery of the lower levels • Students MUST study at a level of complexity that matches the level of the assessment!

43. Understanding, not memorization • Many test questions involve analyzing and evaluating • When your teenager studies for a test, he/she must learn and study at the same “level” that the question will be asked.

44. Moving up the skills ladder • Parents/teachers must model the desired skill. • Then they must be sure the skill is being done correctly • Finally, student should independently utilize the skill, and be assessed.

45. How does your child study? If “I studied” using these skills? And test questions ask to: assemble, construct, create, design, develop, formulate, write appraise, argue, defend, judge, select, support, value, evaluate appraise, compare, contrast, criticize, differentiate, discriminate, distinguish, examine, experiment, question, test choose, demonstrate, dramatize, employ, illustrate, interpret, operate, schedule, sketch, solve, use, write • I can • define, duplicate, list, memorize, recall, repeat, reproduce state • AND maybe • classify, describe, discuss, explain, identify, locate, recognize, report, select, translate, paraphrase • OR Perhaps • choose, demonstrate, dramatize, employ, illustrate, interpret, operate, schedule, sketch, solve, use, write

46. How does your child study? Massed practice (cramming) Practiced Learning over Time A “chunk” studied each night Results in better “pop quiz scores” Placed in long term memory due to repetitive practice over time. • Can result in good test scores (within 24 hours) • Provides little or no long term retention (you will need to relearn it for the final)

47. Fact 8 Source: How the Brain Learns, David Sousa, p.15 Students must have successful practices to learn “Meaningful chunks” Step-by-step modeling Guided Practice Independent Practice Feedback

48. Facts 9 and 10 Source: How the Brain Learns, David Sousa, p.15 Whoever explains, learns! When you study with your child ask open-ended questions that require your student to provide “linking” information to demonstrate relationships (providing the answers are “accurate”!) Practice does not make perfect..practice makes PERMANENT.

49. Fact 11 Source: How the Brain Learns, David Sousa, p.15 You need to learn and study on the level that you will be assessed. Be sure you practice at the level you will be tested.

50. Neuro networks • Recently, (within the last 20 years) we have been able to do “active” brain studies (we watch changes in the brain, while someone is performing an activity) • THREE networks have been identified that activate when learning occurs