We have all had to learn something, like walking or talking, but how we physically learn has interested many people. The problem is that we ask, “How do we learn?” The actual thing we should ask is, “How does my brain learn?” This mistake, it seems, is why we do not learn the way we should – the right way – but we learn the way we want to, ignoring how our brain does its best work.
How do we learn wrong? Why is our brain mad? Well, a problem with the way we learn is that we usually have a schedule, a pattern. Our brain likes changes, ones of doing things in a different order or amount. Studying is a problem in this way, because that pounds information at the brain, which does not like being ordered around. School does the same thing. It is just like driving 90 MPH on a 50 MPH road – you get slowed down eventually. As Benedict Corey, author of How We Learn, said in that book on his mistake, “So, after dropping out, I made an attitude adjustment. I loosened my grip. I stopped sprinting. Broadened the margins, to paraphrase Thoreau.”1 After this, he lived life. School wasn’t his life anymore. He lived life as if school was a part of it, not it itself. He “never let go of [his] studies, just let them become part of [his] life.” Then, as an adult, he started studying how the brain learns. He found that distractions and naps aid learning. Schools, in this case, do not do very well in letting your brain open the door – they kick that door wide open. Do we need to do things to learn? Yes, but thinking, that is something we truly need. “The most necessary task of civilization is teaching people how to think… [our education system] does not encourage original thought or reasoning,” said Thomas Edison. Thinking helps understanding, and without it, do we truly know and understand?” Thinking does use more brainpower; so why not think so that we do not have to use as much? How does doing enter the equation? Doing helps us learn because we are using more senses. There are examples of how video games teach kids things that are – supposedly - important. How about making the games? “The Constructionist mind is revealed… imagining children making the games instead of just playing them.” And, also in Minds in Play, Papert mentions that we can learn from this. This action puts thought and knowledge to use, and this begs the question of what, seemingly just there, can teach us? The answer? Many things can and will teach us. The problem – only certain types of these teaching work. What types of teaching do and do not work? Imagine you are a new college student and walk into the science classroom on your first day, and there stands a professor. How will you understand what he says? Experts talk differently than novices, and so you would not understand a good amount of their jargon. Who you really want to see when you walk into that classroom is someone who has been in class for several years, so that he or she understands the topic and what students think about when they are learning these things. Then, the next year, you would want someone with a little more knowledge to teach, and so forth. This step-by-step process is good for our brains, and for overall knowledge of the community. How does our brain physically work? This is the hard part to understand, and of course, the basis of learning overall. So, the brain is made of neurons. These 100 billion neurons allow electrical impulses, or action potential, to pass through them. Dendrites, kinds of points between neurons, grow based on how much you use them in which way. Spiny Arbors then grow on these, adding information to your knowledge. But how is the signal protected from interruption from other neuron signals? This is protected by Myelin, a white and fatty substance that insulates the neurons. This also speeds up the time it takes for the signal to go where it needs to. Our brain goes on to use its Reticular Activating System – RAS - to filter information. It first puts actions like breathing and heartbeat control. This all goes to the Hindbrain, which controls everything you need to survive – unconsciously. The RAS then places “processing of senses” into the Forebrain, which we also unconsciously use. The Midbrain is what controls sight, alertness, motor control, and hearing. This is the part we consciously use. How do we use this to learn? The Hippocampus – kind of its own type of structure, located in the Forebrain – is the brain’s Google. When we learn something, it keeps it there, but more stuff we learn is stacked on top. It is easier to remember how to text then what your 7-year-old birthday cake looked like! Learning, of course, is not the easiest thing – the average attention span is about eight seconds. That is why learning is difficult – but worth it. The brain is basically a computer. When you read this, you are probably putting information into you Hippocampus. That is storing what you keep – if you keep any – onto a stack somewhere. You are learning. This is not, of course, from an expert. I am a curious someone telling you how it makes sense to me. If you are still curious, please look at the sources on the following page.
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