Education and Neuroscience - The Good
How has neuroscience helped education?
The Bilingual Advantage
We used to believe that bilingual education impedes language development, as evidenced when bilingual children become frustrated when they confuse different languages. Indeed, bilingual children show slower language development than monolingual children during the early years, however,by the age of six or seven exhibit normal language development. Neuroscientific research shows that exposure to another language before six months old is beneficial for learning that language later (Kuhl, Williams, Lacerda, Stevens, & Lindblom, 1992); and grammatical processing in the second language may be negatively affected if that language is not learned until high school (Neville & Bruer, 2001). There is a substantial amount of research to support bilingual education if one wants to learn another language. Bilingual children also show evidence of a greater working memory especially its executive function, which is criticalto learning regardless of context. (Blom, Kuntay, Messer,Verhagen, & Lesseman, 2014; Krizman, Marian, Shook, Skoe, & Kraus, 2012). Most importantly, a bilingual program showed that children engaged in the program outperformed those who did not (Petitto & Dunbar, 2008).
It is noteworthy that the children registered in the program studied were from a lower socioeconomic background . Lower socioeconomic status has been linked as one of the most consistent and reliable predictors of underachievement. Bilingual education may have the potential to compensate for this disadvantage. When all evidence is considered it is possible to extrapolate that the benefits of bilingual education could lead curriculum development to include a second language at the primary or elementary school age, in order to promote working memory throughout the lifespan.
On Creativity and Physical Activity
Areas that commonly see budget cuts in curriculum choices are arts and physical education; however, neuroscience has shown that this budget-cutting strategy may impede students’ development over the long term.. Music training may enhance creativity (Gibson, Folley, & Park, 2009) and is associated with memory, verbal intelligence, and executive functions (Moreno, Friesen, & Bialystok, 2011). Physical exercise also improves both short-term and long-term memory (Winter et al., 2007), and school achievement (Hillman, Erickson, & Framer, 2008). These findings, when applied to curriculum development could lend to a rich arts and physical education program geared to enhance academic success through creativity and enhanced memory capabilities.
Timing
Neuroscientific research has long demonstrated that schools should start later in the morning. Research into human circadian cycles has revealed that longer morning sleep for adolescence when compared to adults acts as a catalyst to boos academic performance. (Carskadon, 1990; Dewald, 2010; Hagenauer, 2009). Despite the overwhelming evidence, educational reform with regards to sleep is slow moving and indicative of the penchant for the educational system to resist change.
Memory
Neuroscience research suggested that students struggling in learning may be more related to working memory deficits than a lack of knowledge. Poor working memory may lead students to be less likely to hold information long enough to successfully solve problems or transfer information into long-term memory (Mazzocco, Feigenson, & Halberda, 2011). This research lends its self to diversity of tools used for learning. Rather than drills that promote practice of a concept,exercises that improve memory capacity may have a much greater effect on learning.
Discussion
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How to overcome barriers in translating neuroscientific research into practice? Does establishing a new field of study – educational neuroscience worth its efforts? In Zadina’s (2015) paper, she referred to an example in which her own experiences in teaching guided the research team she was in to successfully identify differences in anatomical measurements of developmental dyslexia subtypes. In my opinion, educational neuroscience graduates may apply knowledge from basic research in their teaching and direct research based on their application results. What do you think?
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What are the ethical concerns with applying neuroscientific knowledge to education? What will be a potential paradigm to resolve them?
References
Blom, E., Kuntay, A. C., Messer, M., Verhagen, J., & Lesseman, P. (2014). The benefits of being bilingual: Working memory in bilingual Turkish-Dutch children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 128, 105–119.
Carskadon, M. A. (1990). Patterns of sleep and sleepiness in adolescents. Pediatrician,17, 5–12.
Coffield, F. M. (2004). Learning styles and pedagogy in post-16 learning: a systematic and critical review. Learning and Skills Research Centre.
Dewald, J. F. (2010). The influence of sleep quality, sleep duration and sleepiness on school performance in children and adolescents: A meta-analytic revue. Sleep Medicine Reviews, 14, 179–189.
Gibson, C., Folley, B. S., & Park, S. (2009). Enhanced divergent thinking and creativity in musicians: A behavioral and near-infrared spectroscopy study. Brain and Cognition, 69, 162–169.
Hagenauer, M. H. (2009). Adolescent changes in the homeostatic and circadian regulation of sleep. Developmental Neuroscience, 31, 276–284.
Hillman, C. H., Erickson, K. I., & Framer, A. F. (2008). Be smart, exercise your heart: Exercise effects on brain and cognition. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 9, 58–65.
Krizman, J. M., Marian, V., Shook, A., Skoe, E., & Kraus, N. (2012). Subcortical encoding of sound is enhanced in bilinguals and relates to executive function advantages. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 109, 7877–7881.
Kuhl, P. K., Williams, K. A., Lacerda, F., Stevens, K. N., & Lindblom, B. (1992). Linguistic experience alters phonetic perception in infants by 6 months of age. Science, 255, 606–608.
Mazzocco, M. M., Feigenson, L., & Halberda, J. (2011). Impaired acuity of the approximate number system underlies mathematical learning disability (dyscalculia). Child Development, 82, 1224–1237.
Moreno, S., Friesen, D., & Bialystok, E. (2011). Effect of music training on promoting preliteracy skills: Preliminary causal evidence. Music Perception: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 29, 165–172.
Neville, H. J., & Bruer, J. T. (2001). Language processing: How experience affects brain organization. In D. B. Bailey, J. T. Bruer, F. J. Symons, & W. Lichtman (Eds.), Critical Thinking about Critical Periods (p. 151-172). Baltimore: Paul H. Brookes.
Petitto, L. A., & Dunbar, K. (2008). New findings from educational neuroscience on bilingual brains, scientific brains, and the educated mind. In K. Fischer, & T. Katzir (Eds.), Building Usable Knowledge in Mind, Brain, and Education. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Winter, B., Breitenstein, C., Mooren, F. C., Voelker, K., Fobke, M., Lechtermann, A.,& Knecht, S. (2007). High impact running improves learning. Neurobiology of Learning and Memory, 87, 597–609.
Zadina, J. N. (2015). The emerging role of educational neuroscience in education reform. Psicología Educativa, 21, 71–77