From neurons to teaching efficiency …..and to your job

Helen AbadziEducation for All Fast Track Initiative

(c/o World Bank)March 18, 2011

For the University of Michigan

Smart domains of knowledge for you to study

• International agencies are deluged with CVs

• When you finish your masters or doctorate in education what will you be able to say you can do?

• Can you advise how best to train people at various levels?– Can you explain why some choices re better than others?

• Can you do design evaluation studies, analyze complex datasets?– Can you explain whether the findings make sense given how people

learn or think?

Cognitive neuroscience:Knowledge domain to help you interpret concepts:

– Such as• Constructivism• Active learning• Child-centered learning• Teacher-centered instruction• Classroom climate• Quality of education• Zones of proximal development

A glimpse to a trove of knowledgeknown by a few

• Low-income students tend to do very poorly• International agencies want to see financing converted

to information• How to facilitate better retention, integration, use of

knowledge under conditions unknown in higher-income countries?

• Cognitive neuroscience offers the needed principles– Mainly cognitive psychology of the 1990s

• Education faculties rarely teach this fieldThe lecture will give you a sample

What happens to information on its way to being learned?

Knowledge taught in school must go through:• Attention mechanisms• Short term memory limitations• Encoding through “rules” of cognitive

networks• consolidation into long-term memory

The micro level features are reflected in macro memory features

• Education modifies brain architecture• As a result of school work:• certain proteins are made for permanent storage• New axons and dendrites created

– Connecting parts of the brain that were not earlier connected• Neuron synapses open and close in milliseconds• Knowledge is stored in neuron assemblies

– spatio-temporal patterns

Principle from neuron functions:We remember best the info we have used most recently and most

often

Neuron assemblies connect in spatio-temporal patterns to store information

Feedback is needed for modification

Neural networks

Neuron assemblies

Biological mysteries of memory

• Aromas of rosemary• Chewing gum• Effort, physical activity• Glucose• Items presented within 30 minutes of humor

– funny classes matter• Sleep • But emotions have inverted U relationship

with performance

Daily lifeSchoolcurricula

Vocational skills, computer use,TypingWord, Excel

Imitating conscious or unconscious movements (buttoning shirt)

Reading automaticityKnowledge encoded in movements

Valuing certain knowledge

Backgroundnoises deemed ordinary

Reward expectations

“noncognitive” skills:Showing up on timeCarrying out obligationsetc

Your mind contains these kinds of

Conscious knowledgeWe can talk about it Unconscious knowledge

Short-term memory capacityWhy speed is needed for comprehension

(working memory)

Long-term memory

12 seconds at mostAbout 7 items4 pictures

Cognitive networks

125 gigs semantic memory !

Implication of short-term memory:Fluency must be the goal of all training• Students should be trained for fluency in reading• In math• in vocational skills (procedural memory)

• In basic facts – so that they pop up in students’ minds– No time should be lost in searches

Short-term memory capacity determines how we learn and act

• Fluency must be the goal of all training• Automatic, fluent performance needed for

frequently used skills• If we search the mind for answers, we forget

the problems we tried to solve !

After some practice, our mind groups letters into ever-larger chunks

All sophisticated skills are built like this

Implication of short-term memory:Fluency must be the goal of all training• Practice shortens reaction time, we do things

without much attention:– Reading– Math calculations– Vocationally related skills– Gas chromatograph, computer operation, etc.

• Time, materials, homework must be used to bring about fluency

• So what is the most important goal in beginning literacy?

Journey of an information itemWhen did Mozart live (1756-1791)?

• An item going into your mind (e.g. Mozart’s birthdate)– Must first get attention, enters through senses

• Passes through the short-term memory bottleneck• Ends up in the contents of the long-term memory bottle• Gets classified into existing networks based on specific

“rules”• If not contemplated or used, it may be forgotten• With use, it gets reconsolidated, reclassified under networks

of “deeper” meaning• After 10 years of use or 10,000 hours of practice, expertise

arises, and the item resides in a modular network

Attention is needed to learn anything

• Animals are set up to pay attention mainly to changes in the environment.– The ‘default’ state is inattentiveness– Attention requires conscious control – Control develops throughout childhood

• Perhaps adding roughly a minute per year of age

• Being called on by a teacher influences performance– Reinforcement on a ‘variable ratio’ maintains attention best (B. F. Skinner)

• A student who knows little and has little chance of being called upon will likely learn very little from schooling

Bangladesh: How many paying attention?One student recites, rest unoccupied

Teachers in Nepal interacting mainly with the front of the class

How does knowledge get constructed?

Biological tendency for network organizationCognitive networks under construction

Items are usually categorized on the basis of meaning (particularly after age 12)

Children in particular may classified items in series

If information survives up to long-term memory.. “rules”determine which items will be retained

• Spoken rather than written info• Imageable (picture superiority effect)• Contemplated and connected to

existing knowledge through meaning• Encoded through multiple senses • Somewhat distinct from others

– but not unheard of• At the beginning or end of a session• In small chunks at a time• Reviewed at intervals spaced apart

– not crammed• Generated rather than just given

Crucial for remembering and forgetting:organization and links among items

• Information is recalled along the same paths on which it was encoded

• We remember information items by traveling along the pathways where they were encoded– E.g. remember a foreign language better by reviewing your old books,

going where it was spoken

• Places, time, smells, are encoded with the information (encoding specificity)– Proust and the “madeleines”

To be remembered, items must be attached to very specific “hooks”

(encoding specificity), zones of proximal development?

If we don’t know where to “hang” something, we forget it– Can you remember…. Chloro(trephenylphosphine)gold” ?

We need concrete examples to retain abstractionsIf we know where to hang something, we understand!

From items we draw conclusions and find rules

• A paradox:– Items can only be linked

very specifically to other items (encoding specificity)

– but once linked, rules are extracted from patterns

• conclusions drawn– knowledge multiplies, easy

to learn anything !– Cognition - interplay between

remembering an item and deriving conclusions

– Generalization, transfer difficult– Certain rigidity

Conclusion

Precise fit of information items

New items attached

Prior knowledge

example example

The mind derives rules from items and events

• People drop the details, remember the gist

• Particularly for repetitive events, the specific information may be discarded– What did you see on the road while going to work

three months ago?• People will reconstruct from repetitive events,

develop “schemas”– “recall” false details based on likely events

The more knowledge we have, the more we have hooks

to hang new items

• Fast reading, fast intermediate calculations reward learners– help create ‘self motivated learners’

• Elaboration, practice reconfigure networks• 10 years of practice create expertise• Innovation, creativity – research ongoing on

these issues

Elaboration and use reconfigure cognitive networks into “deep structure”

• Upon teaching, items may be classified through “superficial” characteristics

• With elaboration and practice, items may be reclassified under underlying concepts

• “surface structure” to “deep structure”• “deeper” principles help create analogies:

– Generalizing: Transfer of learning to problems that superficially appear different• Have same “deeper” structure

• “rote memorization” just connects items, – no elaboration

Elaboration, contemplation:Crucial educational concept

• “Contemplation” activities help transfer items to multiple or different classifications• Some such activities may be “active learning”

• Really active processing

• Students who get elaboration exercises connect knowledge– E.g. Connections to motor networks

• Multisensory inputs– Knowledge “pops up” whenever needed

Some implications of cognitive network functions

• Organization and links matter as much as the information itself

• Knowledge is cumulative – Students need exact “hooks” with prior knowledge– Dropouts can’t just return without remediation

• Students with primary school deficits can’t benefit from secondary school

• They need remediation!

• extra books benefit the best– Matthew effect

Poor-quality schools may just teach items in loose series

The heroes of the revolution are…

The principles of constitutional law are….

2x2=4, 2x3=6, 2x4=8, 2x5=10….

• Note: Information is recalled along the same paths on which it was encoded

Students may just recite or listen…

High-quality institutions offer activities to create complex networks

• Students recite + • read long texts+ • manipulate + • collect real-world samples + • answer questions connecting various items + • derive new conclusions from data + • solve problems + • practice for fluency + • generalize into various circumstances

Knowledge in the schools of the poor

Less utility for employers

Knowledge in the schools of the better-off

More utility for employers

Time is needed for consolidation:instructional time amount crucial

• Teaching time increases the probability that cognitive networks will be built

• High-income countries and schools put more at students’ disposal, so even if some tasks are inefficient, there is redundancy. – also repetitions, reviews etc.

• Schools of the poor give less time to students. – May get few chances to create a sensible semantic

network about a topic

Instructional time is what the governments pay forBut only a fraction of the investment

is actually converted into learning time

Class time as allotted by a government (e.g., 200 days, 1000 teaching hours)

Remaining after school closures (strikes, weather, teacher training, extra holidays)

Remaining after teacher absenteeism and tardiness

Remaining after student absenteeism

Class time devoted to any learning task

Learning time relevant to curriculum

Lack of textbooks translates into time wastage at all levels

• Copying, dictation necessary • Limited practice, time, feedback• Due to a lack of knowledge and materials,

teachers do very few activities • Teacher boredom: Could you spend 20 years

in blackboard transcription?

Efficient classroom activities

• Brief lecturing with examples, analogies• Asking students at random to answer

– variable ratio reinforcement best maintains attention• Elaboration, contemplation of the material

– retrieval, recombinations, analyses– Selective use of groups

• Textbooks, other structured material– Students should copy or take dictation only as a curricular

activity

Automaticity and working memory crucial in reading

Minimum reading speed needed for comprehension45-60 words correct per minute

(working memory)

Long-term memory

12 seconds at mostAbout 7 items4 pictures

Cognitive networks

125 gigs semantic memory !

Sound (OLE2)

35 words per minute

Perceptual Learning:

Visual complexity in various languages and scripts(Psycholinguistic grains)

Englishthrough, caught, bake, often, saw, sew

FrenchIls etaient, oiseau, mois, etant

Bengalijomi – earth

boithak – meeting

koThin - difficult

Can all students be engaged in this class? Why not?

Do these students discriminate among letters of the blackboard from this distance?

Setting the basis for efficient math acquisition

Mathematics are innate to some extent

• Triple code in the brain: sense of quantity, number name, symbol– Babies, animals manipulate about 3 items

– Addition and subtraction more “natural”, multiplication and division less so

• Magnitude processing, Weber fraction (some people better than others)

Higher-level math is based on preschool and early grade tasks

• Lower SES children start off and stay in poorer performance

• Activities needed to connect the verbal and the visuospatial parts

• Interventions needed since kindergarten:– quickly estimate how many things in a group – Build number line– Measure, compare sizes– Develop fluency of calculations

Develop early the number line people have in their heads

Instructional principles to applyFrom cognitive neuroscience to teaching practices

- Students need feedback- Sufficient learning time- Retrieval opportunities

- Need for fluency

- Info must pop up in mind without conscious searches

-Need for teaching methods that optimize classification and retrieval of info

-Optimally spaced reviews

Input into short-term memory Neuron connections

to encode information

Long-term memory consolidation (protein formation transfer from hippocampus etc)

Interventions in countries of all income and educational levels

• Fluency of basic skills – emphasis on achievement in grades 1-2

• Prior knowledge needed for a specific topic (hooks)• Textbooks or a structured set of materials per student• Use of allotted time for instruction, practice, elaboration• Teacher training for appropriate (elaboration) activities

– video-modeling methods more efficient in behavior change• Supervision of the relevant teaching activities

– Frequent feedback and reinforcement to teaching staff, given the way the brain’s reward system works

Countries need valid technical advice on learning efficiency

• Which expert to believe? • Degrees in education do not guarantee knowledge

– Often personal opinions, “Anglo-centric” views are given

• Evidence-based expertise is needed!

• You could learn this domain of knowledge and do a better job !

Suggestion: learn better how to integrate psychology findings

• Test hypotheses in dissertations and theses• Take 3 psychology courses before you

graduate– Cognitive psychology– Perceptual psychology – for reading etc.– Neuropsychology

• ALSO:– Social and/or motivation– Educational psychology? Depends on content– Tell your faculty you want such courses

Thank you for your time!