Transcript The Biological Basis of Learning

Brain Basics II: Attention and
Memory
©Ruth Ferree, PhD
Curry School of Education
University of Virginia
Experiment
Keep that experiment in mind
• I. Hard –wired or learned?
• II. Getting information into our brain-the
senses
• III. Why doesn’t our head explode? The
reticular activating system.
• IV. Top down influence
I. Hard-wired or learned?
The synapse
• Neurons do not touch. There is a
microscopic gap, a synapse, between them.
• Chemicals called neurotransmitters flow
across the synapse. Those biochemicals are
the messengers between neurons.
The neuron that “fires” releases an action
potential, a measurable electrical pulse
that flows down the axon. “What fires
together, wires together.”
Genetics and the Environment
Current thinking puts the ratio at 50/50
Epigenetic development
• Biology, genetic inheritance and age, may
place constraints on the influence of the
environment.
• As part of a dynamic system, everything
matters.
II. Getting information into our
head – the senses
Each of our senses has a unique
sensitivity to our environment, but
The brain deals with the
information in a similar way, by
establishing neuronal pathways.
• We are hard-wired to recognize some
patternsSuch as speech sounds (Chomsky and Pinker)
Such as faces ( Infant studies)
• We learn to recognize other patterns
because of frequency of encounters and/or
emotional state when we encounter them.
The Moony Face Experiment
III.Why doesn’t our head
explode?
The reticular activating system
The world is full of stimuli, we
just don’t pay attention to it all.
• Feel your big toe.
• Selective attention
The reticular activating system is
our environmental radar.
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Alert to three main things:
Is it novel?
Is it important to me?
Does it fit a pattern I’m familiar with?
Novelty
• Even little babies
notice when things
change.
• Movement is “novel.”
• Think about shocking
commercials.
Is it important to me?
• Consider “the cocktail
party effect” or “the
airport effect.”
• “Not in my
neighborhood.”
• This is why you learn
students’ names as
quickly as you can.
Is it related to something I
already know?
• Priming.
• Our brain starts firing in a familiar pattern.
Like advertisers, teachers can
take advantage of these attentiongetters.
IV. Top down influence
• When we pay attention to something, we
have a better chance of remembering it.
• Top- down influence means we consciously
think about something. If I tell you to look
at what the child in red is doing in the next
picture, you’ll focus on her.
Sometimes top-down influence
can make us perceive or
remember something incorrectly.
Think about expectations teachers have for ESOL
students.
Implications for teaching
• One reason for the popularity of creating
concept webs, semantic webs, is that they
seem to parallel our brains’ networks.
• When we give students advance graphic
organizers, we’re taking advantage of topdown influence.
• The more patterns we tap into, for instance
if we give visual, physical and auditory
cues, the better: “gifted” thinking.