Teaching with the brain in mind Chapters 1-6

After reading chapters one through six of Teaching with the brain in mind, I stopped to note a couple things that seemed to me to be some of the most important notes in the text so far. The authors talk about the developing brain and what can be done to help a child maximize their learning potential. In the first several pages, the authors note that there are three main aspects that we can use to describe the human brain. The one aspect that I thought was most relevant and important to me was how the brain is incredibly adaptable. The text states that our experiences and actions and lead to changes in our brain. When we think about it, it seems funny that our environment has that much input in our cognitive development, but it’s true. Much like our own, we must accept that a student’s environment change how he or she acts or feels. Teachers can help by creating an environment that is relaxed, challenging, and open.

Continuing on, the authors discuss the process of preparing children for school. As anyone who has taken a class on child development knows, development begins in the womb. There are many things that women who are pregnant need to avoid like smoking, alcohol, and other drugs. That can go without saying, but it doesn’t take away from the seriousness that these vices carry, especially to an unborn child. Most of our brain cells develop in the womb, so don’t be that person that risks the further development of a child just because of a beer or cigarette.

There are other things that parents can do to prepare children for education. Much of what is mentioned can be achieved by spending time with your children. By spending time with them, a parent is given the opportunity to model proper social behavior, create healthy emotional bonds, and help them develop reading, writing, and memory skills. As a basic rule, a parent should be present in their child’s life. Playing games, singing songs, going on outings, doing chores, and reading books, are just a handful of the things that a parent can do to help their child grow. Another thing to mention is nutrition. It is briefly presented in the text, but I like the point made how eating healthy is just as important to the development of the child as social interaction and academics. I think that nutrition is something that we think about all the time, but tend to overlook when teaching students. We are far too focused on their learning that we forget about their physical development. With nutrition comes exercise and activities. As mentioned before, playing games is important to a child’s development. It teaches them fairness, the ability to follow rules that have immediate but not harsh consequences, and helps them develop fine and gross motor skills.

These are obviously not all the points made in the reading. If I noted on everything, this would be far too long. The points I noted were few, but to me they are the most important things a parent and educator can do to help a child grow into a healthy person.

Images of Relationship

When comparing the response to the Heinz dilemma, it’s funny how the response from the boy differs so much from the girl’s response. The boy seems to take the problem head on and solve the problem, as the author says, like a math problem. By plugging in the right numbers or variables, the answer will be right. The world is very black and white and he uses the resources provided to create a solution. The Girls response was very different from the get go. She was more empathetic to the different perspectives in the scenario, including the perspectives of the wife, and the druggist in relation to the husband. She uses these perspectives to create different solutions rather than rely on the natural procession of events to find a solution. Despite the differences between the two responses, both shared the aspect that in the end, the people involved in the scenario would come to some understanding, whether it be between the man and the druggist in the girl’s case, or the man and the judge in the boy’s case. It was this comparison that made an impact on me the most. It is important that as future teachers, we consider how differently our students approach problems, no matter the parameters of that problem. By considering their different approaches, we as teachers can help them build on those thoughts and the processes required to develop complex thinking.

Constructivist Cautions

I very much enjoyed reading this article. If anyone is on the fence regarding Constructivism in the classroom, this article may help you explain to others why. I appreciate what people are trying to do, fix our schools. It’s easy to look down on our educational system and say “yeah. There are a lot of things that are wrong so we should change it.” I would love to see those people try and change it first hand in a classroom setting. The authors put it very well, “that there is a crucial difference between evidence that documents the need for change and evidence that documents the efficacy of a particular strategy of change.” This line affected me the most. Although we need to change how we teach and learn, it is important that our first choice of change is not the first option, and that we consider every approach available.  I like the point they make regarding the responsibility of the teacher in a constructivist classroom. Constructivism puts an emphasis on student directed learning, taking weight off the teacher’s shoulders, but the teacher will have just as much work as he or she did before. The third point I enjoyed was the caution that talked about how students make their own meaning from any kind of instruction. The difference is making a meaning that has either nothing or something to do with the context.