Training Brains: Improving Behavior, Cognition and Neural Mechanisms of Attention in Lower SES Children
Helen J. Neville, PhD
Dr. Neville summarized her research on the cognitive impacts of socioeconomic status and her work to change that impact. SES plays a major role in student achievement, attention, stress, etc. But Dr. Neville has found success with intervention programs for the children (particularly training them to focus their attention) and their parents (creating a more stable home environment). She has received a grant to start working with latino families - the highest at-risk population.
changingbrains.org - new, non-technical DVD for parents and educators to help them understand the impact of SES and ways to change brains, proceeds used to translate it to Spanish
Friday, November 18, 2011
Tony Wagner L&B Keynote
The New Educational Challenges
New skills for work, continuous learning, & citizenship in a "knowledge society" for all students. These skills are not effectively taught.
The "Net Generation" is differently motivated to learn
The Seven Survival Skills for Careers, College, and Citizenship
Students must be on their way to mastery of these skills through school
1. Critical thinking and problem-solving
2. Collaboration across networks and leading by influence - must be able to understand and appreciate differences
3. Agility and adaptability - contrast that with the regularities of school
4. Initiative and entrepreneurialism - setting "stretch" goals and achieving most of them is better than setting basic goals and achieving all of them, "fail early and fail often," yet we penalize children when they fail in school
5. Effective oral and written communication - writing with voice, passion, and perspective
6. Accessing and analyzing information
7. Curiosity and imagination - only one curriculum being taught, and that is test prep. AYP or AP. There is an enormous gap between what we teach and the skills students need. 50% of students who begin college never complete a degree, many because they didn't have the skills (especially writing) to succeed.
What motivates the "net" generation?
- Accustomed to instant gratification and "always-on" connection
- Use the web for 1) extending friendships, 2) interest-driven, self-directed learning, and 3) as a tool for self-expression
- Constantly connected, creating, and multitasking in a multimedia world - everywhere except in school (Technology is a double-edged sword - we need to use the powerful technologies to engage students and extend the classroom, but we also need to understand that this generation doesn't know how to NOT multitask, so they need to learn to "develop the muscles of concentration")
- Less fear and respect for authority - accustomed to learning from peers, want coaching, but only from adults who don't "talk down" to them
- Want to make a difference and do interesting/worthwhile work - want to make a difference more than they want to make money
The Culture of Schooling versus The Culture of Innovation
The teachers who make big differences are outliers. They create a culture in their classroom that is different from that at their institution.
- Individual achievement versus collaboration
- Specialization versus multi-disciplinary learning
- Risk avoidance versus trial and error (We don't talk about failure here, we talk about iteration)
- Consuming versus creating
- Extrinsic versus intrinsic motivation
- Evolution from play to passion to purpose
Implications for "Reinvention"
We have to move away from what has always been an information-based learning system (focus on "timeless learning" (academic content that has persisted over time)) to a transformation-based system (focus on what you can do with what you know; focus on using content to master the competencies for "just-in-time learning"). We have to think carefully about what content is truly important and consider how it might be used to teach skills.
Watch The Finland Phenomenon
Redefining Rigor: 5 "Habits of Mind" - Learning to ask the right questions
- Weighing Evidence
- Awareness of Varying Viewpoints
- Seeing Connections/Cause & Effect
- Speculating on Possibilities/Conjecture
- Assessing Value - both socially and personally
Questions to consider
- What skills are you teaching, and how are you assessing them?
- What is the school doing to systematically improve instruction, and how do you know it's working? Are you a better teacher than 2 years ago - if so, in what ways and how do you know?
- How well are your students prepared for college, careers, and citizenships, and how do you know?
- Is your school "adding value?"
Redefining Educational Excellence
Accountability
- Track cohort graduation rate and how well students do once they are in college (National Student Clearing House (www.studentclearinghouse.org)
- Use the college and work readiness assessment to assess analytic reasoning, critical thinking, problem-solving, and writing (www.cae.org)
- Video-tape focus groups with recent grads (data for the heart)
Academics
- Doing the new work: teaching & assessing the skills that matter most
- Develop strategies for teaching & assessing the 3Cs: Critical & Creative thinking, communication, and collaboration
- Pilot interdisciplinary courses around essential questions and capstone projects at multiple levels
Require all students to have digital portfolios (track progress, real audience, means for teacher accountability), work internships, and service-learning projects
Doing the New Work in New Ways
- Collaboration & Transparency
- Isolation is the enemy of innovation and improvement
- Every student has an adult advocate
- Every teacher on teams for collaborative inquiry - looking at student & teacher work
- Videotape teaching & supervision (lesson study vs. evaluation)
- Peer-reviewed digital portfolios for teachers and leaders
New skills for work, continuous learning, & citizenship in a "knowledge society" for all students. These skills are not effectively taught.
The "Net Generation" is differently motivated to learn
The Seven Survival Skills for Careers, College, and Citizenship
Students must be on their way to mastery of these skills through school
1. Critical thinking and problem-solving
2. Collaboration across networks and leading by influence - must be able to understand and appreciate differences
3. Agility and adaptability - contrast that with the regularities of school
4. Initiative and entrepreneurialism - setting "stretch" goals and achieving most of them is better than setting basic goals and achieving all of them, "fail early and fail often," yet we penalize children when they fail in school
5. Effective oral and written communication - writing with voice, passion, and perspective
6. Accessing and analyzing information
7. Curiosity and imagination - only one curriculum being taught, and that is test prep. AYP or AP. There is an enormous gap between what we teach and the skills students need. 50% of students who begin college never complete a degree, many because they didn't have the skills (especially writing) to succeed.
What motivates the "net" generation?
- Accustomed to instant gratification and "always-on" connection
- Use the web for 1) extending friendships, 2) interest-driven, self-directed learning, and 3) as a tool for self-expression
- Constantly connected, creating, and multitasking in a multimedia world - everywhere except in school (Technology is a double-edged sword - we need to use the powerful technologies to engage students and extend the classroom, but we also need to understand that this generation doesn't know how to NOT multitask, so they need to learn to "develop the muscles of concentration")
- Less fear and respect for authority - accustomed to learning from peers, want coaching, but only from adults who don't "talk down" to them
- Want to make a difference and do interesting/worthwhile work - want to make a difference more than they want to make money
The Culture of Schooling versus The Culture of Innovation
The teachers who make big differences are outliers. They create a culture in their classroom that is different from that at their institution.
- Individual achievement versus collaboration
- Specialization versus multi-disciplinary learning
- Risk avoidance versus trial and error (We don't talk about failure here, we talk about iteration)
- Consuming versus creating
- Extrinsic versus intrinsic motivation
- Evolution from play to passion to purpose
Implications for "Reinvention"
We have to move away from what has always been an information-based learning system (focus on "timeless learning" (academic content that has persisted over time)) to a transformation-based system (focus on what you can do with what you know; focus on using content to master the competencies for "just-in-time learning"). We have to think carefully about what content is truly important and consider how it might be used to teach skills.
Watch The Finland Phenomenon
Redefining Rigor: 5 "Habits of Mind" - Learning to ask the right questions
- Weighing Evidence
- Awareness of Varying Viewpoints
- Seeing Connections/Cause & Effect
- Speculating on Possibilities/Conjecture
- Assessing Value - both socially and personally
Questions to consider
- What skills are you teaching, and how are you assessing them?
- What is the school doing to systematically improve instruction, and how do you know it's working? Are you a better teacher than 2 years ago - if so, in what ways and how do you know?
- How well are your students prepared for college, careers, and citizenships, and how do you know?
- Is your school "adding value?"
Redefining Educational Excellence
Accountability
- Track cohort graduation rate and how well students do once they are in college (National Student Clearing House (www.studentclearinghouse.org)
- Use the college and work readiness assessment to assess analytic reasoning, critical thinking, problem-solving, and writing (www.cae.org)
- Video-tape focus groups with recent grads (data for the heart)
Academics
- Doing the new work: teaching & assessing the skills that matter most
- Develop strategies for teaching & assessing the 3Cs: Critical & Creative thinking, communication, and collaboration
- Pilot interdisciplinary courses around essential questions and capstone projects at multiple levels
Require all students to have digital portfolios (track progress, real audience, means for teacher accountability), work internships, and service-learning projects
Doing the New Work in New Ways
- Collaboration & Transparency
- Isolation is the enemy of innovation and improvement
- Every student has an adult advocate
- Every teacher on teams for collaborative inquiry - looking at student & teacher work
- Videotape teaching & supervision (lesson study vs. evaluation)
- Peer-reviewed digital portfolios for teachers and leaders
Adam J. Cox Executive Function Workshop
Building the Eight Pillars of Capable Young Minds
Adam J. Cox, PhD
DrAdamCox.com
The purpose of this 3-hour workshop was to describe the Executive Function capabilities of children - particularly those in junior high - and to prescribe strategies that educators can use to help develop those capabilities.
Dr. Cox began his presentation by describing educators as the "architects of young minds, rather than the conveyors of content." His basic premise that our role as educators is to teach children how to think, using our content as a vehicle for that thinking.
He also stated that children are desperate to be taken seriously and implied that much misbehavior is the result of adults not taking children seriously - not listening to their desires and opinions or thinking about what they have to say. On the other hand, we also often have unrealistically high expectations for children - particularly in social domains (e.g., high levels of communication, interpretation, motivation, and interaction).
The most crucial event in the evolution of the human species is the ability to wait.” Jacob Bronowski, The Ascent of Man
A species that takes longer to develop is capable of greater cognitive complexity. The delay in development of today’s adolescents may be a function of the increasing complexity of today’s society and culture.
Electronica leads to limited auditory attention, heightened impatience and irritability, and social withdrawal.
Extinction of boredom and the demise of civility. Losing the ability to wait.
The stimulation we provide makes all the difference.
Boys: compliance feels submissive; boredom is stressful; high proportion of kinesthetic processors; respond well to kinematics; tendency to overlook detail
Girls: Typically know how to circumvent the “crisis” of boredom; More likely to enjoy auditory-based instruction; highly engaged by concepts with social relevance; May lose momentum in the vortex of perfectionism. (Study: estrogen linked to working memory)
Universal Fulcrum of Immediate Improvement
- Define and illustrate desired outcomes
- Continuous, explicit verbal feedback
- Positive feedback has greater impact on younger kids, negative feedback (critical) has a greater impact on later adolescents
- Make the process personal and emotional
- Assess consolidation daily
- One of the most important things they learn in the 5th and 6th grades is the ability to pick out the most important things and retain those
We are competing with a lifetime of electronica.
Teaching the “Trophy Generation”
- Need for constant fun and stimulation
- High level of self-absorption
- Persistent need for affirmation
- Insistence that “anything is possible”
- Conflation of electronic and real experience
Pillar I: Initiation
Likely Challenges
- Trouble getting started
- Confusion about priorities; doesn’t put first things first
- Inability to delay gratification
Possible Solutions
- Collaboratively build and reinforce classroom and study routines
- Explain how to determine priorities (could supply a rubric for decision-making)
- Parcel large or complex tasks into smaller steps
- “Chunk” time; use timers as necessary
"I want to be not just a good teacher, but your teacher"
Pillar II: Attention
Likely Challenges
- Trouble inhibiting distraction; a wandering mind
- Selective attention
- Insufficient Energy
Possible Solutions
- Narrow the field of attention (selective seating, strategic study center, deny visual and auditory stimulation; offer exercise or quiet relaxation (15 min on, then break, then 15 min on – will finish work better and faster)
- Encourage self-monitoring (use on-task charts to build two-tier thinking, make interval check-ins routine (personal buzzer/timer), Invite kids to be a part of school planning – today’s kids are generally not reliable self-monitors/evaluators – we need to teach and encourage this)
- Change learning channel frequently (sustained auditory attention is a major challenge for many 21st century children)
- Consider administering school-wide learning style assessments (theory that guides the instruction in your school); invite students to participate in school planning (taking them seriously, ideas incorporated into the plan, get better results faster)
Tone + Tempo = Synchrony of a Well “orchestrated” classroom
Making strategic use of
Vocal tone, rate and rhythm of speech, vocabulary, relevance, physical proximity, projected energy, facial expressions, gestures – attention emerges from the spaces between us rather than from within us
Classroom clouds
- Facts and knowledge
- Subjectivity of students (Personal)
- Co-regulated learning relationship – essence of application of executive function in the classroom
Pillar III: Cognitive Flexibility
Likely Challenges
- Problems changing tempo
- Reluctance to shift focus
- Colliding time-frames
Possible Solutions
- Activate two-tier thinking (ask for predictions about what steps will be required and how long they will take; provide immediate, non-judgmental feedback)
- Announce transitions well in advance, and allow ample time for organization (Don’t teach up to the bell – leaves people in chaos and they don’t have time to synthesize)
- Support synchronized tempo by animating instruction
- Provide an optimal example (sit student next to another s/he admires with better flexibility)
- Always reinforce effort more than ability or accomplishment (Carol Dweck, Mindset) because...
- effort is the foundation of a positive work ethic
- easier to take ownership of effort than talent
- potential for praise is infinite compared with attainment of a specific goal (effort is recyclable)
Many kids understand but never seem to "know" course content due to lack of repetition and rehearsal (the only way to consolidate memory). But this does not have to be boring and rote - think multimodal. Kids just need more experience with the content. Going off on tangents is a valuable instructional technique, but not a good learning technique. When we teach, we need to approach the topic from 360 degrees – present the idea in a lot of different ways, don’t get off topic. Repetition and rehearsal are irreplaceable pathways to better connected brains (neural networks of retention)
Pillar IV: Working Memory
Likely Challenges
- Forgets what s/he knows
- Difficulty multitasking
- Tests below ability level
Executive Function helps produce knowledge through the following 4 steps:
- Stimulation-Focused Thought (micro)
- Overlearning (this is a key "tipping point" in the era of distraction and where we nurture the neural architecture of intelligence)
- Reflection and Insight (macro)
- Consolidation
Capable minds learn to toggle between micro and macro cognitive frames
Possible Solutions
- Emphasize overlearning strategies
- Students should write or type notes immediately
- Ask for immediate, articulated recall of information
- Work toward assessing consolidation daily
Maximizing memory:
- Chunk new information
- Repetition and rehearsal (over-learning)
- Short, frequent quizzes
- Make & organize index cards
- Study right before going to sleep
- Review first thing in the morning
Collaborative tracking boosts productivity and academic esteem. Public tracking done artfully and sensitively – we don’t want to harm kids, we want to build community and motivate
Pillar V: Organization
Likely Challenges
- Pervasive clutter and chaos
- Unconstructive multitasking
- Constantly forgets to bring things home
Possible Solutions
- Support learning and retention by making time and space for organization
- Review and sign-off on student agendas daily
- Ask for an explanation of unconventional organization systems (you never know - they may think of something better!)
- Teach how to use an "end-of-day" checklist
- Provide peer tutor or professional coach if needed
Teach study skills! Note-taking, note cards, setting up a study space, etc.
Pillar VI: Planning
Likely Challenges
- Poor time awareness
- Trouble with sequencing
- Doesn’t visualize relevant outcomes
Possible Solutions
- Help articulate goals and sequencing strategies
- Explain how to think and work backward from a goal
- Identify the key elements of a plan (time needed, materials, equipment, resources)
- Provide daily contact with measured progress in a context of caring (MUST improve my feedback time!!!)
Pillar VII: Self-monitoring (Social)
Likely Challenges
- Self-absorption gets mistaken for self-centeredness
- Awkward interpersonal skills
- Problems with code-switching
Theory of Mind – each child has unique experience that is different from others’ experiences, we are developing more sophisticated levels of Theory of Mind as we develop. The better we get at that, the better we get at EQ.
To help students have more "conversational courage" we can:
- Focus on topics of interest and/or confidence
- Maintain a matter-of-fact tone (don't get emotional)
- Limit eye contact (often more willing to talk to us if we're not looking at them)
- Make conversation a background to an activity (e.g., toss a ball)
- Adopt the persona of a coach
Students need to learn both social rules (e.g., conversational distance, turn-taking, eye contact) and social cognitive skills (use of conventions such as greetings, voice modulation/emotion detection, giving compliments, goal-directed transitions/code-switching)
Possible Solutions
- Integrate social conventions into casual conversations and classroom instructions (state: "make sure to spend equal time listening to one another and signal if you like your partner's ideas")
- Privately suggest alternative behaviors
- Employ non-verbal signals to avoid embarrassment
- Begin with an explanation, but end with rehearsal (let them practice social skills!)
We must understand what identity kids want to identify with if we want them to ascend with us. Once we unlock what they want to feel about themselves, everything else becomes logical.
Kids are masters of decoding your voice. Your voice indicates whether you are a coach or a boss. They respond better to coaches.
We tend to focus on intellectual skills and achievement at school and are neglecting executive function, cognitive skills, and personality.
Pillar VIII: Emotional Control
Likely Challenges
- Spontaneous, strong emotion - with little provocation
- Personalizes the non-personal (takes it personally)
- Chronic irritability, moodiness
Possible Solutions
- Project empathy before attempting to correct emotional problem (attentive listening)
- Minimize direct eye contact, use a matter-of-fact tone
- Explain acceptable ways for expressing dissatisfaction
- Work toward converting disruptive students into classroom school leaders
Bottom line: I need to focus my instruction and allow for repetition and rehearsal - perhaps not as much elaboration and "going off on tangents." I also need to integrate explicit use of executive function on a daily basis - stop and review, end-of-day checklist, frequent smaller assessment, talk openly about time management and content organization. I MUST be better about getting quick and specific feedback to my students so that they can accurately reflect on their progress and improve over time.
Adam J. Cox, PhD
DrAdamCox.com
The purpose of this 3-hour workshop was to describe the Executive Function capabilities of children - particularly those in junior high - and to prescribe strategies that educators can use to help develop those capabilities.
Dr. Cox began his presentation by describing educators as the "architects of young minds, rather than the conveyors of content." His basic premise that our role as educators is to teach children how to think, using our content as a vehicle for that thinking.
He also stated that children are desperate to be taken seriously and implied that much misbehavior is the result of adults not taking children seriously - not listening to their desires and opinions or thinking about what they have to say. On the other hand, we also often have unrealistically high expectations for children - particularly in social domains (e.g., high levels of communication, interpretation, motivation, and interaction).
The most crucial event in the evolution of the human species is the ability to wait.” Jacob Bronowski, The Ascent of Man
A species that takes longer to develop is capable of greater cognitive complexity. The delay in development of today’s adolescents may be a function of the increasing complexity of today’s society and culture.
Electronica leads to limited auditory attention, heightened impatience and irritability, and social withdrawal.
Extinction of boredom and the demise of civility. Losing the ability to wait.
The stimulation we provide makes all the difference.
Boys: compliance feels submissive; boredom is stressful; high proportion of kinesthetic processors; respond well to kinematics; tendency to overlook detail
Girls: Typically know how to circumvent the “crisis” of boredom; More likely to enjoy auditory-based instruction; highly engaged by concepts with social relevance; May lose momentum in the vortex of perfectionism. (Study: estrogen linked to working memory)
Universal Fulcrum of Immediate Improvement
- Define and illustrate desired outcomes
- Continuous, explicit verbal feedback
- Positive feedback has greater impact on younger kids, negative feedback (critical) has a greater impact on later adolescents
- Make the process personal and emotional
- Assess consolidation daily
- One of the most important things they learn in the 5th and 6th grades is the ability to pick out the most important things and retain those
We are competing with a lifetime of electronica.
Teaching the “Trophy Generation”
- Need for constant fun and stimulation
- High level of self-absorption
- Persistent need for affirmation
- Insistence that “anything is possible”
- Conflation of electronic and real experience
Pillar I: Initiation
Likely Challenges
- Trouble getting started
- Confusion about priorities; doesn’t put first things first
- Inability to delay gratification
Possible Solutions
- Collaboratively build and reinforce classroom and study routines
- Explain how to determine priorities (could supply a rubric for decision-making)
- Parcel large or complex tasks into smaller steps
- “Chunk” time; use timers as necessary
"I want to be not just a good teacher, but your teacher"
Pillar II: Attention
Likely Challenges
- Trouble inhibiting distraction; a wandering mind
- Selective attention
- Insufficient Energy
Possible Solutions
- Narrow the field of attention (selective seating, strategic study center, deny visual and auditory stimulation; offer exercise or quiet relaxation (15 min on, then break, then 15 min on – will finish work better and faster)
- Encourage self-monitoring (use on-task charts to build two-tier thinking, make interval check-ins routine (personal buzzer/timer), Invite kids to be a part of school planning – today’s kids are generally not reliable self-monitors/evaluators – we need to teach and encourage this)
- Change learning channel frequently (sustained auditory attention is a major challenge for many 21st century children)
- Consider administering school-wide learning style assessments (theory that guides the instruction in your school); invite students to participate in school planning (taking them seriously, ideas incorporated into the plan, get better results faster)
Tone + Tempo = Synchrony of a Well “orchestrated” classroom
Making strategic use of
Vocal tone, rate and rhythm of speech, vocabulary, relevance, physical proximity, projected energy, facial expressions, gestures – attention emerges from the spaces between us rather than from within us
Classroom clouds
- Facts and knowledge
- Subjectivity of students (Personal)
- Co-regulated learning relationship – essence of application of executive function in the classroom
Pillar III: Cognitive Flexibility
Likely Challenges
- Problems changing tempo
- Reluctance to shift focus
- Colliding time-frames
Possible Solutions
- Activate two-tier thinking (ask for predictions about what steps will be required and how long they will take; provide immediate, non-judgmental feedback)
- Announce transitions well in advance, and allow ample time for organization (Don’t teach up to the bell – leaves people in chaos and they don’t have time to synthesize)
- Support synchronized tempo by animating instruction
- Provide an optimal example (sit student next to another s/he admires with better flexibility)
- Always reinforce effort more than ability or accomplishment (Carol Dweck, Mindset) because...
- effort is the foundation of a positive work ethic
- easier to take ownership of effort than talent
- potential for praise is infinite compared with attainment of a specific goal (effort is recyclable)
Many kids understand but never seem to "know" course content due to lack of repetition and rehearsal (the only way to consolidate memory). But this does not have to be boring and rote - think multimodal. Kids just need more experience with the content. Going off on tangents is a valuable instructional technique, but not a good learning technique. When we teach, we need to approach the topic from 360 degrees – present the idea in a lot of different ways, don’t get off topic. Repetition and rehearsal are irreplaceable pathways to better connected brains (neural networks of retention)
Pillar IV: Working Memory
Likely Challenges
- Forgets what s/he knows
- Difficulty multitasking
- Tests below ability level
Executive Function helps produce knowledge through the following 4 steps:
- Stimulation-Focused Thought (micro)
- Overlearning (this is a key "tipping point" in the era of distraction and where we nurture the neural architecture of intelligence)
- Reflection and Insight (macro)
- Consolidation
Capable minds learn to toggle between micro and macro cognitive frames
Possible Solutions
- Emphasize overlearning strategies
- Students should write or type notes immediately
- Ask for immediate, articulated recall of information
- Work toward assessing consolidation daily
Maximizing memory:
- Chunk new information
- Repetition and rehearsal (over-learning)
- Short, frequent quizzes
- Make & organize index cards
- Study right before going to sleep
- Review first thing in the morning
Collaborative tracking boosts productivity and academic esteem. Public tracking done artfully and sensitively – we don’t want to harm kids, we want to build community and motivate
Pillar V: Organization
Likely Challenges
- Pervasive clutter and chaos
- Unconstructive multitasking
- Constantly forgets to bring things home
Possible Solutions
- Support learning and retention by making time and space for organization
- Review and sign-off on student agendas daily
- Ask for an explanation of unconventional organization systems (you never know - they may think of something better!)
- Teach how to use an "end-of-day" checklist
- Provide peer tutor or professional coach if needed
Teach study skills! Note-taking, note cards, setting up a study space, etc.
Pillar VI: Planning
Likely Challenges
- Poor time awareness
- Trouble with sequencing
- Doesn’t visualize relevant outcomes
Possible Solutions
- Help articulate goals and sequencing strategies
- Explain how to think and work backward from a goal
- Identify the key elements of a plan (time needed, materials, equipment, resources)
- Provide daily contact with measured progress in a context of caring (MUST improve my feedback time!!!)
Pillar VII: Self-monitoring (Social)
Likely Challenges
- Self-absorption gets mistaken for self-centeredness
- Awkward interpersonal skills
- Problems with code-switching
Theory of Mind – each child has unique experience that is different from others’ experiences, we are developing more sophisticated levels of Theory of Mind as we develop. The better we get at that, the better we get at EQ.
To help students have more "conversational courage" we can:
- Focus on topics of interest and/or confidence
- Maintain a matter-of-fact tone (don't get emotional)
- Limit eye contact (often more willing to talk to us if we're not looking at them)
- Make conversation a background to an activity (e.g., toss a ball)
- Adopt the persona of a coach
Students need to learn both social rules (e.g., conversational distance, turn-taking, eye contact) and social cognitive skills (use of conventions such as greetings, voice modulation/emotion detection, giving compliments, goal-directed transitions/code-switching)
Possible Solutions
- Integrate social conventions into casual conversations and classroom instructions (state: "make sure to spend equal time listening to one another and signal if you like your partner's ideas")
- Privately suggest alternative behaviors
- Employ non-verbal signals to avoid embarrassment
- Begin with an explanation, but end with rehearsal (let them practice social skills!)
We must understand what identity kids want to identify with if we want them to ascend with us. Once we unlock what they want to feel about themselves, everything else becomes logical.
Kids are masters of decoding your voice. Your voice indicates whether you are a coach or a boss. They respond better to coaches.
We tend to focus on intellectual skills and achievement at school and are neglecting executive function, cognitive skills, and personality.
Pillar VIII: Emotional Control
Likely Challenges
- Spontaneous, strong emotion - with little provocation
- Personalizes the non-personal (takes it personally)
- Chronic irritability, moodiness
Possible Solutions
- Project empathy before attempting to correct emotional problem (attentive listening)
- Minimize direct eye contact, use a matter-of-fact tone
- Explain acceptable ways for expressing dissatisfaction
- Work toward converting disruptive students into classroom school leaders
Bottom line: I need to focus my instruction and allow for repetition and rehearsal - perhaps not as much elaboration and "going off on tangents." I also need to integrate explicit use of executive function on a daily basis - stop and review, end-of-day checklist, frequent smaller assessment, talk openly about time management and content organization. I MUST be better about getting quick and specific feedback to my students so that they can accurately reflect on their progress and improve over time.
Monday, October 10, 2011
Ken Kosik at UVU Arts in Education Conference
The arts ask the really big questions. Cognitive neuroscience asks big questions. Molecular neuroscience asks small questions.
Somewhere in our evolutionary history, the human need to make art has emerged. Around 50,000 years ago, our ancestors started to paint on the walls of caves. No other species had ever done this. And the paintings would not have been seen by very many people. So there is an urge to create this art that extends beyond the desire for others to see it. Musical instruments begin to emerge at about the same time, as did burying the dead with things - the emergence of abstraction.
Human genomes are almost identical to each other (only 1% different from one person to another). Neanderthals are also remarkably similar to us. But there are small differences, which may contribute to the human drive to create art. All of our closest relatives have gone extinct. Even the closest living ones (i.e. chimps, etc.) are threatened. Chimp genes are 97% like ours. But they wouldn't spontaneously help each other like we do. This is called the "social brain."
Reading: Oliver Sacks' The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat
Attributes of the Social Brain:
- Ability to recognize people's faces (there is a part of the brain devoted specifically to this function; test yourself at faceblind.org)
- Watching the eye movements of people you're talking to
- Language - (there is a musicality to the Italian language, and they use the "musical" parts of their brain to attempt to extract meaning from nonsense words)
- Memories - beyond declarative ("Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinion, their life a mimicry, their passion a quotation." Oscar Wilde; "Let us, then, say that this is the gift of Memory, the mother of the Muses, and that whenever we wish to remember anything we see or hear or think of in our own minds, we hold this wax under the perceptions and thoughts and imprint them upon it, just as we make impressions from seal rings; and whatever is imprinted we remember and know as long as its image lasts..." Socrates) The Greeks linked memory (Mnemosyne is the goddess of memory) and the arts (the Muses are her daughters)
Memory is not about the past. It is about the future. Memory is mental time travel. (Yadin Dudai quote on the role of memory)
We do not recall things perfectly. Rather, our memories help to inform our thoughts. When memory goes away, we lose our future. When you ask an Alzheimer's patient what they would like to do this summer, they have a difficult time providing detail about their desires.
Daydreaming vs. Task-oriented Behavior
The brain shifts when you are not trying to achieve a goal. It continues to use a lot of energy, but it activates the parietal lobes - the "dark energy" of the brain, when you are at rest, but active.
What does the brain do?
It tells us our own story - creates autobiography
1. Places us in the lead role of own story (agency, maps our position in space)
2. Creates a continuity of consciousness upon a fragmented field of memories
3. Deludes us about our past by conflating memory with imagination
4. Puts emotional valence on our experience so we can learn to survive
The brain tells our story. We have to explain what we don't understand. Confabulation is when we form false memories of events by confusing imagination and memories. But we also engage in storytelling through the arts - stories, painting, music, etc. As we chip away at a scientific understanding of things, we often don't get to the really big questions that the arts address.
In our day-to-day life stories, our brains respond profoundly to visual stimuli. But the mind can put a different kind of look to the same scene. The actual visual input is far more important than all of the meaning that we put on that information. This is true of all stimuli - it is the meaning we make that is most important.
Somewhere in our evolutionary history, the human need to make art has emerged. Around 50,000 years ago, our ancestors started to paint on the walls of caves. No other species had ever done this. And the paintings would not have been seen by very many people. So there is an urge to create this art that extends beyond the desire for others to see it. Musical instruments begin to emerge at about the same time, as did burying the dead with things - the emergence of abstraction.
Human genomes are almost identical to each other (only 1% different from one person to another). Neanderthals are also remarkably similar to us. But there are small differences, which may contribute to the human drive to create art. All of our closest relatives have gone extinct. Even the closest living ones (i.e. chimps, etc.) are threatened. Chimp genes are 97% like ours. But they wouldn't spontaneously help each other like we do. This is called the "social brain."
Reading: Oliver Sacks' The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat
Attributes of the Social Brain:
- Ability to recognize people's faces (there is a part of the brain devoted specifically to this function; test yourself at faceblind.org)
- Watching the eye movements of people you're talking to
- Language - (there is a musicality to the Italian language, and they use the "musical" parts of their brain to attempt to extract meaning from nonsense words)
- Memories - beyond declarative ("Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinion, their life a mimicry, their passion a quotation." Oscar Wilde; "Let us, then, say that this is the gift of Memory, the mother of the Muses, and that whenever we wish to remember anything we see or hear or think of in our own minds, we hold this wax under the perceptions and thoughts and imprint them upon it, just as we make impressions from seal rings; and whatever is imprinted we remember and know as long as its image lasts..." Socrates) The Greeks linked memory (Mnemosyne is the goddess of memory) and the arts (the Muses are her daughters)
Memory is not about the past. It is about the future. Memory is mental time travel. (Yadin Dudai quote on the role of memory)
We do not recall things perfectly. Rather, our memories help to inform our thoughts. When memory goes away, we lose our future. When you ask an Alzheimer's patient what they would like to do this summer, they have a difficult time providing detail about their desires.
Daydreaming vs. Task-oriented Behavior
The brain shifts when you are not trying to achieve a goal. It continues to use a lot of energy, but it activates the parietal lobes - the "dark energy" of the brain, when you are at rest, but active.
What does the brain do?
It tells us our own story - creates autobiography
1. Places us in the lead role of own story (agency, maps our position in space)
2. Creates a continuity of consciousness upon a fragmented field of memories
3. Deludes us about our past by conflating memory with imagination
4. Puts emotional valence on our experience so we can learn to survive
The brain tells our story. We have to explain what we don't understand. Confabulation is when we form false memories of events by confusing imagination and memories. But we also engage in storytelling through the arts - stories, painting, music, etc. As we chip away at a scientific understanding of things, we often don't get to the really big questions that the arts address.
In our day-to-day life stories, our brains respond profoundly to visual stimuli. But the mind can put a different kind of look to the same scene. The actual visual input is far more important than all of the meaning that we put on that information. This is true of all stimuli - it is the meaning we make that is most important.
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Raising Nerds
The article linked below is a great reminder that we need to be raising a nation of nerds. In other words, we need to value education as much as (if not more than) athletic prowess and make it a key focus of our government, culture, society, and families. I couldn't agree more.
http://www.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/06/28/granderson.raising.nerd/index.html?iref=obinsite
http://www.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/06/28/granderson.raising.nerd/index.html?iref=obinsite
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
Compulsive Liars
So compulsive liars aren't crazy, they're crazy smart! Fascinating findings:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=87922568
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=87922568
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Genetics and Autism
I had the outstanding opportunity to attend a presentation by Dr. Valerie Hu, a leading autism researcher. Dr. Hu is a biochemist, so she looks at autism from a biological stand point. She has made some amazing inroads into understanding the genetic correlations with autism and I wanted to share some notes here for my friends with autistic children and my former and current students who have or will have the opportunity to work with students with autism.
Intro to Dr. Hu's work: http://www.modelmekids.com/autism-research.html
First, Dr. Hu realized that the current method of trying to analyze the biology of autism was completely ineffectual. Researchers were throwing all types of autism into the same pot and then trying to determine what made those with autism different from those without. Of course, they couldn't figure it out. There was so much variance in the data that they couldn't draw any conclusions from it. So Dr. Hu and her grad students began to categorize people based on the behavioral inventories that are currently in use. They were able to tease out four distinct forms of autism based on those inventories - severe language-impaired, intermediate, mild (including Asperger's), and savant.
Once these distinctions were made, they were able to start comparing the genetic data to determine if these behavioral categories were also evident biologically. They are. Dr. Hu has been able to determine definite biological/genetic markers for each of the four types of autism. The markers are particularly significant for those with severe language-impaired autism.
Parents of children with autism will not be surprised to hear what some of those genetic markers are. Dr. Hu discovered differences in the genes linked with circadian rhythms (which regulate sleep-wake cycles, among other things), digestion, head size, sensitivity to stimuli, etc. She states that this new form of analysis is 98% accurate for each type of autism and 94% accurate overall, meaning that a blood test for autism is on the horizon.
Additionally, it appears that many of these genetic anomalies are not related to flawed or damaged genes, but rather are caused by markers on the genes that turn them up or down. For example, one of the genes that is related to circadian rhythms regulates the amount of melatonin in the body. It is turned down in kids with severe autism. So, we may be able to supplement kids' melatonin to give them some relief and help them to sleep better.
Another fascinating finding here is that one of the genes that seems to be most profoundly impacted in children with autism is closely linked with the amount of testosterone in the body. If this gene is turned off, the amount of testosterone goes up, which reduces an enzyme in the body that helps to regulate sleep-wake cycles, neural inflammation, etc. So, boys already have more testosterone than girls. Autistic boys produce more testosterone because this gene is turned off, which reduces the production of the enzyme, which results in more testosterone production, etc. It is a terribly vicious cycle that both explains why more boys than girls have autism and explores a possible cause of some of the symptoms of autism. This research tells us that hormone therapy (giving estrogen), may help to alleviate some of the symptoms of autism.
Link to more info: http://www.livescience.com/12920-autism-common-males-testosterone-affects-gene.html
Basically, the idea here is that we are near a blood test for autism AND, perhaps even more interestingly, the genetic testing is leading to customized treatments for each autistic child as we discover which genes are impacted and then target therapies (genetic, hormonal, etc.) to their specific genetic deficiencies.
Super-exciting stuff that I think gives everyone a lot of hope for the future of children with autism.
Intro to Dr. Hu's work: http://www.modelmekids.com/autism-research.html
First, Dr. Hu realized that the current method of trying to analyze the biology of autism was completely ineffectual. Researchers were throwing all types of autism into the same pot and then trying to determine what made those with autism different from those without. Of course, they couldn't figure it out. There was so much variance in the data that they couldn't draw any conclusions from it. So Dr. Hu and her grad students began to categorize people based on the behavioral inventories that are currently in use. They were able to tease out four distinct forms of autism based on those inventories - severe language-impaired, intermediate, mild (including Asperger's), and savant.
Once these distinctions were made, they were able to start comparing the genetic data to determine if these behavioral categories were also evident biologically. They are. Dr. Hu has been able to determine definite biological/genetic markers for each of the four types of autism. The markers are particularly significant for those with severe language-impaired autism.
Parents of children with autism will not be surprised to hear what some of those genetic markers are. Dr. Hu discovered differences in the genes linked with circadian rhythms (which regulate sleep-wake cycles, among other things), digestion, head size, sensitivity to stimuli, etc. She states that this new form of analysis is 98% accurate for each type of autism and 94% accurate overall, meaning that a blood test for autism is on the horizon.
Additionally, it appears that many of these genetic anomalies are not related to flawed or damaged genes, but rather are caused by markers on the genes that turn them up or down. For example, one of the genes that is related to circadian rhythms regulates the amount of melatonin in the body. It is turned down in kids with severe autism. So, we may be able to supplement kids' melatonin to give them some relief and help them to sleep better.
Another fascinating finding here is that one of the genes that seems to be most profoundly impacted in children with autism is closely linked with the amount of testosterone in the body. If this gene is turned off, the amount of testosterone goes up, which reduces an enzyme in the body that helps to regulate sleep-wake cycles, neural inflammation, etc. So, boys already have more testosterone than girls. Autistic boys produce more testosterone because this gene is turned off, which reduces the production of the enzyme, which results in more testosterone production, etc. It is a terribly vicious cycle that both explains why more boys than girls have autism and explores a possible cause of some of the symptoms of autism. This research tells us that hormone therapy (giving estrogen), may help to alleviate some of the symptoms of autism.
Link to more info: http://www.livescience.com/12920-autism-common-males-testosterone-affects-gene.html
Basically, the idea here is that we are near a blood test for autism AND, perhaps even more interestingly, the genetic testing is leading to customized treatments for each autistic child as we discover which genes are impacted and then target therapies (genetic, hormonal, etc.) to their specific genetic deficiencies.
Super-exciting stuff that I think gives everyone a lot of hope for the future of children with autism.
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