If you feel you've missed out on a UC Berkeley education, don't worry. Now, you can go to iTunes and download classes. This is great, but I wonder how the people paying tuition feel. Another thought: I wonder if high school teachers could supplement homework assignments - perhaps for gifted or AP students - by having them download and take notes on some of these classes.
The following points outline how mood and context can affect memory:1. Emotions drive attention, create meaning, and have their own memory pathways (LeDoux, 1994).2. While feelings travel a circuitous, slower route throughout the body, the emotions always take the brain’s “superhighways” (Jensen, 1998).3. Emotions drive creativity, and this is a function of the amygdala. “Removing the amygdala, however, is devastating. That destroys the capacities for creative play, imagination, key decision making, and the nuances of emotions that drive the arts, humor, imagination, love, music and altruism” (Jensen, 1998).4. “When you experience a gut feeling, it’s because the same peptides that are released in your brain are also lining your gastrointestinal tract.” Miles Herkenham of the National Institute of Mental Health says that 98 percent of all communication within the body may be through these peptide messengers (in Pert 1997, p. 139) “This view implies a far greater role for the understanding and integration of emotions in learning” (Jensen).5. We remember that which is most emotional. This happens because all emotional events receive preferential processing (Christianson, 1992).6. Emotions give us a more activated and chemically stimulated brain, which helps us recall things better. The more intense the amygdala arousal, the stronger the imprint (Cahill, Prins, Weber, and McGaugh 1994) from Goleman (1995). (see information on the amygdala above)7. Conclusion: What is the effect of all of this on memory? We remember things that are emotional and meaningful and tend to forget those things that have no attachment to emotion or meaning. Even if dry material is presented in the context of something exciting such as field trip, it is more likely that the material will be remembered.8. Context-dependent memory means that memory gets associated to the text in which they are studied. A person’s ability to recall an item depends on the person’s ability to reproduce the list context. There is evidence that subjects have difficulty recalling items when the context changes between study and test (Anderson).9. “Subjects can show better memory when their mental states at study and at test match” (Anderson).10. Mood congruency refers to the fact that people find it easier to remember happy memories when happy and sad memories when sad (Anderson).11. How can one make use of this information? If you are a student trying to remember something for a test, keep the following in mind:- Attach the content of the material to something personally meaningful or emotional.
- Paraphrase material to create personal meaning of content.
- Re-create an internal mood at test time similar to the one you had at study time.
Right Brain World now offers a research, writing and cyber-marketing service to innovators, inventors, educators and other creative people. Have a look.
There has been a lack of "bloggage" on the site lately...but there is a reason. I'm in the middle of developing a site which will outline a new service in E-learning. Stay tuned for details.
Games are good tools for getting students to use all their senses, particularly visual, auditory and kinesthetic, which makes this a good method for different types of learners. Recent evidence shows the values of bringing emotion into the learning environment. Games create a positive association with learning and “allow for the repetition and deeper processing that strengthens neural pathways” (Millis, 2003).Excerpted from: The Global Challenge Curriculum: The Application of Chaos Theory in the Classroom, Lee Chazen, EDTE 227, Dr. Sherrie Carinci
Check out Global Challenge.
Not too long ago, I heard Daniel Pink in an interview on NPR. I was inspired because I thought someone was finally speaking on a topic that was hardly being addressed anywhere else. He was speaking about the need for more conceptual thinkers, and suggested that businesses would soon turn to people with M.F.A.'s as oppossed to M.B.A.'s. In his book, A Whole New Mind, he said:"But the keys to the kingdom are changing hands. The future belongs to a very different kind of person with a very different kind of mind - creators and empathizers, pattern recognizers, and meaning makers. These people - artists, inventors, designers, storytellers, caregivers, consolers, big picture thinkers - will now reap society's richest rewards and share its greatest joys."
I would just add one thing to this: If this is to become true, someone must devise a strategy to sell the idea. For people to believe in the power of conceptual, right-brain thinkers, someone will have to first convince school administrators, politicians and CEO's. Perhaps we should step back for a second and begin thinking of ways to sell the concept. Yes, it's a good idea, but how do we convince others of this?
Will we get to the point where a physical public school is an outdated idea from a bygone era? Will it soon be possible to have a “cyber-learning consultant,” whose purpose is to arrange a completely electronic curriculum for students? Will there come a time when students, for whatever reason, leave the public school entirely in exchange for a digitally-based education, designed specifically for them? Under a program like the one described above, the student’s schedule would be filled with weekly podcasts, online tests and various online readings. For students who progress well and are in need of building interpersonal skills, there is the option of an educational online game with other students across the globe. What if the student experiences trouble in his or her classes and no one is around? No problem. Visit a cyber-tutor using instant messaging AV technology. By creating a program to fit the needs of the students, the education becomes catered or more suited to the type of intelligence the student exhibits. Problems with ADHD are no longer significant in this environment. The cyber learning consultant comes in and constructs the type of program to fit the student who is easily distracted. A typical classroom with 30 other students and dozens of triggers and distractions may not be the place for this type of learner. Institutions are slow to react to the needs of special learners, but an E-environment adapts quickly.Education is the second largest industry in the United States,* and many in this industry are familiar with E-learning. The world of online classes or cyber-based instruction and educational software is nothing new, but this three part essay takes us further down the path in order to ask some important questions: “where is this phenomenon taking us? Will it be good for students and teachers, and will it be good for business and the economy?
*Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, Career Guide to Industries, 2006-07 Edition, Educational Services, on the Internet at http://www.bls.gov/oco/cg/cgs034.htm (visited March 22, 2006). Last Modified Date: December 20, 2005
Will we get to the point where a physical public school is an outdated idea from a bygone era? Will it soon be possible to have a “cyber-learning consultant,” whose purpose is to arrange a completely electronic curriculum for students? Will there come a time when students, for whatever reason, leave the public school entirely in exchange for a digitally-based education, designed specifically for them? 