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What we get wrong about learning
We learn many things in our lifetime, from learning to walk and talk, read and write, ride a bike and drive a car. The list seems endless, because it probably is. Learning takes on different forms. Learning to walk, for example, differs a lot from learning algebra, or how to evaluate a Sylvia Plath poem.…
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Can brain training make us smarter?
Can listening to Mozart make you better at mathematics? Can learning a musical instrument make you cleverer? We know from studies that some types of learning, such as learning a foreign language or how to play a musical instrument, can slow cognitive decline in later life. But what is their impact on learning more generally?…
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Book Review: Tackling Disadvantage and Underachievement in Schools
Diane Montgomery, Routledge (2020) In Tackling Disadvantage and Underachievement in Schools, Diane Montgomery has written a useful and highly accessible resource for teachers from Early Years to secondary school. Using evidence from decades of research, practical examples and case studies, Professor Montgomery guides the reader through the factors that may cause underachievement, including the role…
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Characteristics of life-long learners
We all have different experiences of formal education and often these experiences shape our future expectations. My formal education was chaotic; six primary schools in three different countries followed by three secondary schools. My final year of schooling was perhaps the worst of all, having started yet another new school that didn’t offer some of…
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Book Review: The Psychology of Great Teaching: (Almost) Everything Teachers Ought to Know
By Pedro De Bruyckere, Casper Hulshof and Liese Missinne. Corwin (2022) It’s only in the past few years that psychology has played a much larger role in teaching and learning, despite many aspects of psychology relating directly to it. However, there has been a tendency to place psychology under the umbrella of cognitive science and…
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Can drawing enhance learning?
We can view learning as multi-representational. We might, for example, learn through reading or listening, but we may also use diagrams, charts, schematics or video. When describing the working memory model I can refer to the different systems, such as the phonological loop and central executive and explain what they are for. But, in this…
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What is test expectancy?
According to some descriptions, (e.g. Craik and Lockhart, 1972) memory is nothing more than a by-product of processing. The depth at which information is processed determines the strength of the memory trace and how easily we can recall it later. Information can be viewed as the raw material for creating knowledge, but the operations we…
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Why do we forget what we learned at school?
Do you remember what you learned at school? Chances are you have a vague idea but the details are a bit fuzzy. Or you might not recall anything. Surely, however, if learning really is an ‘alteration in long-term memory’ then we shouldn’t forget what we’ve learned? So, perhaps, we forgot because we didn’t learn it…
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The Problem with Blank Slates
Summary: Blank Slate (Tabula Rasa) views of human development erroneously claim that we are born devoid of innate mental content. From birth, humans already have in place the systems required for rapid learning. These systems include those related to object recognition, language, numbers and intentions of others. They are then fine-tuned as the infant interacts…
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The Emotional Learner 