Week 4 - How to be a better learner

Its the last week of the course and we are looking at the advanced aspects of learning.

From one of this weeks videos, I went wandering online and found an interesting article by The Mind Training Company (Link) and the wonderful diagram made from Wilder Penfield's studies, one of the fathers of modern Neuro science. They wrote:

"highly skilled neurosurgeon, Wilder Penfield, mapped thousands of sites in the cortex by way of ESB research on hundreds of live patients. The technique allowed Penfield to create maps of the sensory and motor cortices (homunculus) and show their connections to the various limbs and organs of the body. It was as a result of his groundbreaking work in the treatment of Epilepsy and the development of the Montreal procedure to reduce, and in 50% of his cases, cure its symptoms, that Penfield produced detailed mapping of the brain. Below are diagrams of the sensory and motor homunculi and how they relate to these organs, as found by Penfield and a pictorial representation of the human body if the limbs were in proportions directly relative to the size of the cortex area that governs their use. Penfield was awarded the Lister Medal for his contributions to surgical science in 1950."

Unknown artists impression of Wielder Penfields work

This was of interest because of beauty of the work he did, of course there is more to it as new studies are finding but it takes people like Wilder Penfield to get us going, to see this beauty and be inspired by it.

This weeks videos started us of looking at:

• The importance of exercise, not just for the cardiovascular benefits, but also for the growth within the Hippocampus. Of course you may have read on week one that it also helps with the 'Diffuse' mode of thinking.
• Practice makes perfect. The importance of practice to imbed good learning is critical, along with retrieval to ensure that it's used.

In terms of the exercise I noted above, I had a great 'Diffuse moment' the other day. While on a wonderful walk with my wife on the beautiful Sussex Downs a thought popped out at me from nowhere about a problem I had been thinking about at work. I was so excited that I had experienced this that I chatted to my long suffering wife all about it, 'I got my Diffuse moment, I'm so happy'. The trouble was that I talked so much about the moment that I forgot the thought I'd just had. Oh well, cant win them all.

I was chatting to one of my Son's about metaphors, as I was telling him about the one we have been learning about, (Slots in your working memory). He felt that this wasn't a clear enough explanation of what happens when you are working on a problem. We chatted for ages and finally settled on a metaphor we both liked, so here it is:

When we have a  new thought it can be likened to water gently trickling down a sandy hill, the water makes a small faint grove in the mountain, as you continue to work at it more water trickles down, making the grove a little deeper and can even allow it to meet up with other groves, previously leant. The more you gently think about it the deeper it becomes. But beware, if you try to take in too much it is like pouring a bucket full down the hill, it just washes over the top of it all and doesn't create a grove at all, it can be overwhelming. A steady trickle is best, giving it time to dry a little is also not a bad thing as well as allowing it to join other channels.

We went on to understand that people learn by practice, not by just being told. Doing it deepens the learning and the learner can stumble along enjoying the experience.

WE CAN ALL CHANGE OUR BRAINS - positive thinking, exercise and a mindful approach all help.

The complexities of the brain and our understanding of how it works will be moving quicker with some of the advances I am reading about at the moment. How this new learning can be applied to improve the lives of those who have a learning difficulty such as Autism is of great interest to me. This course had lead me to look at new and old aspects  of research and ponder over the implications that may find ways to help both myself in my explanations of cognitive behavior in a positive and constructive way as well as apply this new understanding to my role of teaching others to support vulnerable people to have the best quality of life we can offer. Wonderful.

I've been reading up more on our working memory, Linda Walker, one other staff on the course I have been doing, gave me a few links to some articles and papers to look at this some more. On an interesting blog by Rene Liesefeld called 'the number Seven is not Magical, but Cognitive Capacity Limitations Are Real and Relevant'. (Link). He discuss that we have four slots in our working memory, this refers to our capacity to hold information at any one time. These 'Slots' are still being debated but the evidence is growing that supports the four slot capasity idea. The relevance of this in my work is very significant. People need to be able to grasp a lot of complex understanding when it comes to working with people who have a learning difficulty and present them with Challenging behaviour. At the time when they experience the challenging behaviour it can be very stressful and we are expecting them to quickly respond in a positive and empathic way.
I don't think I will ever stop adding to this blog about learning, but this course, now nearly over has been an amazing journey, one I never imagined it would be and would like to thank all those involved with it.