Reflective Essay 2: The Brain, Education, and the Competitive Edge

Reflective Essay 2: The Brain, Education, and the Competitive Edge

Cedric B. Stewart

Sam Houston State University

Issues in Contemporary Education

EDL-734

Drs. Edmonson & Jones

In the early part of the twentieth century, a man considered by some to be a radical thinker for his time proposed that a good education should have both a societal purpose and a purpose for the individual student. He further postulated that educators should progressively organize subject matter in such a way that it included the student’s past experiences. By doing so, he put forth that previous experiences could then be used as a tool upon which future growth could be built and thereby expanding the individual’s potential contribution to society. These beliefs were first espoused many years ago by John Dewy as he argued that educators must understand the nature of the human experience.

Now as the current model of education shifts more toward an outdated business school approach that is myopically focused on products and not processes, some are once again questioning the wisdom of ignoring the impact of past experiences on the learner. This time, however, the proponents of using experiences as part of the educational process, aimed with clinical research findings, advocates the use of those experiences as one of the integral parts of the total natural learning process. Based in neurobiology, researchers and educators alike are concluding that effective learning can only occur when it is incorporated through practicing real-life skills.

Hence, brain-based learning seeks to provide a natural approach to learning. Caine and Caine (2001) using this theoretical framework as a basis, proposes that learning becomes more expressive when the brain is provided opportunities that supports the processes in the search for creating meaning and connecting patterns. The acquisition of real and profound knowledge is therefore ultimately linked to the capacity of the learner to internalize and individualize each learning experience. Key to understanding this concept is the relationship that emotions have on intellectual functioning.

Consequently, one could easily contend that if we have such overwhelmingly convincing scientific evidence to suggest that a better way of teaching is possible, then it would make sense that we should be actively seeking to initiate the suggested changes. Unfortunately, at this time and in spite of the evidence to the contrary, we are still selecting to educate vast numbers of students using the traditional standard model. The three largest obstacles to this shift in our paradigm can best be categorized as a lack of clear communication, failure to initiate proper applications, and inadequate evaluations.

The educational process is comprised of a vast systemic cluster of individuals and groups of varying levels of academic and cognitive abilities that exercises and protects a variety of self-serving interest. A relatively stable and unchanging model of public schooling has only served to reinforce these constituents’ comfort levels within the existing educational system. In addition, most of these individuals have also been funneled through this same system and many often believe that school is a social machine that exists to prepare the nation’s workforce. The very idea of changing suddenly that time-honored approach especially based on scientific work that is rooted in such a seemingly lofty, contemporary, and difficult to understand area as neurobiology, probably seems to the average person, as being out of their capacity to comprehend the underlying concepts and thus the system itself should probably be left alone and remain unchanged.

The fallacy of this logic is that the problem should be with the delivery of the message and not with the message itself. Too often, the general public is often satisfied with cursory bits of fragmented salacious information that they use as the only basis for forming seemingly rational decisions concerning social institutions that affect their lives. Clearly, there is mounting evidence to suggest that under the current standard system, test scores and dropout rates both continue to rise simultaneously while college preparedness continues to decline. The implication being is that the learning that is occurring is primarily static and surface and is not necessarily indicative of an increase in overall learner proficiency. It has failed to be communicate adequately to the mass consumers of public education, and in many respects to private and parochial schools as well, that the average brain and therefore the capacity to learn does not operate like a machine.

The next area of contention is that successful brain –based learning cannot be appropriately applied using the existing parameters of the standards based model. Contextually, the optimal learning environments, which extend beyond the traditional classrooms, should be emotionally enriching places that challenge the learners through a variety of activities. These places should be emotionally stimulating and non-threatening that actively encourages learners to take risk for the sake of intellectual growth through establishing patterns and associations with prior knowledge. These newly acquired and more profound personal meaningful associations and permanent patterns can then be stored for later retrieval creating a deeper level of knowledge with potential real world applications.

Unfortunately, the current educational practice is often to introduce newly disjointed information to students that is dictated by state-mandated curriculum guides, which often focuses on tested objectives and fails to connect to the larger conceptual   frameworks upon which they are based. Lessons are seemingly planned and executed in manageable units without any or limited regards for students’ past interest or experiences within the subject matter. Learning occurs through consolidation of information and is generally expressed by students through means of rote forms or short-term memorization. The communities and businesses that often physically surround these schools and are an excellent source of untapped resources is often completely neglected or are marginally used, at best, in this current model of educational practice. Under this approach to application, teaching has become highly standardized with professional judgment, discretion, and creativity having been replaced by the sole need to increase standardized test scores.

Under the current standardized model, the use of a single indicator such as standardized test scores has also resulted in an inadequate evaluation of a learner’s true ability. Whereas an assessment of learning in itself is not a fundamentally bad thing, a single standardized assessment, however, lacks the innate ability to provide a complete evaluation of an individual’s performance and dynamic knowledge level. The use of a sole indicator such as a multiple-choice test fails to capture the essence of the learner’s “feel” for the subject matter, which could best be demonstrated through practical hands-on applications in which discussions and interactions are key components.

Inadequate evaluations also lack the ability to capture subtle nuisances that may exist in learning and between learners. Although state mandated test have been widely proclaimed by the media and politicians alike to dispel achievement gaps between ethnic groups, the reality is that several more valid and reliable national tests continue to show a widening disparity between these same groups. In addition, the use of formative and not strictly summative evaluations can serve to provide prescriptive feedback so that immediate adjustments and modifications can be readily made possibly replacing remedial programs that are often the result of failed high-stakes testing.

Today, although there are new approaches such as brain-based learning that is designed to eliminate the limitations of the traditional ways of teaching, many people are still reticent to abandon the standards based model. Whether is it a clear lack of understanding or the normal forces that constrain and inhibit all changes, ultimately it is the learners that are being taxed the greatest by our failing efforts to initiate this change. Traditional schooling may have one time served a very useful purpose, even though it too has always maintained a steady stream of vocal detractors. However, the world continues to evolve at a rapidly advancing pace and educational practices must also change in order to remain viable and sustainable.

Reference

Caine, G., & Caine, R.N. (2001). ''The brain, education, and the competitive edge. ''Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Education.