Brain Based Research in Education

The brain is made up of two hemispheres; the right and the left. The two hemispheres are connected by a large bundle of fibers called the corpus callosum. Unique functional areas within the brain are organized in a style called ‘lateralization’. This refers to the distribution of functional areas in one hemisphere or the other. The left hemisphere, which controls the right side of the body, focuses more attention on speech, writing, science, logic and math. The right side of the brain is more responsive to the prosody in language and the affective tones which color the interpretation of language.

Two areas are particularly important to educators, the prefrontal cortex and the limbic system. These areas work together to accommodate incoming stimuli and create memories. The prefrontal cortex focuses attention and acts as the seat of decision making. It employs logic and reasoning to solve problems. The limbic system is a collection of smaller bodies with collaboratively form and store memories. The organ specifically responsible for memory storage is the hippocampus. The surrounding bodies of the limbic system hold powerful influence over the way in which the hippocampus stores memories. These include the parahippocampal gyrus, amygdala, the thalamus and the olfactory bulbs.

Each of these secondary structures in the limbic system contributes to the way in which memories are associatively coded as they are put into storage. As these memories enter storage the hippocampus creates a series of ‘mental maps’ for itself. Each individual memory is associated with memories of the events that led up and came after its occurrence. The hippocampus connects theses events to promote retrieval in the future during recall. The way in which these events are remembered is where the support structures influence memory.

An individual creates a full memory when he or she integrates all the sensory data that occurred in the instance of the memory. This includes not only the visual perception of the events, but also the somatosensory, audio and even olfactory stimulation that permeates from the environment. All of this input can later be associated with a memory during retrieval. External recreation of the events in which the activity took place further promote retrieval speed.

These findings have significant implications for the way in which children are educated and perhaps how they ought to be educated. Studies have shown that children retain knowledge best when it is conveyed in a context similar to a real life application. The modeled environment provides developing minds with cues that inherently shape the way in which memory is processed and stored. When reintroduced to the ‘real’ environment in which a task or test needs to be performed the mind will use the external cues to recall information. The speed and accuracy of the recall will be higher if the environment remains consistent than if learning took place in a synthetic environment and the actual task performance in another. This suggests that that learning might be more easily achieved if the skills we try to instill in youth were imparted in a real life context.