Procedural learning and automatization have widely been studied in behavioral psychology and typically involves a rapid improvement, followed by a plateau in performance throughout repeated training. More recently, brain imaging studies have implicated frontal-striatal brain circuits in skill learning. However, it is largely unknown whether…

Virtual Reality (VR) has gained popularity in educational fields enabling new learning possibilities. In the implementation process, VR could improve learning by increasing positive affective and cognitive processing, whereas VR also could hurt learning by increasing distraction and leading to poorer learning outcomes. Thus, understanding the…

The brain must strike a balance between reliable information processing and adaptation to an ever-changing environment. At a gross anatomical level, the brain's wiring diagram is believed to be relatively set after development. Therefore, a fundamental question arises: how does stereotyped wiring lead to flexible dynamics, computation, and…

Are there really "right-brained" and "left-brained" learners? The argument of left- and right-brain learning is the second most pervasive neuromyth in education. In this article, we debunk this myth by distinguishing fact from fiction. Each hemisphere indeed shows dominance in processing certain types of cognitive function.…

The human brain is a flexible information processing system. Across a range of simple and complex tasks, such as walking across the street to playing basketball, the brain transforms sensory information from the environment into corresponding motor actions. This sensory input to motor output transformation likely requires a sequence of complex…

Writing is the highest form of thinking, as evidenced by neuroimaging that shows how more neural networks are activated simultaneously during writing than during any other cognitive activity. This book will help teachers understand how the brain learns to write by unveiling 15 stages of thinking that underpin the writing process, along with…

Plasticity is a neural phenomenon in which experience induces long-lasting changes to neuronal circuits and is at the center of most neurobiological theories of learning and memory. However, too much plasticity is maladaptive and must be balanced with substrate stability. Area CA3 of the hippocampus provides such a balance via hemispheric…

Background: Many students struggle with mathematics difficulties, such as arithmetic problem-solving, intuitive geometry concepts and learning disabilities. Currently, there is an increasingly interesting in applying neuroscientific research paradigms to elucidate mathematical thinking and neural mechanisms that underlie academic achievement. On…

Over the past twenty-five years, or so, considerable advances have been made in understanding how learning occurs in the brain, though much of this research is still to make its way into education. One contribution it should be making is to furnish the philosophical critique of past and current theory with supporting empirical evidence. For…

Authors of the newly revised Teaching with the Brain in Mind, Liesl McConchie and Eric Jensen offer whole-brain approaches teachers can take to engage students in new learning and retaining that knowledge.

Activities that are effective in supporting attention have the potential to increase opportunities for student learning. However, little is known about the impact of instructional contexts on student attention, in part due to limitations in our ability to measure attention in the classroom, typically based on behavioral observation and…

The neural bases of cognition may be greatly informed by relating temporally defined developmental changes in behavior with concurrent alterations in neural function. A robust improvement in performance in spatial learning and memory tasks occurs at 3 wk of age in rodents. We reported that the developmental increase of spontaneous alternation in a…

In this chapter, I propose a stance on learning fractions as multiplicative relations through reorganizing knowledge of whole numbers as a viable alternative to the Natural Number Bias (NNB) stance. Such an alternative, rooted in the constructivist theory of knowing and learning, provides a way forward in thinking about and carrying out…

Research on what neural mechanisms facilitate word reading development in non-alphabetic scripts is relatively rare. The present study was among the first to adopt a multivariate pattern classification analysis to decode electroencephalographic signals recorded for primary school children (N = 236) while performing a Chinese character decision…

The creation and analysis of models is integral to all scientific disciplines, and modeling is considered a core competency in undergraduate biology education. There remains a gap in understanding how modeling activities may support changes in students' neural representations. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of simulating a model…