America’s education system needs help. While websites like
Khan Academy and Coursera have vastly expanded the dissemination of knowledge
through the use of technology, it still feels like a major part of the picture
is missing. How can policy makers and teachers alike use the growing body of
information on child development to improve the learning environment for
children and pave the way for a successful future for both individuals and the
nation as a whole? In essence: how can we use cognitive science to improve
education?
On April 2, 2013, I attended a talk by Dr. Sharon
Thompson-Schill, Director of Penn’s Center for Cognitive Neuroscience and
Christopher H. Browne Distinguished Professor of Psychology. She spoke at the
World Café Live, and the atmosphere was much more informal than I was
accustomed to when attending Professor Thompson-Schill’s class. While it was
amusing to see my professor start speaking with a beer in her hand (she joked
about it as well), it in no way detracted from an excellent speech about the
use of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to study the function of the
frontal lobes
TMS is a noninvasive method that uses electrical currents to
activate or deactivate certain parts of the brain. This relatively new
technology is extremely useful when working with human subjects because it
leaves no lasting effects and is approved by the FDA. Studies in the past have
shown that when the frontal cortex (the area of the brain right behind one’s
forehead) of adults is inhibited using TMS, subjects become more creative.
Young children experience extended frontal lobe immaturity naturally as part of
the developmental process, which essentially means that they are more creative
than the vast majority of adults.
This also means that children learn very differently than
adults. As Professor Thompson-Schill stated, “A long period of [frontal lobe]
immaturity is really optimized for learning in an unstructured environment. If
that’s really what it’s good for, then we are not capitalizing on that by the
way we teach our children.” Then she joked, “You know, 20 years from now, maybe
I’ll have something concrete to say
about that and our educational systems.” While there may not be new curriculums
planned out yet, there are other researchers at Penn who are focusing not only
on understanding how children learn to understand the world around them, but
also on how to better teach them.
I recently met with Dr. Deena Skolnick Weisberg whose lab at
Penn focuses on both the “development of imaginative cognition” and “the nature
of adults’ and children’s abilities to reason scientifically.” One of her goals
is to “bolster children’s latent scientific reasoning skills,” and she believes
that embracing children’s characteristic imaginations is one way to do this. She
and the members of her lab are currently in the process of developing a system
to measure a child’s scientific reasoning skills. They will then create and
test a series of exercises intended to improve these skills to determine what
works best. While science and creativity are often viewed as diametrically
opposed, Dr. Weisberg pointed out that they share common skills, such as the
ability to look at a situation from multiple perspectives and envision many
potential explanations for a single event. When I asked her if she had any
examples of the types of exercises she and the members of her lab may use, one idea
she proposed was telling a child two slightly different versions of similar
stories with the goal of helping the child realize that a single event can be
viewed in many ways. I look forward to seeing the results of her research in
upcoming years.
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