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Contact UsWhich of these five “neuromyths” are prevalent among instructors, instructional designers and administrators? Does your understanding match the expert consensus? Dig in to find out.
Neuromyths – Round 1
Teaching is a wonderful and difficult blend of different fields. It is a fundamentally social activity, with all the complexity and nuance of human interaction. It is also a well-studied field, with mountains of results attempting to discern does and doesn’t work. Part of those results are firmly related to our understanding of the workings of brains, neurology, and what it means to learn something.
The good news is that compared to the general public, educators are less likely to endorse false ideas about teaching, learning and the brain, which we will call “neuromyths.” Unfortunately, some neuromyths are still endorsed by far too many teachers.
In this piece we will look at 5 different assertions about the brain, development and teaching. You’ll have a chance to decide whether you agree or not, and then you can reveal what the research says on the matter.
Source and Quotes: The scholarly work comes from a 2019 international report produced by the Online Learning Consortium in 2019 based on the work of a 10-person research team from higher education institutions worldwide. All quotes are from that report. There will be a Neuromyths Round 2 piece coming soon, so you may wish to hold off reading the source directly, but you can find it below (1) and choose for yourself.
Statements about teaching, learning and the brain. Correct or Incorrect?
This is incorrect. Memories are rewritten (or even created) during the act of retrieval. The broad consensus is that “the construction of memory encoding, storage, and retrieval is an active and constructive process that is highly influenced by pre-existing beliefs, expectations, and knowledge.” This process is complex and nuanced, and is prone to “biases, errors, and omissions.”
2019 report percentage of correct responses:
69% of instructors, 79% of instructional designers and 74% of administrators.
This is correct. Physical changes in the structure and connections within the brain are associated with learning. Over just a few decades, modern brain-imaging tools have taken this idea from the level of a sensible conjecture to a well-established fact.
2019 report percentage of correct responses:
67% of instructors, 64% of instructional designers and 58% of administrators.
This is incorrect. Research shows that frequent low stakes testing can help with reducing test anxiety, reducing achievement gaps, and increasing both assessment scores and long-term retention.
Percentage of correct responses (from 2019 report):
72% of instructors, 84% of instructional designers and 83% of administrators.
This is incorrect. This bizarre myth has origins in the 1800s with a French researcher and has incredible staying power in the modern world. Both neuroscience theory and modern brain-imaging agree that we use virtually every part of our brains all the time (even while sleeping). Regardless, this is one of the few instances in which a majority of instructors endorse a neuromyth.
Percentage of correct responses (from 2019 report):
47% of instructors, 57% of instructional designers and 50% of administrators.
This is correct. Our brains have extensive and varied systems to manage the load of signals coming from our senses. Part of that system creates a hierarchy of prioritization. New sensory information is sought and bumped up in that priority list. This actually presents a constant confounding factor to education researchers. If a new kind of teaching method or learning activity is introduced, it may be more successful simply because learners will focus on something new. Positive initial results may fade over time, indicating the novelty was the driving factor.
Percentage of correct responses (from 2019 report):
72% of instructors, 66% of instructional designers and 66% of administrators.
These first five myths remind us how easily we might end up carrying around misconceptions about the brain. More importantly, these neuromyths can truly change the methods we use for our courses and the “teaching moves” we employ with our students. In Part 2, we’ll look at five more neuromyths that continue to shape how we think about teaching and learning.
Notes
- Betts, K., Miller, M., Tokuhama-Espinosa, T., Shewokis, P., Anderson, A., Borja, C., Galoyan, T., Delaney, B., Eigenauer, J., & Dekker, S. (2019). International report: Neuromyths and evidence-based practices in higher education. Online Learning Consortium: Newburyport, MA.
Generative AI disclosure: After writing this piece I used generative AI to write a first draft of both the short “teaser blurb” that went out by email, and the final paragraph of the piece. I tried creating the featured image with generative AI but wasn’t happy with it and used a stylized Wikipedia image instead. Want to know more? Send me an email and we can chat!