Learning in a Brain Compatible
Classroom
Presented by
Rosalie Furman
Duquesne University
BRAINO
Please choose 9 words from the following list and
complete your Braino card:
Amygdala
Cerebral Cortex
Dendrites
Axon
Cortisol
Endorphins
Dopamine
Corpus Callosum
Paraphrase Passport
Simultaneous Roundtable
Affirmation
Mozart Effect
Mindmap
Semantic Memory
Episodic Memory
Hippocampus
How would you title this picture?
Inside-Outside Circle
 Share your title with other students.
Affirmations
Point to someone and say, “You are a genius!”
 Affirmations make firm that which you
value.
 Affirmations model a habit of affirming
others instead of criticizing.
Confucius say:
五十而知天命)
 “It is easier to ride a horse in
the direction that he is already
headed.”
What is brain compatible
learning?
 Brain compatible learning is
understanding what the brain needs for
optimal learning potential and then creating
a teaching environment to accommodate
those needs.
The Five Principles of Brain
Compatible Learning
5
3
4
2
1
Five Principles of Brain
Compatible Learning
How would you accommodate these principles in
your school and classroom?
 1. Brains seek safety and security
 2. Brains need nourishment
 3. Brains need social interaction
 4. Brains are emotional
 5. Brains seek and process information
I. Brains Seek Safety and
Security
• The brain’s primary goal is always survival.
When we are frightened, threatened or
anxious, our primitive fight-or-flightdefense alarm systems kick in and we
downshift into “primitive survival mode”.
Stress and Anxiety
Threat or anxiety decreases the probability of
learning.
Boredom
Lack of challenge results in little or no learning.
Low threat + High Challenge &
Motivation =Relaxed Alertness
Higher-level thinking occurs when we are in a
state of relaxed-alertness
Cerebrum
Corpus Callosum
Thalmus
Hippocampus
Cerebellum
Amygdala
Brain Stem
Practice Providing Safety
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Smile
Use humor
Establish routines and procedures
Engage in classbuilding activities
Create smaller communities of learning
Teach to instructional levels for success
Provide a supportive, non-threatening classroom
climate
II. Brains Need Nourishment
• We need to feed our brain!
• The brain weighs only 3 pounds, which is
about 2% of our bodies weight, BUT
consumes 20% of our body’s water and
energy.
• It takes a lot of energy to feed
100 billion neurons.
A Neuron
Dendrites
Axon
Cell Body
The brain is fed by:
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Food
Water
Oxygen
The Environment
Sleep
Music
Why Music?
 Music creates mood states:
Music can “charge and energize the brain”
 Music can carry instruction.
 Music can signal and prepare the brain.
 Music can boost intelligence.
Provide Nourishment in the
Classroom
 Provide healthy snacks.
 Include green leaf and flowering plants in your
classroom to cleanse the air.
 Monitor sleep habits of your students.
 Provide students with water bottles so they remain
hydrated.
 Include exercise daily.
 Provide music in the school.
Music, Mix, Freeze
 Share with a colleague something that you
have learned that has some personal
meaning to you.
III. Brains need Social Interaction
 Brains are far more active when interacting
with others:
 Discuss
 Debate
 Learn cooperatively
Cooperative Structures
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Think Pair Share
Paraphrase Passport
Numbered Heads
Say Something
Expert Jigsaw
Literature Circles
Question Generator
Talking Chips/Drop a Chip
Think-Pair-Share
 Teacher poses question
 Teacher allows for “Think Time”
 Students pair and discuss responses
Paraphrase Passport
 One student shares response. The other student restates the
information.
 “In other words…” “Are you saying…?”
Say Something
 Teacher poses question for partners to discuss
 “Say something that disagrees with that point of view.”
 “Say something to share how that information makes you feel.”
What makes an outstanding teacher?
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1. Think about your response.
2. Taller partner shares his/her response.
3. Shorter partner paraphrases.
4. Repeat
Numbered Heads
 Each student in the team has a number.
 After team discussion, teacher chooses one
number to share-out for the whole group.
 This ensures active listening and individual
accountability
Expert Jigsaw
 Students become teachers
Literature Circles
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Reader: Chooses a special part to read aloud
Question Generator: Creates questions
Responder: Answers question
Clarifier: Paraphrases responses
Augmenter: Adds additional information to answer
Connector: Connects information to self
Praiser: Exaggerates affirmation
Talking Chips
 Student get “x” amount of chips, and must
make that number of contributions to the
team.
Drop-a-Chip
 Students give a chip that has a specific
meaning to other members of the team.
 “I really like that idea.” (Drop a Praise chip)
Take Brain Breaks
The brain needs physical as well as mental breaks:
 Energizers
 Silly Sports
 Stretching
 Snacks
 Recess
 Dance
 Creative Expression
Circle 11
 1. Form a circle of four to six
 2. Say: One, Two, Three: ELEVEN
making a fist in the middle of the circle
 3. On the count of eleven, players open their
fist to reveal from zero to five fingers.
 4. Add the sum of the group’s fingers.
 5. Your group did it? Change the number.
IV. Brains are Emotional
Close your eyes and remember an incident
from your childhood.
 Our brains are better able to
recall that which is associated
with emotion--that which
makes us “feel”-is remembered.
Emotions are Critical to Learning
 Emotionally-laden
experiences generate
more interest,
engagement, and
retention because
emotional learning has
preferential processing
in the brain.
Emotional Events Get Preferential
Encoding
Engage emotions…
• Through the use of stories, videos, pictures and
activities.
• By asking students how they “feel” about topics.
• By debating emotionally-charged topics.
• Through the use of drama, theater, and expressive
arts.
Museum Walk
 In a small group
(using your bodies)
create a sculpture
representing
something you have
learned today.
 Be prepared to share
the title of your
sculpture.
V. Brains Seek & Process
Information
Engage multiple memory systems to enhance
the brain’s ability to retain.
 Semantic: Fact memory
 Procedural: Skill memory
 Episodic: Episode memory
 Working: Thinking memory
 Spatial: Map Memory
Semantic Memory
 Content knowledge, facts, formulas, etc.
 Semantic memory is created through
repeated practice. “Practice makes Perfect”
 Build bridges to connect new learning
 Use mnemonic devices
 Test later
 Use Novelty
Bio Poem
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First name:
Four descriptive traits:
Sibling of or son/daughter of:
Lover of:
Who fears:
Who needs:
Who gives:
Who said:
Resident of:
Last name:
Procedural Memory
 Sometimes called “motor memory” or
“muscle memory”.
 We acquire procedural memory by doing-writing, drawing, etc.
 Skills require repeated practice but
eventually become automatic.
 Test procedural memory through authentic
assessments.
Episodic Memory
 Episodic memory is designed for one-time
events--easily forgotten.
 Write it to memory: journals, diaries, etc.
 Relive the event by drawing or discussing.
 Vary your delivery in the classroom--make
it memorable—no front of room.
 Ask students to change seats—even it’s just
for a few minutes.
Working Memory
 This is the short-term memory system where we
hold the things that are at the forefront of our
minds (literally).
 The more information in working memory, the
less capable students are of new learning.
 Process learning to move to long-term memorywrite, draw, discuss, mind mapping, etc.
 Reflect on learning (metacognition)
Mind Mapping
Is a process of visually depicting a concept with symbols,
images, colors, key words, and branches.
Spatial Memory
 Spatial memory is our natural memory
system strongly rooted in evolution.
 Includes our mental maps of where physical
objects are located in our environment.
 Retain information by visually and
physically organizing it--graphic organizers,
mind maps, visual cues.
Brains Seek Novelty
 The brain can process the teacher’s voice while making
judgments about the tone quality, the teacher’s dress,
hair style, as well as the student sitting next to him/her,
the temperature of the room, distracting noises, etc. etc.
etc.
• “Are you paying attention?”
• Prime with content--Surprise with process
• Avoid habituation
Brains Need Immediate Feedback
 Focus feedback on ways to improve rather than
overall evaluations.
 Traditional workbook work is
feedback-poor.
 Build feedback into each lesson- Checking for
understanding techniques:
Signals
Individual chalkboards
Questioning Strategies
Exit Tickets, etc.
Brains Seek Patterns to Construct
Meaning
X
A B C Order
Linking Connections
Facts Learned in Isolation are
Soon Forgotten
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Thematic teaching
Integrated language arts
Interdisciplinary instruction
Graphic Organizers (make the invisible
visible)
Using organizers
allow learners to
replicate patterns
or excellence.
Brains Seek Meaningful Learning
 Relate and Motivate: Link content to student
interests
 Cultivate Meaning: Have students explain in their
own words, negotiate meaning, write about how
the knew knowledge fits into their mental schema.
 Focus on Process -- Not Outcome. Students learn
more from the process of searching for meaning
than from retrieving an answer.
Closure
 ABC’s of Brain Compatible Learning
No Other Profession
No other profession changes more lives.
No other profession instills more pride.
Through children’s eyes you’re a
guiding light,
A beacon down life’s road.
Your work is like no other profession in
the world.