Notes on How We Learn: The New Science of Education and the Brain by Stanislas Dehaene
In recent decades, neuroscientists have made a cornucopia of discoveries regarding learning. If the objective of education is to teach students, shouldn’t we incorporate at least some of these findings into school curriculums? Stanislas Dehaene proposes how to do precisely that.
Contrary to popular belief, we are born with considerable knowledge. While breathing our first breath, we already have a rudimentary understanding of concepts such as laws of physics, numbers, probabilities, animals, inanimate objects, faces, and languages. To survive in our ever-changing world, however, we need to learn much more. And we do. How We Learn explains how.
Our brains are prediction machines constantly creating and updating mental models of our surroundings. When a prediction is violated, the models that have made it are adjusted, and we learn. To achieve lasting results efficiently, we can benefit from what Stanislas Dehaene calls “the four pillars of learning”: attention, active engagement, error feedback, and consolidation.
Attention is choosing what to ignore and what to examine in more detail. Multitasking is a myth—our brains have limited resources, and they cannot perform two mentally demanding tasks simultaneously. At least not well.
Once something has caught our attention, we need to actively engage with it. A 1963 experiment has shown that if we place two kittens in the same environment but make sure one of them cannot move, only the free kitten will learn to see even though both will receive identical visual inputs. In other words, passive learning doesn’t work.
After learning, we should test ourselves (or be tested) and receive detailed feedback. However, testing is not about grading. It’s about retrieving and using information.
Finally, we should revise in order to consolidate the newly acquired knowledge. And we should sleep—regularly and as much as our bodies want us to. During sleep, our brains replay the events of the day dozens or even hundreds of times and try to formulate general rules that explain all the data they have collected. In addition, they transfer important information to longer-lasting repositories.
All in all, How We Learn is less technical than similar books, such as A Thousand Brains by Jeff Hawkins and Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker. But it isn’t less practical or engaging. After all, learning is relevant to all of us, and we can all learn better.
Exelente selección,la traducion a español buena 10 de 10.
Agradezco a Aleksandar Tasev nuestro presentador literario ,por ser tan aceptivo en mostrarnos libros de esta calidad.