[xmca] Educational neuroscience and sococultural theory to education

[Ulvi İçil <ulvi.icil@gmail.com>]

Dr. Willis is a neurologist and an educator, a classroom teacher. It seemed
to me interesting that she combined the two in herself.

And I think, what the joyful or non-joyful education verifies is ,
sociocultural approach to education since, is not joyful education a social
environment created by the educator?

Not only the character of the milieu in which education is realized, is
social. But this verifies also that brain is a social organ, a social brain
in close interaction with this social milieu. So one must be distant to
searches for "pure neuroscientific inputs" into learning and teaching.

Thus, I believe, educational neuroscience and sociocultural theory to
education are  not and should not be conceived as rivals or extremes, but
they should be conceived as complementary, working in close connection for
the best outcome.



http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/summer07/vol64/num09/The-Neuroscience-of-Joyful-Education.aspx

 When students are engaged and motivated and feel minimal stress,
information flows freely through the affective filter in the amygdala and
they achieve higher levels of cognition, make connections, and experience
“aha” moments...


Neuroimaging and measurement of brain chemicals (neurotransmitters) show us
what happens in the brain during stressful emotional states. By reading
glucose or oxygen use and blood flow, positron emission tomography (PET)
and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) indicate activity in
identifiable regions of the brain. These scans demonstrate that under
stressful conditions information is blocked from entering the brain's areas
of higher cognitive memory consolidation and storage. In other words, when
stress activates the brain's affective filters, information flow to the
higher cognitive networks is limited and the learning process grinds to a
halt.
and

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