What is the benefit to understanding how the brain functions when it comes to understanding how people learn? How do you think this knowledge can contribute to the way you shape your instruction and design your learning activities?
Understanding how the brain functions, and in some cases dysfunctions, is key to understanding when there is something wrong with a few students in the population.
It is also important to understand that different people have different strengths and weaknesses resulting in some ways from their anatomy. An educator might try to design instruction that caters to peoples strengths some of the time, but also encourage them to develop their weaknesses. Different people use different parts of their brain dominantly. Instructional designers should keep this in mind…some students will be at a relative advantage or disadvantage based on cognitive style in a given learning environment, and cognitive style is partially a product of the brain’s structure.
Knowledge of brain structure and research methods can help educators understand student behavior during learning tasks. If an educator believes that a certain behavior is characteristic of a certain neurological condition, the educator might refer a student to an expert to determine whether intervention is called for.
