Neurosciences and their advances in understanding brain function reveal great findings about how the brain learns, its plasticity, and the mechanisms we can use to enhance the developing brain.
Education, for its part, has the responsibility and at the same time an opportunity to use this knowledge to generate new teaching processes and new pedagogical models consistent with brain development at different stages of life, and in this way, get the best out of that learning brain.
Thus, neurosciences and education come together to give way to Neuroeducation and, with it, specialized training such as the Master’s Degree in Neuroeducation and Capacity Optimization, which aims to cognitively stimulate the brain to enhance students’ abilities.
What is the main objective of Neuroeducation?
Neuroeducation is a new brain-based vision that takes advantage of knowledge about brain function, integrating it with psychology, sociology, and medicine in an attempt to improve and enhance both students’ learning and memory processes and to better teach teachers (Mora, 2013).
It involves introducing knowledge about the brain and learning and bringing it to the educational field, whether it be teachers, students, parents in general, relevant institutions, and leaders who need to develop educational policies. Its objective is to improve the way lifelong knowledge is imparted, trying to maximize students’ capacities, as well as recognizing those shortcomings that can be worked on at an early age to achieve the full potential of that knowledge-acquiring brain.
Neuroeducation allows for evaluating and improving the preparation of the teacher and helping and facilitating the learning process of the student (Mora, 2013). If we combine the paradigms offered by Neurosciences and the school curriculum, new teaching processes and new pedagogical models consistent with brain development at different stages of life should be generated.
Challenges
Although we are in the development of a new brain-based culture and many scientists are committed to these research efforts around learning, there is still a long way to go to have well-contrasted data with substantial evidence.
We cannot overlook the fact that discussing cognitive and biological brain function is a densely loaded topic, which makes it difficult for teachers to grasp the knowledge. The first challenge I see when considering this new educational approach is the language used to transfer knowledge; creative and ecological methods must be developed that can be applied in a non-overloaded way in a classroom.
The idea is for teachers to obtain the essential information to understand how a child’s brain learns and how to develop didactic strategies that can be applied in those classes.
However, the primary strategy is for the teacher to understand and learn about brain function in a didactic way.
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Alumni of the Master’s Degree in Clinical Neuropsychology at ISEP. Psychologist specializing in evaluation, stimulation, and rehabilitation in children and adults.
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