Learning as Problem Design Versus Problem Solving: Making the Connection Between Cognitive Neuroscience Research and Educational Practice

Abstract

-How can current fi ndings in neuroscience help educators identify particular cognitive strengths in students? In this commentary on Immordino-Yang ' s research regarding Nico and Brooke, I make 3 primary assertions: (a) the cognitive science community needs to develop an accessible language and mode of communicating applicable research to educators, (b) educators need proper professional development in order to understand and relate current research fi ndings to practice in the classroom, and (c) the specifi c research on Nico and Brooke clearly suggests that educators need to rethink the classroom as a place not of problem solving but rather problem design in order to further understand and use the cognitive strengths of each individual student.For educators, there is still an open question as to how to effectively apply the research being conducted in the rapidly unfolding fi elds of cognitive neuroscience and developmental psychology to educational practice. How can educators best use such research in order to improve standard notions of classroom design? The assessment of the research on Nico and Brooke ( Immordino-Yang, 2007 ) provides a good fi rst example of generalizable neuropsychological principles from case studies that can be translated into practical application by educators. Specifi cally, through the way in which Nico and Brooke develop essential skills, educators can begin to see a shift from a classroom as a place of problem solving to one of active problem design. In using the research on Nico and Brooke in this manner, neuroscientifi c research receives practical grounded application in the classroom. Emerging from Immordino-Yang ' s research, this commentary addresses three critical areas: the neuroscientifi c community ' s approach to communicating results to educators, the necessity for professional development for educators, and how this particular research strongly suggests that classrooms should be thought of as places of problem design rather than the more traditional notion of problem solving. COMMUNICATING AND USING RESEARCH RESULTSThe fi rst essential question raised by the research results regarding Nico and Brooke is, how can researchers best present their work to facilitate connections to education? Immordino-Yang ' s article makes several steps toward this goal. First, she directly and clearly relates the results of the research to principles of learning and describes Nico and Brooke as learners. Second, she applies the " developmental lens of an educator " ( Immordino-Yang, 2007 ), drawing applicable conclusions for education as the research unfolds and providing a much needed model for articulating principles that then can be extracted for application in the classroom. Third and related, the essay creates a dialogue, developing trust between researcher and educator. The assumption throughout the writing is that the information provided by the study is accessible and applicable to all educators who 1 Head of School, Milken Community High School

The Smoke Around Mirror Neurons: Goals as Sociocultural and Emotional Organizers of Perception and Action in Learning

“…In terms of implications for mainstream classrooms, Ablin (2008) related this process to principles of lesson design and student–teacher interaction with his description of skill development as one of individualized problem construction. That is, rather than encouraging students to try to directly internalize a teachers’ goals, he suggests that we provide students with opportunities to engage with the teacher’s goals indirectly through a process of active problem construction.…”

“…In “A tale of two cases: Lessons for education from the study of two boys living with half their brains” (Immordino‐Yang, 2007), I showed that Nico (missing his right cerebral hemisphere) and Brooke (missing his left) had compensated for basic neuropsychological skills to previously unexpected degrees and argued that the ways they had compensated revealed general principles about the active role of the learner and the organizing role of emotion and social interaction in development 1 . In this paper, building from my original argument and from those of my colleagues in their commentaries (Ablin, 2008; Christoff, 2008; Snow, 2008; van Geert & Steenbeek, 2008), I argue that the juxtaposition of Nico’s and Brooke’s performances provides a powerful wedge into the problem of individual differences through providing an extraordinary example of the relationship between perception and action in learning. This example leads to a tentative scheme that brings together cognitive developmental theory with recent neurobiological evidence on the functioning of mirror neuron systems in the brain, to produce pedagogically relevant insights into the nature of contextualized skill development and a deeper analysis of the functioning of mirror neuron systems in learning.…”

Fold-back: Using emerging technologies to move from quality assurance to quality enhancement

“…In contrast to the instructivist understanding, however, the work of our design team is informed by the constructivist understandings of learning emanating from contemporary research in education, psychology and neuroscience that position student activity, affect and context as a significant part of the phenomena of learning (Coates, 2005;Engeström, 2006;Hutchins, 2010). As a result, the first task for our design-research project became designing the problem (Ablin, 2008) of accounting for quality in the institution in a way that includes an expanded, and possibly an expansive, understanding of learning. Designing the problem is a common part of design work in many fields and involves designers working with stakeholders to develop new ways of understanding what needs to be achieved through the design work.…”

The Power of Mindset in Shaping Student Success

“…Successful people generally solve problems by using a variety of cognitive and emotional approaches, shaping these approaches in individualistic ways to solve what appears on the surface to be the same problem for everyone. However, when students like Sean are constantly asked to solve problems using only the models provided by the instructor, they often experience nothing but frustrations (Fisher & Rose, 2007;Ablin, 2008). Recent research in neurocognition suggests that teachers must distinguish between task accomplishment and task performance.…”