Activating your prior knowledge …
The scientific study of engagement with educational contexts is in its infancy. -Howard-Jones (2019)
Learning starts with engagement. But what does educational neuroscience already know about the neural mechanisms of engagement in our brains?
For this general introduction to neuroscience and engagement, you have the choice between two options:
At the end, there will be a short quiz. We encourage you to take some notes while watching or reading.
“To learn, we need to engage”, states prof. dr. Paul Howard-Jones (Bristol University, UK). Being engaged is thus crucial for learning. It means that we are caught and held in something. If we want to learn something from a learning opportunity, we need to be ready and open to it. Engagement is therefore strongly related to and influenced by our emotions and motivation.
Communication between subcortex and cortex
To understand how engagement works in our brain, we must look at the connections between the subcortex and the cortex. The cortex is a thin sheet of neurons forming the outer bark of the brain. The subcortex consists of multiple structures lying deeper in the brain (see Figure 1).
The communication between the subcortex and the cortex is bi-directional:
Because of this intensive connectivity between emotions (subcortex) and reasoning (prefrontal cortex), some scientists even suggest not considering them separately. Both are important for learning and engaging students to learn.
Four takeaways concerning engaging students
Brains engage differently
The relationship between engagement and learning is not a simple one. Engagement can lead to learning, but learning itself can also lead to more positive emotional responses and further engagement with learning (Supekar et al., 2015). Recent MRI studies (Howard-Jones et al., 2016a and 2016b) have shown increased activation in the brain’s reward system, i.c. nucleus accumbens (see Figure 2), when students could win points while learning. The gamified learning environment increased the activity of the reward system, increased students’ engagement, and increased their learning. Another recent study (DiMenichi et al., 2019) shows that when receiving feedback, the rewards system’s activation correlates to how much the student learned from the feedback.
However, not every brain is the same. Not every student responds in the same way to rewards and emotions. Not every student learns in the same way. Therefore, it is essential to consider interpersonal differences between students and understand that there is no one size fits all to engage your students to learn. Your students all differ in what engages them. As a teacher, you must consider these differences when designing your classes and selecting strategies to engage your students.
Different experiences can stimulate engagement and the reward system
When something holds a prospect of reward, we are more eager to engage in it. An approach response in the brain (see: 3.2.2) can be stimulated by rewards such as praise and tokens, acknowledging achievements, novelty, provision of choice and sharing attention.
Rewards
Rewards are one of the main stimulations to approach a learning opportunity. Rewards and acknowledging achievement are immensely important for engagement and learning.
Novelty
New or unexplored things can drive curiosity which impacts learning.
Uncertain rewards and choice
Uncertain rewards have a more significant impact on the reward system than predictable ones. Offering choice can also stimulate the reward system.
Sharing attention
Working together with others is also rewarding and stimulates learning.
Fear and anxiety prevent us from learning
Fear and anxiety can cause us to avert our attention away from learning. Our only concern is dealing with the situation causing fear or anxiety. This reaction is connected to an evolutionary mechanism that helps us avoid threats, the so-called fight-flight response. In the classroom, feeling unsafe causes disengagement from a learning opportunity.
A subcortical structure called the amygdala is responsible for detecting threats. When a threat or an unsafe situation is detected, the amygdala impacts our prefrontal cortex. In particular, the amygdala affects our working memory in the prefrontal cortex, thereby reducing our ability to hold or process new information or even recall and use previously learned information. Fear and anxiety also avert our attention from the learning opportunity because our total attention is focused on the source of the fear or the anxiety, thereby reducing our ability to engage with something else.
Brain plasticity
Our brain does not provide a biological limit to what we can achieve. When we learn, the connections between neurons strengthen. Intensive study changes not only the brain’s function but also the structure of specific parts. What we decide to do significantly impacts how our brain develops and our learning capacity. Promoting the message of brain plasticity to students positively affects their achievement. Knowing that the brain is plastic and can be altered by learning might incite students to engage more with a learning opportunity. It encourages students to believe in their own potential, not to give up and try their hardest.
Quiz
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