Orienting network

The orienting function involves aspects of attention that support the selection of specific information from numerous sensory inputs.

– Fan et al. (2009:209)

The orientation network determines what we pay attention to (Posner, 2012:48-71). Specifically, this system is responsible for selecting and amplifying the information relevant to (learning) goals we want to achieve. At the same time, directing attention also implies ignoring other things or thoughts considered irrelevant. This ignoring can, however, lead to what cognitive psychology calls “attentional blink” or “inattentional blindness” (Rock et al., 1992): our eyes are open, but our brain is blinking and thus missing potentially important and relevant information. A good example is the gorilla experiment at the beginning of this module. Participants are asked to count the number of ball passes a team makes in a basketball game. By focusing all their attention on counting the passes, they very often miss the gorilla running through the screen and doing a dance in the middle. As a teacher, it is therefore important to remember that when students are engaged in a task, non-relevant stimuli – in their opinion – can literally become invisible.

The orienting system can be triggered by providing cues that indicate where in space a student should direct his or her attention. As a teacher, it is crucial to be attentive that your students are in fact paying attention to what you want them to pay attention because only that information will enter and be represented in their brains. Last but not least, attention is closely related to engagement (see module 3). Attention will drop if a learning opportunity is not engaging (anymore).

At the neural level, the orienting system causes the neurons associated with the important and relevant information to become more activated and fire synchronously with neurons from the orienting system (Posner 2012:70, Dehaene 2020:154). The activity of other neurons that do not provide relevant information is reduced or inhibited.