Neuroeducation

Neuroeducation is an "interdisciplinary field that combines neuroscience, psychology and education to create improved teaching methods and curricula" ^[1]

Neuroeducation research and initiatives try to use discoveries about learning, memory, language and other areas of cognitive neuroscience to inform educators about the best strategies for teaching and learning. More and more, teachers want and need to know about how students think and learn. Neuroscientists, on the other hand, would like to know how can teachers’ questions drive neuroscience research ^[2]

Learning disabilities

Another line of approach in neuroeducation is to understand what nervous and mental disturbances and diseases in students can affect their learning and how teachers can collaborate with other professionals to help identify the problem in classrooms and to address it in terms of special education methods for social inclusion of his/her affected students.

Thus neuroeducation encompasses the study of common ailments such as:

• Dyslexia
• Dyscalculia
• Stuttering
• Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder
• Minimal brain dysfunction
• Mental retardation
• Developmental disorders
• Learning disability
• Vision and hearing impairment
• Brain injury
• Dyspraxia
• Mental diseases such as depression, anxiety, etc.
• Systemic diseases with cognitive impairment, such as anemia, myxedema, undernutrition and others

History

Neuroeducation is a very recent field under this name, but the concept and early publications which tried to bridge neuroscience to education, were made by Henry Herbert Donaldson (1857–1938), a neurologist, who wote a book in 1895 titled The Growth of the Brain: A Study of the Nervous System in Relation to Education, and Reuben Post Halleck (1859–1936), an educator, who wrote in 1896 another book titled The Education of the Central Nervous System: A Study of Foundations, Especially of Sensory and Motor Training ^[3]

External links

• Neuroeducation
• The Neuroeducation Institute

Source

• Uma ponte entre a neurociência e a educação (A Bridge Between Neuroscience and Education). Article originally published in Portuguese language by Renato M.E. Sabbatini at Noosfera, October 2009. With permission (Creative Commons Share-Alike)

References

1. ^ ‘Neuroeducation’ Emerges as Insights into Brain Development, Learning Abilities Grow
2. ^ Society for Neuroscience's Neuroeducation Summit Advances Collaboration Between Educators and Scientists
3. ^ Théodoridou ZD; Triarhou, LC. Fin-de-Siècle Advances in Neuroeducation: Henry Herbert Donaldson and Reuben Post Halleck. Mind, Brain, and Education, 3 (2), 119-129. May 2009