Education

What’s the brain got to do with education?

 Quite a lot – according to teachers in a recent survey commissioned by The Innovation Unit and carried out by researchers at the University of Bristol. Although current teacher training programmes generally omit the science of how we learn, an overwhelming number of the teachers surveyed felt neuroscience could make an important contribution in key educational areas.  The research was undertaken to inform a series of seminars between educationalists and neuroscientists organised by the Teaching and Learning Research Programme (TLRP) and the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). [continue reading…]

In the Peanuts comic strip, Charlie Brown was never able to kick the football, fly a kite properly or lead a baseball team. He was also sad and often the target of ridicule from his peers. A new Canadian study looking at the connections between athletic skill and social acceptance among school children confirms that Chuck’s problems were true to life: kids place a great deal of value on athletic ability, and youngsters deemed unskilled by their peers often experience sadness, isolation and social rejection at school. [continue reading…]