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How does nature and nurture influence learning
The natural human learning process
Implications of nature versus nurture for education
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Natural Human Learning Process The learning process in human beings is very natural, and we all want to learn from a very young age. Doctor Rita Smilkstein studied learning in humans for many years and has found this to be true. After reading this paper and learning about how the brain works during the learning process, you may be able to find a time in your life where you utilized the learning process, just as I began to think about how I have learned something using techniques similar to the NHLP. (“We're Born to Learn: Using the Brain's Natural Learning Process to Create Today’s Curriculum”)
The natural human learning process is a process developed by doctor Rita Smilkstein. Her wondrous studies incorporate tens of thousands of people, cohesively, over several years. Dr. Smilkstein’s intelligent process enumerates in six stages. Each consecutive stage builds upon the previous one. These stages are; motivation, start to practice, advanced practice, skillfulness, refinement, and finally mastery. Dr. Smilkstein calls learning a natural biological process. I learned how to play video games through these stages. From my very first glance, I knew I wanted to learn to play video games. The thrill of interacting with an automated competitor was extremely intriguing. The earlier versions of video games,
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The neurons or brain cells are shaped like trees. Young brain cells, called soma, resemble an acorn or small seed of a tree. The seed sprouts limbs when stimulated, called dendrites. Further on in development, the cell will grow a trunk like structure called an axon. The axon has an outer shell, like the bark of a tree, called the myelin sheath. Finally, at the base of the cell, there are root-like structures called axon terminal bulbs. Through these bulbs and the dendrite of another cell, cells communicate with each other through electrochemical impulses. These impulses cause the dendrites to
Neurons and glia (cells that support neurons) are specialized cells for electrical signaling over long distances. Understanding neuronal structure is important for understanding neuronal function.
From infancy to adulthood, organisms are always learning. The conscious and the subconscious are taking in information and sorting it, discarding irrelevant information and storing the relevant. The most common mode of gaining knowledge is through repetitions and memorization. These methods are effective for knowing exact definitions but do not develop understanding. In O Americano Outra Vez, Richard Feynman describes his teaching experiences while at the Brazilian Center for Physical Research. There he discovers the flaw in the modern education system, students are memorizing material but are unable to apply it to a real life scenarios, demonstrating they are gaining knowledge but not understanding it. Similar to Feynman’s Brazilian class,
When trying to understand how the brain works you have to understand how complex the brain is and how well it adapts to the information that it receives and processes the information. The brain controls everything that you do from breathing to moving your arms and legs to emotions, as well as many other functions of the body. (Pritchard, 2009) The brain being a very complex, and has to be addressed in several different ways. No one person learns the same but information will be retained and stored as part of the learning process. An “example of this idea of variety is that based on the V-A-K description of learning styles by Levine (2003)” (Pritchard, 2009) Levine looked at this in a different light and that you can transform things with learning like changing verbal to visual. By changing these things up there are different approaches to how you retain information. With ...
...n looking at the results, they found out that the learning curve was exponential. The researchers assumed that learning occurs while people study and encode material into the brain.
The neuron has two important structures called the dendrite and axon, also called nerve fibers. The dendrites are like tentacles that sprout from the cell and the axon is one long extension of the cell. The dendrites receive signals from other neurons, while the axon sends impulses to other neurons. Axons can extend to more than a meter long. Average sized neurons have hundreds of dendrites; therefore it can receive thousands of signals simultaneously from other neurons. The neuron sends impulses by connection the axon to the dendrites of another nerve cell. The synapse is a gap between the axon and the adjacent neuron, which is where data is transmitted from one neuron to another. The neuron is negatively charged and it bathes in fluids that contain positively charged potassium and sodium ions. The membrane of the neuron holds negatively charged protein molecules. The neuron has pores called ion channels to allow sodium ions to pass into the membrane, but prevent the protein molecules from escaping (potassium ions can freely pass through the membrane since the ion channels mostly restrict sodium ions). When a neuron is stimulated (not at rest), the pores open and the sodium ions rush in because of its attraction to the negatively charged protein molecules, which makes the cell positively charged. As a result, potential energy is released and the neurons send electrical impulses through the axon until the impulse reaches the synapse of any neurons near it.
Dr. Smilkstein’s learning process is brilliant. The Natural Human Learning Process describes the six steps that the human brain goes through when learning something new. The process describes the way we learn different skills and the way our emotions can determine the way we learn. This process has helped me and other humans to understand the way the human brain works along with the way we learn.
Kolb’s learning cycle is used to break up the learning process into different stages, such as doing, reflecting, conceptualizing and experiencing (Kurian, 2013, p.162). The use of Kolb’s learning cycle (1984) has a wide impact on the advancements in learning. Within the four stages, the practitioner would have taken part in a task and would have noted down their observations. At this stage the practitioner would have begun to see the positives and negatives of the task that they have just carried out. From then on the practitioner will form new ideas from the observation notes. Later, being able to use these new ideas to plan their task effectively. Once the practitioner has implemented their task, for the second time with the new ideas. Kolb’s learning cycle (1984) begins again. However, Kolb’s model has been criticized due to the fact that it does not give a wide range of detail about the process of reflection, and lacks evidence. It can sometimes be seen as rigid and sequential (Trodd, 2012,
There are several types of learning styles that are recognised. The basic form, which is well known, is associative learning, making new associations between events in the envi...
Biology The brain consists of both neurons and glia cells. The neurons, which are cells housed in a cell body called a Soma, have branches which extend from them, referred to as dendrites. From these dendrites extend axons which send and receive impulses, ending at junction points called synapses. It is at these synapse points that the transfer of information takes place. At the heart of neuroplasticity is the idea of synaptic pruning.
Bruer, John T. The Myth of the First Three Years: A New Understanding of Early Brain Development and Lifelong Learning. New York: The Free Press 1999.
Reflecting back on how every human has the capacity to learn once born caused my understanding of the meaning of learning to
Gluck, M. A., Mercado, E., & Myers, C. E. (2014). Learning and memory: From brain to behavior (2nd ed.). New York: Worth Publishers.
There are several negative stereotypes associated with video games and those who play them; some of these may often hold true. However, there are plenty of learning opportunities in video games. While the direct purpose of some games is to educate or train, other games that do not directly have this purpose can still become a learning experience for the player. As Ntiedo Etuk, president of the educational video game company Tabula Digital said, “The traditional view of video games has been that they are distractions from the task of learning” (Electronic Education Report 1). Video games are an effective tool for learning and retaining skills both inside and outside the classroom environment. The basic cycle of game play--the introduction to the game, game play, collaboration, improvement of these between each round, and evaluation at the end of the game (Klievink and Janssen 159)--are nearly parallel to the traditional classroom learning cycle of reading a textbook or listening to a lecture, taking a quiz, studying, focusing on items missed on the quiz, and taking a test or exam. Within this cycle, there are many opportunities to develop and perfect both educational, life, and occupational skills.
I think that understanding each stage will not only help you to better understand what the
The most basic elements of a neural network, the artificial neurons, are modeled after the neurons of the brain. The "real" neuron is composed of four parts: the dendrites, soma, axon, and the synapse. The dendrites receive input from other neuron's synapses, the soma processes the information received, the axon carries the action potential which fires the neuron when a threshold is breached, and the synapse is where the neuron sends its output, which are in the form of neurotransmitters, to the dendrites of other neurons. Each neuron in the human brain can connect with up to 200,000 other neurons. The power and processing of the human brain comes from multitude of these basic components and the many thousands of connections between them.