“Cognitive Disorder” for this site has a non-traditional definition: a difficulty for children of normal intelligence in engaging, learning, remembering, and applying specific academic content and skills. The disorder may affect, mathematics, reading, writing, science, or social studies. Children may or may never “catch up” with their peers. Their disorder may be a traditional “Learning Disability” or it may have been categorizes as an emotional, behaviorial, or psychological condition. Regardless of its category, these conditions have impaired student learning. Regardless of their symptoms, these conditions arise from some kind of brain problem. So MentalEdge is calling them all “Cognitive Disorders.”
Cognitive ENGAGEMENT: Some children have problems learning because they have different brain “wiring” or a “neurotransmitter imbalance” compared to neurotypical students. For this discussion, let’s assume that our learning environment is a traditional school classroom with a single teacher, and that one of our primary goals is to improve student achievement over both the short term and the long term. Subgoals for the good of the child are certainly to make friends, to be less disruptive, and to develop lifelong interests and good habits. But our immediate goals are to increase student achievement in academic content. THE BEST way to do this is to continuously engage and immerse student in that content. If they are engaged in the CONTENT, they will learn. That’s what humans do.
WARNING! — Engaging in CONTENT is not the same as engaging in an ACTIVITY. A football player in engaged in sport CONTENT; the cheering fans are engaged in an ACTIVITY. The player learns and practices skills through intense engagement. These skills of athleticism, fitness, discipline, teamwork, and strategy may be useful throughout the player’s life. The cheering fans participated in an activity that certainly engaged their attention, emotion, and behavior, but their engagement was of a different nature from the player.
The Big Question: how can students meaningfully and successfully ENGAGE with school CONTENT?
Generic Answer(s) – See “ANSWER” in graphic page banner above — call them teaching & learning rules. From personal experience, these methods work on all children (and adults).
- content and skills can be more personally interesting or MEANINGFUL.
- content can be taught/presented/learned in a more COGNITIVELY-CONGRUENT manner. (see Medina’s Brain Rules: http://www.brainrules.net/the-rules)
- content needs to be PRACTICED until it is indelibly in long-term memory.
- content should CONNECT to child’s expanding life & culture, especially including the arts.
- use IMAGES and video where possible to teach, connect, practice, and review.
- provides appropriate CHALLENGE & feeling of success. Like leveling up in video game.
- provide continuous FORMATIVE evaluation to child. (like games do — Kahoot quiz)
- your STUDENTS are your richest untapped resource (peer teaching & learning, etc.)
- are you a TEACHING ENGINEER or a LEARNING GARDENER?
- nothing can stop a child who WANTS TO LEARN. (intrinsic motivation)
- half-and-half rule: half class time LEARNING/PRACTICING “curriculum” — half class time APPLYING curriculum in a personal, creative way. (making, writing and/or doing)
- provide help & positive support when needed.
Show me this at work in a real classroom! Here’s an example of a classroom in a school dedicated to embedding the learning disabled kids into regular classrooms. Watch “Ruby’s Inclusion Story” (12-min) to see how a first grade teacher, students, and parents teach a Down Syndrome (intellectually impaired) child. Notice especially how HAPPY Ruby and her classmates are. Compare Ruby’s eagerness to participate and expectation of acceptance with Portia’s defeatist attitude as she tries to find a job. (note: there is professional disagreement on the value and validity of the inclusion model. This video presents a pro-inclusion perspective):
Specific Content Tips for all ages
Reading: should meet a need or interest of child. Otherwise the brain ignores it.
(research note: much reading research done on content with minimal or no meaning!) Remember that the brain must build a symbol-processing region, so reading mastery will take time to achieve.
Writing: the purpose of writing is to communicate to an audience (of one or more). Otherwise, writing is meaningless. From tweets to poems, stories, and all kinds of writing published on school website, for younger children or next year’s class, or for parents.
Spelling: in addition to spelling lists, students add words they want to learn to spell. How can they learn the usage of every word?
Math: every teacher should be able to answer, “Why are we learning this?” If the teacher doesn’t understand the content, how will the student understand it?
initial learning is inductive: it proceeds from specific concrete examples eventually to general categories, abstractions, and rules. Tactile manipulatives (then virtual manipulatives) help build the math brain (which does come “pre-wired” like the language brain).
Math teaching & learning techniques (math is usually toughest both to teach & learn)
- math games that provide practice are one of the few research-solid ways technology can improve achievement (15% increase in elementary grades).
- there are simple ways to check calculations that can empower every teacher and child (like digit sum checking).
- there is rich history and art to every element of mathematics to add interest.
- Connect math to every subject:
- .. Can you count the nouns?
- .. What’s average length of your words? … your sentences? How many adverbs did you use?
- .. What percentage of your words are adjective or adverb “modifiers?”
- .. How many years after the Revolutionary War ended did the Civil War begin?
- .. Graph weights of hummingbird, robin, crow, and eagle? Which are heavier than a banana?
Check out ST Math for a respected, tech-embedded math system: https://www.stmath.com
Science & Social Studies: connect all new learning to existing knowledge (concept maps). Integrate reading, writing, math, social studies, science, and the arts into rich tapestries of knowledge (for all levels). Hands-on where possible like “kitchen science.” Connect to interests and curiosity. If it’s not interesting and/or fun, can you make it so? Social studies costumes and maps. Science graphs, charts, 3-dimensional representations.
Mental Disorders and Learning Disorders are BRAIN DISORDERS
— from Thomas Insel, Director of the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
Watch this 15-min authoritative TED talk (2013) that connects mental disorders to learning disorders. While it doesn’t address the latest discoveries, it one of the best summaries of where the field is going by someone who really knows. Speed up video as needed. Don’t worry if it starts slowly. It’s worth it!