Studies show many teachers do not understand how students learn. Here are five of the most common myths about the science of learning reported on in Education Week:
1) Multiple intelligences
The myth: Brain function varies significantly from student to student; individual students have a “dominant intelligence” (mathematical, verbal, or spatial, etc.), and instruction should be tailored to their dominant intelligence.
Why it’s wrong: Brain development and activity is fairly consistent across individuals. Neuroscience has not found separate systems in the brain for different kinds of cognition.
2) Learning styles
The myth: Students process information through their primary learning style—typically visual, auditory, or kinesthetic.
Why it’s wrong: Matching instruction and activities to individual learning styles has not been found to improve student performance more than developing well-structured lessons overall. Teachers don’t consistently match students’ behaviors with the same learning styles, or particular instructional practices with a given learning style.
3) Brain hemispheres
The myth: Some people are more “right-brained” and others are more “left-brained.” This helps explain if students are more creative or logical, and how they learn.
Why it’s wrong: Individual tasks can activate specific or several different parts of the brain at the same time, in both hemispheres. Even people with brain trauma or a stroke often relearn tasks and skills using different parts of their brains. Personality traits such as creativity, intuitiveness, or rationality are not associated with a particular brain hemisphere.
4) Environmental stimulation
The myth: Highly stimulating environments improve brain power.
Why it’s wrong: Studies have not found that music or other “stimulating environments” improved infants’ or young children’s brain development. It is true that infants and children who are severely neglected or deprived can have slower cognitive development, but more stimulation is not the automatic answer.
5) Coordination exercises
The myth: Short periods of coordination exercises can improve brain.
Why it’s wrong: Regular physical activity supports cognition by improving overall health, and reducing stress, but “coordination exercises” that are intended to improve learning by “improving integration of left and right hemispheric brain function” are part of the debunked “left brain/right brain” framework.
Education Week
