How the Brain Learns

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As we learn we learn!( exposure thru the olfactory system...

Penelope Wolfe of NM 6:21PM February 27, 2012

If you divide increments in acquired knowledge by the the time it takes to gain that incremental knowledge, you get the rate of learning.
If you then divide changes in the rate of learning by the time interval, you get what mathematicians would call the second derivative of the learning curve. What is the second derivative? When it's negative, the learning curve is concave -- slowing or curving downward. When it's positive, the learning curve is convex -- accelerating or curving upward.
But how does the learner experience that degree of positive or negative curvature of the learning curve?
One model says we experience it as perturbations in our affective emotional state -- anxiety vs confidence, boredom vs fascination, dispirited vs enthused, fearful vs courageous, embarrassed vs prideful.
For more details, see "Cognition, Affect, and Learning"
http://knol.google.com/k/cognition-affect-and-learning

Barry Kort of MA 9:05AM February 25, 2012

Interesting article reminds me of two things:
1) the "spiral" learning math texts/workbook used in my son's Challenge class over the years, good at introducing new concepts and revisiting others over the life of the course.
2) my own middleschool social studies final exam, based solely on prior tests which I aced, yet some how I bombed it because I only reviewed the few questions I had missed that semester - assuming I would remember the rest, and didn't well enough after not seeing for months. Timing indeed matters.

Stonewall Speer of IN 11:02PM February 24, 2012

Wonderful work. I'd like to introduce the fact that stress is another important factor in learning. I've also learned that intense & chronic stress can even shrink the Hippocampus.
Another important consideration is an internal state of being Linda Stone coined as "Continuous Partial Attention" could have profound long term affects in all parts of life. We only think we've learned something, but the (self induced) interruptions derail the data from reaching the long term memory.
find me @aSmilingMind on Twitter
Again, thank you for the excellent post.

Gary Ares of RI 5:44PM February 24, 2012