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Teach With A Instead of E

When Edward Lee Thorndike stumbled upon the first law of learning in 1903—the Law of Affect—the world of schools and teaching was changed forever. This Law of Affect, simply stated, looked like this: “If I do something and it feels good, I’ll do more of it; if I do something, and it feels bad, I’ll do less of it.” It described a bond between actions and feelings. The greater the “satisfaction” or “discomfort,” the greater the strengthening or weakening of the bond. The focus for this first law was on the word Affect, deliberately spelled with A. The actions described produced feelings—satisfactory feelings or discomforting feelings—which resulted from affective change in the nervous system. The problem was the cat! In 1898, cats weren’t supposed to have feelings.

Although Thorndike, in his 1898 monograph, Animal Intelligence: An Experimental Study of the Associate Processes in Animals, was willing to explore the question of kitten feelings, he was not willing to go public with it. His question was, however, indicative of his thinking process: “Does the kitten feel the ‘sound of call, memory-image of milk in a saucer in the kitchen (35)?’ ” At that time, psychologists were not prepared to admit that animals had feelings.

Thorndike replaced A with E—Affect became Effect. Today, teachers in preparatory courses learn about Thorndike’s Law of Effect. In other words, Affect (emotions and feelings) is not the center of teacher preparation, but Effect (causal result) is. Thorndike’s revision introduced deep and lasting consequences for education that persist to this day. As shown in Figure 3.1, Thorndike’s contribution to education is recognized to this day.

Semantically, Affect is very different from Effect. The meaning is further complicated because Affect and Effect are used interchangeably to denote outcomes. As verb (Affect), and noun (Effect), both words describe results. In psychology, however, especially educational and cognitive psychology, affect refers to emotions, moods, and feelings. And, therein, lay Thorndike’s dilemma. In 1903, it wasn’t proper to admit that a hungry Cheshire cat could express emotions or feelings. His moody cat, infamous in learning lore, was the intrepid feline who figured out how to escape a carefully contrived puzzle box (36).

The Behaviorist Classroom

In the burgeoning psychology of learning, John Watson, godfather of behaviorism, and B. F. Skinner, who ratcheted it up to a radical behaviorism, designed rigorous methods for studying inputs and outputs associated with learning. Since they had no access to the human brain, their solution was to focus effort on inputs—observable stimuli from the environment and link them to outputs—observable behaviors of animals. Words were chosen to describe the experiments. “Satisfaction” was arbitrarily changed to “Reinforcement;” “Discomfort” was arbitrarily changed to “Punishment.”

That was then. Today, with advanced imagining techniques, previously unobservable neural structures that underlie mental processes are no longer invisible. Thanks to 3D modeling like Diffusion Tensor Imaging and Tractography, neuroscientists know quite a bit more than Watson, Skinner, or Thorndike about how the brain works (33). It is indeed time to revisit Thorndike’s Law of Effect, to restore the original A that aligns with children’s autonomic nervous system emotions and feelings. What can neuroscience tell us today about feelings and learning?

Today, scientists can examine central nervous system gustatory sensory organs to learn about for example, the tongue’s receptors for taste—umami, sweetness, saltiness, bitterness, and sourness. So too can we look at receptors, synapses, and structures that govern feelings in learning. As imaging technologies improve, mysteries surrounding learning recede. A critical canonical principal states that what came first forms a foundation for what comes after. Brain builds from bottom to top, from back to front.

At “primordial” lower-level processing (brain stem), the child will experience evolutionary memories—involuntary actions that we cannot choose to avoid. A typical response to a threat, fear, or imminent danger (real or imagined) results in amygdala hijack. Teachers will testify that these reactive responses are daily occurrences. Primal, involuntary behaviors are at the same level as homeostatic affects that activate with hunger, thirst, and regulation of the body. Sensory affects are very common in classrooms. Children love sweet things, shiny things, and colorful mobiles from the external world that deliver “nice” feelings. Most classrooms are filled with sensory activators.

Above primary lower-level processes, secondary affect processes are located in the midbrain. Pavlov’s classical conditioning, a deeply unconscious affective process, occurs in this region. For instance, the child who, upon hearing the front door slam, immediately experiences physiological changes in his nervous system through Amygdala activation, because he associates the sound of the door slamming with dad showing up in a violent, drunken state. It’s a deeply unconscious state that the child cannot avoid.

In this midbrain space also we locate Skinner’s operant conditioning. Here, stimuli connect with the reward system in the Nucleus Accumbens. The child will respond to a reward in a reflective way by association with past memories. Here, too, are habituation processes (Dorsal Striatum), which involve emotions that parse “affect” into space and time. This is how the brain manages stress, so it is not so overwhelming. Stressors become moments in time based on danger “signals” and safety “signals.” Such memories tied to emotions are essential for building a system of affective regulation— establishes an affective connection with teachers who can scaffold co- and self-regulatory processes.

Above secondary “affect” processes we enter the “awareness” world in the prefrontal cortex. Most children spend a large part of their mental world in awareness—they know that they are experiencing things. Here, in the neocortex, they are able to think, plan, and predict. This, too, is where they experience emotional ruminations and inhibitions. Together with emotional supports, this higher-order processing capability is key to regulation. With guidance, children are able to reflect on alternatives for the future, based on memories of the recent past (self-regulation).

Thorndike’s dichotomous dilemma (Effect trumps Affect) exists in classrooms everywhere. If teachers approach their tasks with results (Effect) as the measure of success, it is easy to set up a system of assessment that looks like high-stakes tests. If, on the other hand, they approach their tasks with emotional maturity (Affect) as the measure of success, school looks entirely different. Sense of belonging, safety, and social-emotional frameworks assume an uppermost status in teachers’ mindsets and method. When educators try to do both in a fragmented system, neither works satisfactorily. This, unfortunately, is how we experience the incoherent legacy of Thorndike.

Today, neural educators interpret Thorndike from a cognitive perspective. A nuanced understanding of Affect vs. Effect makes all the difference. Since Thorndike’s fateful adjustment in spelling, student academic outcomes have been saddled with “impassive” results, as opposed to “ardent” emotions; with products instead of processes; and, with functions instead of structures. No wonder we find dismal results October after October in the Nation’s Report Card (7). It’s not the children; it’s not teachers; it’s Effect over Affect.

Yes, of course there are enlightened exceptions where play, fun, and emotional support are dominant themes in classrooms—intuitive processes from amazing teachers—not from fundamental principles of learning science. But, occasional “intuitive” respite from drudgery is not enough. Schools can be experienced as negative, punitive, and exclusionary “push-out” spaces, where many children fail to achieve their potential.

The Cognitive Classroom

A neuroscience lens applied to Thorndike’s legacy is consummately revealing. The 30,000-foot view describes an evolutionary structure of the brain in three functional regions. The oldest part is often referred to as “reptilian” hindbrain situated at the base of the head. Above that, a newer region (midbrain) is the seat of emotions and feelings. The most recent (neocortex) is located in the forehead where higher-order thinking and conscious “awareness” resides.

In the classroom, each child has a well-developed reptilian brain, a less well-developed emotional brain, and an even less well-developed neocortex. That, of course, is the reason for school. Connecting and growing these three brain regions is also the reason that it takes roughly 25 years to raise a child to maturity. It takes time and effort to connect the three brain regions into a cohesive functioning unit. Teachers and guardians facilitate this growth—reactive reptilian, to ardent emotional, to executive thinking brain—by building circuits, providing cognitive rehearsal for myelination, and strengthening structures for identity and potential. Each child communicates via the neocortex, but lives in the ancient recesses of the survival mind when alone or in social contexts (33). And social context is all about school—it is all about emotions. “Am I good enough?” “Can I survive this new thing?” “What will happen next?”

We revisit and explore further into the three evolutionary regions of the brain in Chapter 6. But for now, it’s sufficient to recognize that each child experiences these three regions to varying degrees.

The child’s passions, intense feelings, and emotions arise from the primitive brain. Primary processes come first because they are rooted in survival. It follows that what comes first guides what comes second. Each child lives in a primitive mind in the primary processing hind region. All newer processes are dependent on these primary processes. Thus, stemming from each child’s evolutionary adaptations, behaviors are reflected in primary affective systems. Feelings matter! The child will experience play impulses, survival impulses, fear activations, and safety impulses. Children are easy prey to deep-seated reactions like fear, anger, and frustration from the ancient recesses of that reptilian, survival brain. All children first seek a sense of belonging to allay the survival urge.

Next, the child will experience secondary processing in the emotional midbrain. Careful guidance and co-regulation in this region will help the child begin a process of self-awareness and self-regulation. Sense of belonging is vital here, also. Every child needs, at least, four consistently caring adults to shepherd them though this emotional morass (37).

Finally, access to the child’s executive functioning area delivers awareness in the tertiary processing neocortex. As humans, we seek connection and emotional interaction in structures of the midbrain. And up front, the neocortex allows us to articulate thoughts and desires, predictions, and plans that are deeply rooted in emotional and survival instincts.

Competing Models

Thus, we identify two competing learning models. The first and oldest is a behaviorist “rewards and punishments” framework that has long established, and deeply entrenched, itself in the culture of schools, home, and workplaces. We also highlight an intellectual and emotional approach that springs from cognitive psychology and neuroscience. Some teachers have shifted to the new paradigm. They reject the older entrenched model by abandoning methods that use rewards and punishments and by embracing a neural perspective that focuses on (i) intrinsic motivation, (ii) adaptive expertise, and (iii) growth mindset. In this section, we explore implications for a preference for one model over the other. Unfortunately, when teachers try to be in both camps, the implications are profound and dramatic.

Skinner replaced Pavlov and Thorndike as the pre-eminent authority on learning for most of the last century. And, like educational psychologists who were beginning to grasp the elements of learning sciences, he was interested in questions relating to knowledge acquisition, knowledge retention, and forgetting. According to Skinner’s doctrine, education is what survives when what has been learned has been forgotten (25).

Skinner was following in the footsteps of the prominent 19th century experimental psychologist Herman Ebbinghaus, who investigated questions surrounding memory and the “forgetting” phenomenon (38). His work showed that up to 90% of what people learn is forgotten within a few days. In fact, the majority of this forgetting occurs in the first few hours.

Ebbinghaus’ findings have been robustly confirmed in modern times. Skinner was able to demonstrate with reinforcement and extinction techniques that learning did indeed accede to routines of Ebbibnghaus’ infamous Forgetting Curve (see Figure 3.2). Sadly, Ebinghaus’ Forgetting Curve is alive and well in classrooms everywhere. Most of what children learn in school appears to be forgotten before they get home. We know better today. A neural perception together with methods, which are informed by how the brain works, will quickly reverse Ebbinghaus’ Forgetting Curve by fostering practices that are metacognitive, collaborative, and generative (39).

Every child interacts with, and makes sense of, incoming sensory data. Sensory data might be visual, auditory, tactile, taste, smell, or some combination. By changing incoming focus, the information will be received in a different way. If the focus is on “content,” we can anticipate the “Effect” outcome; if the focus is on learner, together with their emotional and survival baggage, there can be a different “Affect” outcome. Teachers are often intuitive about how to balance content with context, learner with learning, so that the best outcomes can occur. Unfortunately, in spite of what the intuitive teacher can accomplish, sometimes “less than desired” outcomes result; the learner can become obstreperous, distracted, disruptive, and even aggressive. From a neural standpoint, said “unexpected” behaviors are actually “expected” behaviors.

These latter outcomes being less desirable, children are labeled and stratified into one of the three categories described earlier: (i) compliant, (ii) at risk, or (iii) high risk. Teachers lament children’s “readiness” for learning. Many solutions have become normalized in school settings over the years. These include IEPs, low grade scores (C-minus, D, or NG) detentions, punishments, as well as tutoring, extra-curricular classes, test-prep classes, and a host of study aids that are expensive and time consuming.

Teacher Talk

A Generation-Z (iGeneration) child is tech enabled, digital, and anything but binary. Fast processors, they tend to be equally comfortable in multi-level gaming and blended-learning environments. In fact, today’s classrooms are mostly in the cloud. Fast-processing children can think easily in three- and four-dimensional space (40). These learners find it difficult to trim their wings—zone down to a two-dimensional educational system that is expressly binary—right/wrong, sit here/not there, shut up/listen, don’t interrupt/follow instructions, get a good grade, zero tolerance/suspension. School is boring for fast processors. And boring is the same as high stress. Children experience amygdala hijack with boredom.

Successes with cognitive models provide solid evidence that this new practice shifts learning environments dramatically. Next, are first-hand accounts from teachers who successfully applied a neural lens to their classroom learning spaces. Miss W is a health and fitness teacher who didn’t discover “neuroscience of learning” until she had struggled more than a decade managing, against all odds, to bring order to a world of learners that was dominated by stress, trauma, and failure. Today, she works in an alternative high school with children who have been “pushed out” of the traditional system. This is their last refuge; a final hope to reach for their potential.

So why do rewards work only sometimes? Rewards should work every time…. Right? But they do not. In fact, most children didn’t trust rewards. They associated them with punishments. Here is a first-hand account from Miss W.

A few weeks later, she had an opportunity for a one-on-one conversation with Bree, one of the children who wasn’t shunning her … yet. She decided to ask the 50-million-dollar-question.

There was no answer for this question … at least not until she discovered the neuroscience of teaching. Then she began to equate rewards and punishments as one and the same thing.

She began to change her classroom management vocabulary from words like bad behavior, consequences, and zero tolerance. She replaced them with words like amygdala hijack, reactive, involuntary, a brain where freeze, fight and flight resides, intrinsic motivation and myelination for new structures. Very soon she was devouring every paper she could lay her hands on that discussed issues about structure before function, long-term potentiation, and reticular activating system. The result was immediate and dramatic. It changed her teaching career and enhanced her students’ life trajectories.