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Brain Breaks Work Every Time

Neural Education is foremost a learning platform. It is a tangible academic process that is both theoretical and with practical application. We refer to a “neural lens” that shows up as a nuanced filter for teachers and guardians. Anchored in a simple pedagogical model, teaching with neuroscience aligns with how the brain works and how children learn.

Knowledge of the physical brain is essential. We are often surprised to discover that teachers (and indeed guardians) are the only specialists who do not study the organ that they use most in teaching and raising children. It comes as a shock to many that the human brain evolved over hundreds of millions of years and shows up in the classroom with capacity and capabilities that are both surprising and practical. It clearly falls under the category of “I knew this, but now I see it in a new way.” In other words, when teachers understand constructs like limbic system, HPA axis, Cortisol, plasticity, long-term potentiation, stress, myelination, and much more … everything in the learning world changes ever so slightly, but always immediately, and lasts forever.

As a species, Homo sapiens inherited a powerful brain that is expressed through three functional areas. These are profoundly connected to (i) survival, (ii) emotions, and (iii) higher-order thinking. Many scientists believe that our species made it to the 21st century because of our powerful evolving brains. Neanderthals, Homo erectus, Homo Africanus, and many other ancestral species didn’t make it (53). Our brains probably contributed to this outcome!

As early humans spread around the globe, they encountered diverse climatic and physical environments. Intense survival challenges associated with “not being eaten by the next hungry carnivore that came along” demanded that they enhance their “social” survival skills, and process more and more complex sensory information. In a world of intense competition to stay alive, the ability to run fast on two legs, together with really good hands for manipulating tools, was optimized by developing a large complex brain (54).

“As a species of seeming feeble, naked apes, we humans are unlikely candidates for power in a natural world where dominant adaptations can boil down to speed, agility, jaws, and claws (54).” Paleontologists and evolutionary biological scientists explain how the human species survived against all odds. It appears that early humans used brain-power, innovation, and teamwork to dominate the planet with emergent capacities as follows: (i) cognition, (ii) culture, and (iii) cooperation. Large complex brains can store and process large amounts of complex information. The increased processing power proved to be a big advantage to early humans in their social interactions and encounters with unfamiliar habitats (55).

As humans evolved, they increased their ability to produce white matter connections between nerve cells. Today’s children are born with this innate capacity, which facilitates processing and evaluating large volumes of sensory information. Structures grow and myelinate, which increase processing power for manipulating information in short-term memory. At the same time, these structures can increase the amount of memories that are encoded into long-term memory where they are stored for later retrieval.

Claws and Jaws

The hindbrain evolved more than 300 million years ago. A reptilian remnant of the survival brain, it is often referred to as the reactive, involuntary brain associated with freeze, fight and flight. Here the focus is on reactions— fighting is a reaction to fear, pain, and danger. All children are endowed with healthy reactive brains, and are capable of recognizing danger, and fear, and will respond appropriately with fight or flight.

Love and Joy

The midbrain is associated with emotions. Only mammals inherited this more recently evolved region from roughly 100 million years ago. This is the region responsible for learning, music, art, science, and technology. It is also associated with a sense of belonging, connecting with others, overcoming impulsive behaviors, the ability to contribute in a collaborative way, and capacity for self-regulation. In this respect, the limbic emotional midbrain is an important ameliorating touchstone for the animal, reactive brain that reflects the much-older period.

Imagination and Intuition

The forebrain is the higher-order thinking brain, 4 million years of evolutionary time. In this region of the brain, the child is able to reflect, revise thinking, plan, predict, and solve problems. It is especially practical for critical and original thinking, insight, creativity, and other higher-order cognitive skills. Metacognition is a higher-order cognitive skill that connects all three regions; reactive space, emotional space, and critical thinking space.

We are endowed with a natural and innate capacity to learn. Figure 5.1 shows a mature brain in the human skull that is capable of both thinking and surviving. Our children make meaning in their world. Sometimes, naïve “meaning-making” culminates in pre-conceptions and misconceptions that limit comprehension and erode understanding. Learning scientists recommend mental models that are based on how the brain works. Mental models about the brain are decidedly more appropriate for forming enduring ideas with deep understanding (56).

By adhering to a neural method, teacher focus is always on strengthening synaptic connections with the knowledge that we are increasing white matter tracts. In this model, teachers are cognizant of limitations of working memory. Intentionality for activating neurotransmitters helps promote learning with emotional connections; thus, connecting reptilian hindbrain and limbic midbrain with cortical forebrain.

Agentic learning scenarios foster common vocabulary for neural educators. They articulate practice and processes that ignite children to generate new ideas. A novice member to the Neural Education Facebook group gasped in amazement after a monthly PLC (Professional Learning Community) online gathering:

It’s neurobiological. Humans are hardwired for learning. We are constantly in a state of arousal and attention for danger and surprise. Biological structures like the Reticular Activating System and the Amygdalae are attuned to external stimuli and inbound sensory information from the environment. The overriding “go to” susceptibility is reactive—an involuntary response to perceived stressors, which can hijack a learner—flight, fight, freeze, or paralysis. Pathways to executive functions of the prefrontal cortex are shut down in such situations. This is where “brain breaks” relieve the crisis.

Brain Breaks

Brain Breaks restore the child to higher-order thinking brain. The premise is simple: amygdala hijack causes shutdown to the forebrain. Use Brain Breaks with the child in your classroom who is acting out, hostile, even aggressive and is not able to access higher-order processing. Consider the principal who challenges the child that has shown up in his office with the disappointing grimace: “I am surprised to see you here. You are usually so diligent with your work.” And the child responds, “I am surprised to be here, myself.” Amygdala hijack! Brain Break! The child in amygdala hijack is in need of a fun brain break, to release oxytocin, serotonin, and dopamine.

Brain Breaks are fun and usually less-than-a-minute, high-energy physical activities designed to activate cognitive and emotional brain regions. We recommend crossing the midline to further activate dense white matter tracts in the corpus callosum. Active movement boosts blood flow, sending oxygen to the brain. And physical, social activities enhance working memory, promote skills in being present and, by overturning amygdala hijack, enable the child to engage higher-order processing.

Teacher Talk

The idea that a child might be stuck in a reactive “freeze, fight, flight” state is revealing news to guardians and teachers. It is not a safe assumption to make that when a child shows up in a classroom, he or she is ready to learn. Far from it! In fact, most teachers who are aware of the amygdala hijack effect are prone to begin every lesson with a brain break because they must assume (out of an abundance of caution) that the child is arriving in some aggravated state that reduces mental activity. The brain break guarantees that the child will shift into the prefrontal cortex where they can access higher-order thinking and cognitive skills.

Strategies for Change

Teachers who have made the shift to a neuro cognitive stance do things very similar to all other teachers. To the un-tutored eye, it might all seem to fit the model that has been occurring in classrooms for a long time. Yet, on deeper investigation and when the observer is shown what to look for, amazing revelations are made visible.

Simple Strategies

1. Physical Brain Breaks? Brain breaks are the same as play for children. The cognitive benefits of play are abundantly documented in neuroscience. Experts assure us that the pharmacological advantages of play cannot be overestimated (57). Play is a way to test the possibilities of their environment without consequence—no extrinsic rewards or punishments, just pure fun.
2. Neurotransmitters for Brain Breaks? Children experience their synaptic receptors flooded with appropriate neurotransmitters that promote learning. Norepinephrine helps anticipation and focus; dopamine is flush with happiness and fun; serotonin is palpable in their play and sense of pleasure; and oxytocin is connected to bonding, sense of belonging, and fun. Safe to predict that while these neurotransmitters flood the synapses, there is no aggression in the room—no cortisol, and no fear. When teachers talk about safe learning environment this is what they are aspiring towards.

Radical Strategies

3. Virtual Brain Breaks! When we teach online and have no physical link to the children or their environment, it is not as easy to stop everything and jump into a brain break. However, a well-timed video of children engaged in fun brain break activities can have the same effect. Watch the video together and share in the fun while the children watch and anticipate, engage in the laughter and cheering, and experience the sense of belonging and bonding that is implied.
4. Co-create Brain Breaks! When the child is actually inventing brain breaks, we achieve a win-win learning system. The rules are simple.
   • Must be standing (if possible) to get the blood flow from the thighs to the brain
   • Must be active to engage the cerebellum for movement and balance
   • Must include small-motor skills to engage the parietal lobe
   • Must involve seeing and hearing and speaking (singing, laughing, humming, etc.) to engage the occipital and temporal lobes
   • Must cross the midline so that the corpus callosum is activated

Summary

In this chapter, the neuroscience of learning is anchored in evolution. The brain has a long connection with emotions that stem from fear, danger, and survival. Teachers will reassess how they interact with children who are not in full control of their executive function or higher-order critical decision-making processes. Children, who are not yet fully developed but have access to a well-formed fight or flight system, should not be punished. They need practice in first co- and then self-regulation through metacognition. Strategies for managing the classroom by managing the brain begin with teachers who recognize their own amygdala hijack and know how to get back to their own prefrontal cortex. With self-care, teachers excel in a world where stress response is not always easy. In the next chapter, we apply information we learned in the last three chapters to a cognitive model that is aligned with intention with how the brain works and how children learn.

Vocabulary

Agentic Learning, Freeze Flight Fight, Metacognition