The neuroscience of active learning and direct instruction
2024-05-23
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The neuroscience of active learning and direct instruction
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2024-05-23
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Elsevier
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Abstract
Throughout the educational system, students experiencing active learning pedagogy perform better and fail less than those taught through direct instruction. Can this be ascribed to differences in learning from a neuroscientific perspective? This review examines mechanistic, neuroscientific evidence that might explain differences in cognitive engagement contributing to learning outcomes between these instructional approaches. In classrooms, direct instruction comprehensively describes academic content, while active learning provides structured opportunities for learners to explore, apply, and manipulate content. Synaptic plasticity and its modulation by arousal or novelty are central to all learning and both approaches. As a form of social learning, direct instruction relies upon working memory. The reinforcement learning circuit, associated agency, curiosity, and peer-to-peer social interactions combine to enhance motivation, improve retention, and build higher-order-thinking skills in active learning environments. When working memory becomes overwhelmed, additionally engaging the reinforcement learning circuit improves retention, providing an explanation for the benefits of active learning. This analysis provides a mechanistic examination of how emerging neuroscience principles might inform pedagogical choices at all educational levels.
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This is a theoretical paper drawing on up-to-date cognitive neuroscience to explain the cellular and circuit mechanisms supporting both active learning and direction instruction pedagogies. The involvement of the Reinforcement Learning Circuit in active learning, representing student agency, may explain why active learning produces better classroom outcomes than direct instruction. The paper is written for a neuroscience audience in the hopes that it will serve as a reference for future translations to educator audiences. As one of my final papers, it brings together the critical ideas in neuroscience pertinent to education.
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This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors. AAH is supported by a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Hannah Gray Fellowship.
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https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neubiorev.2024.105737
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