(Essay)
CREATED BY:
LAGOS C. ANA E.
MORALES S. DELIA C.
SAN CRISTÓBAL, MARCH 2010
The world and the people living in it is always changing, every day there are more questions to be answered and more ways to get those answers, on the medical area the brain has been an eternal mystery, but resent investigations have revealed tons of new information apliable in many knowledge areas including education and the teaching and learning proccesses involved in them.
First of all, Ph. D. Diamond M. (2003) in one of her lectures called “male and female brains” talked about her research on the brain´s structural diferences between male and female, this research was made on lab rats because there were not many human being able to aply it on them, but she explains that the brain´s structure of these little animals is very similar to the human one, that is why the results can be use to compare men and women´s brain constitution and funtioning, Diamond explains in her lecture the way our brain is comformed,
its main parts and how those parts development and funtions get affected by factors like the birth, enviromental conditions, age, hormones, sex and the things every being has to do according to his instincts or natural duties.
For example, Diamond M. (2003), says that one area called the cortex including the cortical morphology and thickness are “a key factor” in the proccess of knowing and understanding how female or male act, specifically when “ for the female animal, the main funtions are to bear, protect and raise her offspring, these roles challenge her to go in many directions,
both geographical and conceptual, something that may be more accessible and readily achieved with a symmetrical brain” on the opossite the “male behavior involves finding and defending his territory and finding his female, all rather focused funtions, possibly benefiting form an asymmetrical cortex.” Diamond M. (2003).
The statements previously written may indicate that in some how the diversity of the female funtions or the specifical male funtions may be determinating factors on the brain´s constitution. The author makes clear that there are many other factors related to this and that the researchers on this area still have a lot to dicover and to work with.
If we walk appart from the structure and focus more on “ What are the deterninants of children´s academic successes and dificulties” acorrding to Diamond (n/d) since long time ago in places like China, there has been a culture destinated to proportion a good care of the baby´s mind and general development even before they were born these old principles adviced women to “ behave favorable during pregancy so that their offspring would be bright and survive well.” Nowadays, exists a concept called “ Intrauterine education” which mean to provide the best stimulus to the babies groing by taking “ into consideration pre- as well as postnatal conditions for forming healthy children and their precious brains.”
Diamond explains that “ parents and teachers should create a climate for enchanted minds to obtain information, stimulate imagination, develop an atmosphere to enhance motivation and creativity and discover the value of a work ethic.” Some of Diamond´s advices to accomplish these vital mission are to provide:
...a steady source of positive emotional suport-love encouragement... nutritious diet with enouf protein, vitamins, mineral and calories...stimulate all sences, but not necessarily all at once...present a series of novel challenges that neither too easy nor too difficult for the child at his or her stage of development... enjoyable atmosphere that promotes exploration and the fun of learning...
This between others might lead to many benefits to the children development and academical success as the author explains but also she calls our attention because the lack of this support or the presence of a significant amount of the opposite behavior on parents and/ or teachers may cause difficulties to the children on their academical and personal life, she wants to make clear too that “ the cerebral cortex does not show significant growth with too much stimulation as it does with a moderate amount... Do not over stimulate.” Some parents may incurred in this kind of mistakes thinking than more stimulus would be better for their children without knowing that it won´t be good for them, the chidren may get tired or even get upset for living in so much pressure and this later may cause a rejection on everything related with education or the activities he was force to do without wanting them.
As a personal experience, Diamond mentions what one of her dauthers said once to her: “you gave us the freedom to choose what we wanted to do; you served as a role model showing if we worked hard we could succeed.” This ment a lot to her, but how many parents can quote as beautiful words as she does? Many could say that, not many have this priviledge. But what about if these norms are taken form that contex and are brought to be applied in another country as Venezuela for example would they work? Are there the neccesary conditions?
Apparently it may not, social conditions, medical care or even the basic information is not set for most o the country population, how can we expect for “ Intrauterine education” when sometimes many women don´t even have basic prenatal care? How can we expect for parents to be role models when they are not with their children, when they have to work all day trying to, at least, get the neccesary for their support, or when for personal reasons the children are formed by other menbers of the family different from their parents or worse complete extrangers? This scenery doesn´t seem to be too hopefull because teachers are not only expected to do their job facilitaning teaching and learning proccesses but also complemeting or trying to do as a whole the work, these children´s parents should have been doing.
The previous may be an extreme vission of how the life of some is, but there are so many factors that seem to be working againts the achievement of a good learning including the children changing itself, Willis J. (n/d) in words of Gardner ( 1999) exposes that there are “three current dominat intelligence styles of Linguistic, Visual-spatial, and Tactile Kinesthetic...” and in previous years the linguistic was the predominant, and that´s how the teachers learned and may teach but as the author also explains in the resent years the percentages on the kind of learning has changed too, making sometimes their teaching stile obsolite or less effective.
Most students have something called “learning strengths” and these are related to their intelligence style, by improving the teaching tecniques the learning activities can become more effective and even enjoyable for students allowing them to get a realliy meaninful learning taking advantage of all their personal potential, and being more successful in every area of their life.
REFERENCES:
Diamond M., (2003) “Male and female brains” summary of the lecture for women´s forum west annual meeting.
Diamond M., (n/d) “What are the determinats of children´s academic successes and dificulties?”
Willis J., (n/d) “More About neuroscience and learning”
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