Challenge: Busting learning myths

- We L&D professionals like others, need to be on top of our game by using the latest evidence from research, testing what works and what doesn't. Neuroscience and psychology offer valuable insights, but they can be complex and scientific papers are notoriously badly written. In L&D, we're rarely trained scientists, and we rely on simplified secondary sources which can create myths, poor practice and sometimes even skepticism about good evidence based practice. I invite you to take part in this quiz, so see how many myths you can bust. Before you start, you need to know something important. Research shows, if you guess an answer, even if you get it wrong, you're more likely to remember it than if you were just told. This quiz isn't about being right or wrong, but to help make your learning stickier. I'm going to share five common ideas about your learning, and your colleagues here are going to guess the answer and show a red card if they think it's a myth or a green card if it's a fact. Please play along with them, because you'll learn from the process of guessing. You've got a PDF file to support you too. Number one. Logical people use their left brains, and creative people use their right brains. Myth, or fact? Well done for guessing. This is a myth. For everything you do in the real world, you need both hemispheres of your brain, which continuously work together and are connected by a communication super highway called the corpus callosum. For example, you might think a complex math problem is logical, and left brained, but it turns out that small numbers are processed on the right side, and large numbers on the left side of your brain. And if you need to communicate the information to someone else, you need both left and right sides to do the talking. The left right brain myth largely came about thanks to misunderstandings about some outdated models of language processing. Are you ready to guess number two? You only use about 10% of your brain. If it's true, you only use 10%, then how do you feel if I remove the redundant 90%? It's a myth. You use all of your brain, because if any part was unused it would have shriveled up and disappeared. Your brain is too energy hungry to waste resources on any unused areas. This myth, probably came about because we can always develop our brain more, but even that capacity is not unlimited. If you develop one part more, it could come at the cost of another area, but you still use all your brain. Now it's myth or fact three. Lectures are a great way of learning, they work for universities. Yeah, it is also a myth that lectures are an effective way of learning. Whilst many people can and do eventually learn through the medium of lectures, there are far more effective ways of learning than listening to someone talk through lots of slides. You know this already, because you've experienced lectures and presentations, and you've seen, heard, felt and tested the difference between lectures and engaging interactive learning, where you do the work. Number four. Myth or fact? Exercising helps you grow new brain cells when you're an adult. This is a fact. Scientists used to believe, once you've reached adulthood, you couldn't grow new brain cells, but recent research shows a number of brain areas, especially the hippocampus your memory center, does in fact regularly grow new brain cells. And exercising is a key way to generate brain derived neurotrophic factor BDNF, which is like fertilizer for your brain cells. Finally, number five. Do you think it's a myth or a fact that reading and highlighting key facts helps you learn and revise. Sadly it's a myth. When you're trying to learn something, you need to recall it multiple times in your brain to make those networks fire and wire. Reading provokes familiarity and recognition, which are false friends to learning. You're better making your own notes, or capturing key points visually using mind maps. So, you've busted some learning myths, and now here's another great learning fact for you about growth mindset. Carol Dweck is an educator who shows it's our attitude to learning that's our key to success. People with a growth mindset learn flexibly and actively. Learning from their mistakes and valuing feedback. People with a fixed mindset don't believe they can change. Carol Dweck shows that students who are told they work hard, rather than they're clever or smart, persist in their learning and achieve greater satisfaction and success. She uses the power of yet. Look at these two phrases, and decide for yourself which mindset is more useful for you and your learners to adopt. So, now you have some more valuable facts about the neuroscience of learning and you've busted some unhelpful myths.