How We Learn

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We all know the singular torture of cramming for exams at school or for the big presentation at work: staying up later and later, forcing yourself to read through increasingly blurred lists of facts, foreign vocabulary, equations or facts about ox-bow lakes. The good news is that it doesn't have to be that way. Brain scientists are aiming to transform education. For more than a century they toiled in their own world, in labs, working out the minutiae of memory while teachers and tutors followed their own instincts. That is beginning to change. Cutting edge experiments into how our brains retain information have proved that the standard advice for learning has been flawed and in some cases, flat out wrong. Based on new research in cognitive science, education and psychology, we learn that some children are visual learners while others are auditory; some left brain, others right brain. The brain is sensitive to mood, timing, circadian rhythm, even location. In short, its an eccentric, adaptive learning machine. How We Learn is both a game-changing report from the front line of educational research, and a call to arms. It tells us how the brain operates on a cellular level, how memory storage and retrieval are related and even how sleep factors in optimal memory and learning. This book is not about how to be a genius. It's about something far grander: how to get the most out of tonight's homework