Neuroscience & the Classroom: Making Connections
Dynamic Skill Development
Neuroscientist Kurt Fischer discovered how, each time students advance to the next stage of mastery, there is a surge of growth of new neural networks in the brain.
Harvard Professor Kurt Fischer has combined several avenues of research to converge on a model for learning that links stages of development—beginning with actions, then moving to representations, and finally arriving at abstractions—across all disciplines. Using neuro-imaging tools, he has shown that students’ advances to the next stage are accompanied by a surge of growth in new neural networks that follow a predictable pattern in the brain.