Brain to Brain Videos

Building Students’ Confidence

Three things that I am taking away from this video are that (1) to build students’
confidence, you need to build relationships with them, (2) you need to listen to students when
they speak with you and be intentional about learning about their lives, and (3) always greet
students at the door when they come into class at the beginning of the day.
In ​Neurodiversity​, it was mentioned several times that students with differing abilities
need their confidence built up. All students do as a matter of fact, but this is especially important
with children in special education. This is because these children have been looked down on
their entire lives and told what they are limited to do. This is why ​Neurodiversity​ discusses the
importance of focusing on what the children ​are​ able to do, and also by showing students
positive role models. Relationships are the best way to build confidence because it helps build
trust between the teacher and the student. It will mean so much more to a student if a teacher
who knows them and all their abilities supports their dreams and future achievements, rather
than a random adult who doesn’t know the child at all.
We’ve learned in all our education classes how important it is to listen to students and
get to know them as human beings. It’s impossible to really know a student if all you do is
discuss school. Also, if students know about their teacher as a human being (their interests,
hobbies, dislikes, etc), they’re more likely to want a relationship with them.
Greeting students reminds me of what I learned in Ryan Flessner’s class. He always
emphasizes the importance of saying every child’s name in class at least once a day. This helps
every child feel seen. If a child feels invisible, their confidence will be lower, and they won’t try
as hard in school.

Dr. Pat Wolfe: Mnemonic Strategies for Learning

I want to take away the strategy of using a visual hook to remember lists and words. I
have never been taught about visual hooks, but now I am really excited to try this out, especially
with learning Spanish. Mnemonic Strategies can be used when it’s hard to remember order, like
using ROY G BIV to remember the colors of the rainbow. In education classes, we talk a lot
about helping the students understand rather than memorize, but somethings simply must be
memorized, which is why it is helpful to teach students about mnemonic strategies. The last
thing I want to take away is that teachers need to encourage creativity so that students can
make up their own mnemonic strategies. Students who make up their own will remember them
much better. Also, encouraging creativity will help in other areas of the classroom and life. We
haven’t talked much about using mnemonic strategies in this class, but chapter two of the
Sousa book did mention that mnemonic devices can be helpful learning strategies for students
who have learning disabilities.

Dr. Pat Wolfe: Music, Rhythm, and Learning

Music helps us learn and remember. Anything put to rhyme is remembered longer. A
good way to use music in the classroom to help students remember is a Piggyback Song, where
students use well known songs and make up their own words according to their learning
content. In two of my classes, I have explored the idea of music and learning. In ED 204, I
learned about how integrating music can be beneficial to the whole class. In ED 498, I
researched how music in the classroom is beneficial to ELLs. Based on all the research, music
should be used in the classroom, and used often. It benefits every child in the classroom,
especially students with disabilities.

Dr. Pat Wolfe: The Brain, Abstract Concepts, and Meaning

When it comes to teaching abstract concepts, don’t start with abstract concepts. Rather,
start at a concrete level, then move to a representational level, and then finally teach the
abstract level. Always start with a concrete experience. The best way to teach abstract ideas is
through role play and simulation. This idea reminds me of Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal
Development. Don’t start teaching concepts the students won’t understand. Rather, begin with
concepts they do understand and then slowly elaborate on those as the students increase their
understanding. This is especially important for students who have learning disabilities. Don’t
make learning any more difficult for them than it already is. Start with what they know and with
what they can relate to/have experienced, and build from there.

Dr. Pat Wolfe: Visuals and Learning

About 85% of all sensory receptors in the brain are for vision. The brain is able to
recognize visuals and information it has seen before better than it can recall. Concepts that are
represented visually are remembered longer. I’ve learned throughout my time at school and in
the COE how important visuals are to students. Visuals are especially important for students
with learning disabilities and with autism. Visuals don’t have to stop at learning, though. For
example, if there are students with autism in your class, you should have a schedule, with
written words and pictures. Like many things we’ve covered in this class, visuals are one of
those strategies that need to be used for students with disabilities, but that benefit the entire
class.

Emotion and Perceived Threat

Three takeaways from this video are: (1) students should be able to use what they have
learned in class in their life outside the classroom, (2) a constant cycle of perceived threats
makes people sick, and (3) during fight or flight, you lose thinking abilities. This video reminded
me of the emotional and behavioral disorders chapter of Sousa’s book. A lot of times, people
don’t realize that mental illness is considered a disability when it comes to special education,
and they don’t realize how much emotional disabilities have an impact on schooling. After
reading Sousa’s chapter and watching this video, people should be able to understand that
emotional disabilities are largely outside of the students’ control (they are not just a bad attitude
or focusing on the negative), and that they can really cause disturbances in learning if the
student doesn’t receive the necessary help.
As a side note, this video had the biggest impact on me. Not only did I relate to it, but I
felt like Dr. Wolfe explained exactly what is going on in my mind right now. It was such a relief to
feel like I had some sort of an explanation, because I was so confused for so long about why my
body was functioning differently than normal and about why I was falling behind as a student.

Habits of Design with Professor Boling

 Designed practice is used to make ideas for teaching better. To help with this, teachers
should take notes after they finish a lesson about what went well and what didn’t go well. They
should be very specific and detailed notes. These notes increase in value over time, as the
lesson is modified throughout the years. This is especially important when you design a lesson
for students in special education. These notes can show from year to year what worked best
with different students, and what didn’t work well. In the future, you can use these notes to help
you make the best lesson plan depending on the students you have in your classroom. Of
course, just because a certain method worked with one student doesn’t mean it will work with
every student. I’m thinking of what Kris Baker said: “If you know one student with autism, you
know one student with autism.” Nevertheless, these notes about what went well and what didn’t
go well will be good starting points.

How Do We Learn?
Learning is when your brain goes through the process of making connections between
its cells. If there is a strong connection, there will be a strong memory. The brain prunes any
connections that you don’t use. This goes with the idea that has been touched on multiple times
in these videos and in Sousa’s book, that students need learning to be connected to their lives
and things they are familiar with. Doing this will form a stronger connection, that will help them
remember the content longer and more vividly. It is also important to help students retain
information and to have students continue practicing with concepts they have already learned.
In the lesson plan template for this class, there was a question about how the lesson plan allows
students to retain learning. Considering this when making a lesson plan is important, because it
makes the lesson stronger by helping students form stronger connections that will not soon be
forgotten.

Keeping a Positive Attitude

Three things I am taking away from this video are: (1) a positive attitude is my choice, (2)
I set the example for my students, and (3) it’s important to look for the good. I really connect
these ideas to the idea of the four circles. The four circles are so important because a teacher
cannot teach to her best ability if she is not mentally her best. Students know when a teacher
feels off, as they can feel the differences in her attitude and energy. Teachers must take care of
themselves, so that they can come to class with a positive attitude. But no matter what a
teacher’s life looks like outside of or inside school, she can always choose to have a positive
attitude, even if it requires more energy. This can be done simply by looking for the good. It’s
hard not to find the good when you are surrounded by children.

Keeping Your Joy

This video shares five tips to keep your joy: expect the best, forgive others, don’t
overthink things, watch your time, and keep life simple. In addition to these tips, I want to
remember that our feelings can determine the day. This is so important to remember as a
teacher, because there are so many things that can go wrong and steal our joy. When this
happens, we need to choose to be joyful using the tips above, or else we can ruin the whole day
just by focusing on one bad thing that happened. Also, as another video mentioned, we set the
example for children. If our students can tell we’re having a bad day, they will be more likely to
be in bad moods too. It’s much better to spread joy throughout the classroom.
I connect this video with the four circles that we talked about in class. It’s much easier to
keep your joy and brush off hardships when you are taking care of yourself, physically,
emotionally, and spiritually. Also taking care of yourself and filling your four circles will help you
begin the day in a better mood, which means it will take more to decrease your mood/attitude
than if you woke up feeling neutral.

Labels
It’s important to speak positively to children and label them positively. Teachers should
have high expectations that their students will be kind to each other and speak nicely to each
other. Look for what is right about a child, not what is wrong. Labels are an important discussion
within the world of special education, because children tend to get labeled and then treated as if
one label could describe all that they are. No one label can describe everything that a person is.
We all have good parts and bad parts, so it’s important to see the good parts in others, and to
teach our students to do the same. The idea of labels reminds me of ​Neurodiversity,​ because
the point of the book was that students with disabilities are often labeled based on their negative
attributes, when there are so many positive attributes that people miss out on.

Let’s Talk About Memory

Memory is how you store information; it is not a noun. There are two types of memory:
procedural, which is a habit or skill you’ve done so many times that it’s automatic and
unconscious, and declarative, which is what you know. When it comes to procedural memory,
it’s important to remember that practice makes permanent, whether that practice is good or bad.
It is important to understand the different kinds of memory, so that you can know which type of
memory to focus learning on. This applies to special education, especially students with learning
disabilities, because knowing which type of memory to focus on will make it a little easier for
students to understand the material. It will definitely help make the process of learning less
complicated. Also, it’s important to learn about the memory and how it works, so you can know
how different students in special education are affected by memory. For example, Sousa
discusses that students with emotional disabilities have trouble remembering.

Making Changes? Start Small

When it comes to making changes, take one day at a time, and don't worry about
changing everything in one day. Help students decide that changes in their lives are important
and good, because students do better with change when they desire it. Finally, start with simple
and small changes. Making changes makes me think of students with autism. They struggle
when their life/schedule isn’t predictable. This is why it’s important not to make dramatic
changes all at once, and to give these students a forewarning that things will be changing ​a little
bit.​ It would also be helpful to children with autism if you could try to help them believe that this
change will be a good thing for them and their environment.

Making Connections
 Make connections between standards and the students’ lives. These connections should
involve prior knowledge, experiences, and interests. Learning is more meaningful if the students
can see it in their own lives. For example, teach the verbs that the students experienced that
day in gym class. We’ve learned a lot in this class about the importance of making connections
to the lives of students. This idea was also referenced several times in Sousa’s book. Students
just remember better if the learning connects to what they already know.

Patterns and Programs

Patterns are the things around us that we understand. Programs are the things that we
are able to do. When planning/designing a lesson, teachers need to keep the ideas of patterns
and programs in mind, so they can make the best possible lesson. This reminds me of the idea
we covered in this class that learning should be connected to what students know and are
familiar with. It also reminds me of Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development, because you
need to teach students beginning at a place where they understand, so the content isn’t too
hard for them.