2013

What Do Stress And Gratitude Have In Common? How Do They Connect With Student Achievement? These days, it’s a challenge to manage your own stressors. In men, increased blood flow to the left orbitofrontal cortex suggests activation of the “fight, freeze or flight” response. In women, stress activated the limbic system, which is associated with […]

If you’ve been to at least one of my workshops, you know how much I emphasize the value of managing student states. Here is what you can do at your school: First, foster meaningful relationships with tribes, clubs, committees, partner work, teams and mentors. Then cultivate these strengths over time. After about 4-6 weeks, it’s […]

There are three ways educators can reduce the effects of chronic stress or acute stress on kids. One is reduce your student’s capacity to deal with stress (somewhat difficult to do, but it can be done). This approach means strengthening time with the arts, positive social contacts, community building, conflict resolution skills, and social skills. […]

Applications and Contributions of Emotions As you work with others, framing is the “spin” you put on things. I call it an intentional bias. We all have our biases, but framing is very intentional. For example, you can say, “This last quiz was a disaster. One in five completely failed it. If we don’t ensure […]

The secret to effective brain-based teaching in the classroom using reviews is this: Review is best for retrieval when done about 1/3 to 1/2 of the way towards the exam. If the test is Friday, learn it Monday, review on Wednesday. If the test is in one hour, learn it ASAP, review it in 20-30 […]

Here’s what to do and why you should do it. Brain-Based Teaching Says… At your school, or at least in your classroom, do a social status inventory. From the student’s point of view, here’s what goes through their brain: 1) “Am I safe at school?” 2) “Do I belong or fit in with others?” 3) […]

If you are not using the latest science on how the brain learns when making decisions for student achievement, you are not giving the teachers and students the tools they need.

Raleigh Philp was a kind, thoughtful and amazing man. He was a Jensen certified trainer and contributed much to many teachers and professional developers. He passed away far to young and we all miss him. This is one of his many contributions.

There are two primary ways to go about teaching and training. Neither is consistently better than the other. In fact, it’s more a case of, “It’s not what you do, it’s how you do it.” #1. INDUCTIVE – specific to general… “what, how, why, if” 1) pre-exposure to the topic a.  mention what we’ll be […]

This article speaks to the value of stored experiences, clarity and word choice. It helps us understand why some teachers are so good at communicating. Teacher clarity is a TOP 20 factor, which contributes to student achievement. Here’s what they do: CLARITY & BREVITY Brief sentences,  (not long-winded ones) allow the brain time to process. […]