The field and breadth of Neuroscience is growing so rapidly it is quite difficult to keep up with all of the new information that is being collected regarding the workings of the brain.  There are literally thousands of researchers investigating as many different research agendas.  This being the case, it is challenging to know what is being learned from neuroscience that has a direct application for education. Neumind administrators and staff stay abreast of neuroscience research related to learning through regularly reading professional journals, attending conferences and taking courses.

Even if you read about research in dyslexia for example, you will find multiple researchers saying different things.  The different conclusions, being drawn from the research, do not mean one scientist is wrong and the other is right.  It simply means it is important to compare and contrast each research study to see how they are alike and different. More than likely, when conclusions seem contradictory, the research methods were different thus different conclusions may be completely appropriate.

This article provides a few summaries of neuroscience research findings in the areas of English, Math and Science.  One of the complicating issues with neuroscience research, in a specific academic are, is that each study only looks at a minute portion of the area being studied. When conducting a review of the neuroscience literature you will find articles such as --Monotonic Coding of Numerosity in Macaque Lateral Intraparietal Area and Interactions between Number and Space in Parietal Cortex. These articles are filled with scientific jargon making interpretation difficult for anyone not versed in neuroscience.

Language

Language is made up of several components including, sounds, vocabulary and grammar and these are all mastered in early childhood before formal education begins.  Many research studies conclude that the human brain is predisposed to learning language thus having a dedicated neural system wired for this. Newborn babies can discriminate between all speech sounds in it’s environment but, by the age of 10-12 months loose the ability to discriminate between sounds they are not exposed to.

Brain research, at this point in time, says “true bilingualism” does not exist.  What this means is that one of the languages a person uses has a preferred status or one of the languages always is selected as the primary or base language or mother tongue.  Included in the information gathered in this kind of research is knowledge that all language is processed universally in similar areas of the brain –particularly the left hemisphere.  There is some evidence that individuals may differ somewhat in the area of the brain they use to process a second language.

Studies on bilingualism show that grammar should be learned at a young age. These studies indicate that semantics (word meanings) and vocabulary can be learned later and go on throughout the lifespan. There is still not consensus among researchers as to whether there is a “critical period” for learning a second language.

One key research finding related to learning the languages of English and Mandarin is there is no statistically significant difference in the parts of the brain which are activated at the single word level.  This finding holds true no matter the age of the bilingual learning.