Cool Brain Research

I chose to look at Diane Watanabe. I have to admit she was hard to research. Her name came up attached to many conferences I would love to go to. She was ‘associated’ with many Dana Foundation projects, but almost never specifically cited.

What?

Diane Y. Watanabe, EdD, former Co-Director, Institute of Learning, Teaching, and the Human Brain, Division of Curriculum and Instructional Services, Los Angeles County Office of Education; Consultant on the arts, cognition and the brain.

It seems her specialty (at least as related to her speaking work) is in applying brain research to classroom practice. She is part of LACOE (Los Angeles County Office of Education). She also has a connection to The Dana Foundation (http://www.dana.org/) and partners regularly with neurobiologist Dr. Terrence J. Sejnowski. She helped in the research and writing for Gordon Shaw’s Keeping Mozart in Mind. In 2006 I found where she had presented her research on understanding how the brain works in a GATE student.

She is speaking in the conference, "Learning & the Brain The attentive brain: Using brain research to enhance attention and motivation in students May 6-8, 2010 (http://www.edupr.com/index.html)

She previously spoke at the same conference where the focus was: The Creative Brain: using brain research on creativity and the arts to improve learning. (This conference I really wish I could have attended).

As prepared by lehigh valley arts council:

http://www.lvartscouncil.org/education/artlinks_winterspring07.pdf

Diane Watanabe focuses on "brain research concerning learning research-based strategies for raising student achievement in all subject areas

[She] emphasizes approaches for actively engaging students in reading and learning.

[Her] curriculum and instructional professional development specialist in modeling and analyzing interactive teaching/learning strategies that maximize classroom productivity for K-12th grade.

[She] centers on the importance of the arts in human brain development; impact of arts on habits of mind and lifelong learning; and research-based teaching strategies.”

So What?

Well, to state the obvious, Watanabe seems to meld/bridge the gap between using the arts and critical research to develop new approaches to teaching and retention. Her research is very practical. She works for LACOA and lectures on implementation. She is considered to be a consultant, which means she physically goes into a space and works with those involved to create something that wasn’t there before. She is a specialist in her field of applied brain study as related to arts and retention. If we can understand how the brain works and more specifically, how to enhance the brains natural patterns of learning, we could harness this huge force for change. We would educate not simply lecture. We could cater to our students in a way that we have yet to have touched. Meld the ideas of therapy and emotional health and cognition with increased learning ability and long term retention. We come begin to improve depression, hopefully create a ground-work of stability, so that kids can focus on the lesson at hand rather than the personal turmoil in their personal lives.

Now What?

I fully admit that unfortunately I couldn’t find transcripts from her speaking engagements. I did find write ups about her accomplishments and outlines for conferences and workshops. I have to base most of my assumptions from those sources.

As I mentioned before, if we understand the brain and how to use multiple techniques to create a solid environment for learning and development, we could improve as teachers. I would want to study her techniques, go to her lectures, put into practice her ideas and mold them to what the individual needs are to my current classroom. I would love to study the before and after (and hopefully the after really is forthcoming). Long term we could see if GPA’s improved, if personal behavior improved, what choices and schools did these kids choose after graduation, did they graduate … all questions one could ask after examining these ideas in years of study. Of course in the short term you could gage classroom attentiveness, retention, test scores, participation … all signs that the students want to learn and to grow rather than are forced to attend.

Off topic:

How does one become such a specialist to be asked to speak and teach in these forums, to actually be wanted to implement change? That would be fantastic (especially in my love for the field of the arts).