Uploaded March 2014 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago
"Why students don't learn what we think we teach"
Guest Speaker: Robert Duke
In 1959, Jerome Bruner correctly observed that “The school boy learning physics is a physicist, and it is easier for him to learn physics by behaving like a physicist than doing anything else” (1960, p. 72). Since that time, research in psychology and neuroscience has deepened our understanding of the fundamental principles of human learning. Yet much of what we do in public and private education at all levels of instruction seems to effectively ignore these principles. What’s up with that? We will discuss the reasons why formal education often fails to make substantive and lasting changes in how learners think and behave, and we’ll consider how to design learning experiences that lead to advantageous changes in cognition, affect, and behavior, all of which are components of expertise in every discipline.
Part of the Presidents Office Lecture Series:
McMaster Seminar on Higher Education: Practice, Policy, and Public Life
"Why students don't learn what we think we teach"
Guest Speaker: Robert Duke
In 1959, Jerome Bruner correctly observed that “The school boy learning physics is a physicist, and it is easier for him to learn physics by behaving like a physicist than doing anything else” (1960, p. 72). Since that time, research in psychology and neuroscience has deepened our understanding of the fundamental principles of human learning. Yet much of what we do in public and private education at all levels of instruction seems to effectively ignore these principles. What’s up with that? We will discuss the reasons why formal education often fails to make substantive and lasting changes in how learners think and behave, and we’ll consider how to design learning experiences that lead to advantageous changes in cognition, affect, and behavior, all of which are components of expertise in every discipline.
Part of the Presidents Office Lecture Series:
McMaster Seminar on Higher Education: Practice, Policy, and Public Life
