FACILITATING LEARNING
Thanks to recent researches on brain function,
the Theory of Multiple Intelligence, the evaluation of dominating brain
aptitudes, and techiques created to speed learning, it is now easier to
learn and to store in memory what we study.
Psychologists, neurologists and researchers
are writing about the results of these studies, helping us to understand
and making us enthusiastic about the results obtained by those using these
techniques.
THE RIGHT SIDE OF THE BRAIN
Most people have been accostumed to think
and act according to Cartesian paradigm, based on logical, linear, sequential
reasoning, leaving aside emotions, intuition, creativity, and capacity
to dare trying different solutions.
António Damásio, the well-known
and awarded Portuguese neurologist, who lives in the United States, author
of many published works, states in hist recent book "Descarte's mistake"
that "the departing point of science and philosophy should be anti-Cartesian:
I am (and I feel), therefore I think".
The vision of human being as a whole,
is the key to the global development of the being.
By using more the left hemisphere, considered
as rational, we do leave out the possibility of taking advantage of the
benefits brought by the right hemisphere, such as creative imagination,
serenity, global view, capacity of synthesis and ease of memorization,
among others.
Mandala - By Iraci Santana |
By means of various techniques
we can stimulate the right side of the brain and search the integration
of the two hemispheres, balancing the use of our potentialities.
One of these techniques consists of making some given drawings, in a non conventional way, so that our left hemisphere should consider them as a boring task and give up exerting total control, and then leaving in charge the right hemisphere, that "enjoys" the exercise. |
The use of appropriate music, which diminishes
the brain rythm, and silence also contributed to the balance in the use
of brain hemispheres.
There are some researchers who suggest
barroque music, especially the "largo" movement, which brings the adequate
conditions for learning. It has the same frequency that a fetus hears and
directs us automatically to the right side of the brain, leading the information
to be stored in the long term memory.
Relaxation music, such as "new age" music,
bring about the same effects.
Our mind regulates its activities by means
of electric waves which are registered in the brain, emiting tiny electrochemical
impulses of varied frequencies, which can be registered by an electroencephalogram.
These brain waves are known as:
Beta,
emited when we are consciously alert, or we feel agitated, tense, afraid,
with frequencies ranging from 13 to 60 pulses per second in the Hertz scale;
Alpha,
when we are in a state of physical and mental relaxation, although aware
of what is happening around us, its frequency are around 7 to 13 pulses
per second;
Theta,
more or less 4 to 7 pulses, it is a state of somnolence with reduced consciousness;
and
Delta,
when there is unconsciousness, deep sleep or catalepsy, emitting between
0.1 and 4 cycles per second.
In general, we are accostumed to using
the beta brain rythm. When we diminish the brain rythm to alpha, we put
ourselves in the ideal condition to learn new information, keep fact,
data, perform elaborate tasks, learn languages, analyse complex situations.
Meditation, relaxation exercises, and
activities that enable the sense of calm, also enable this alpha state.
According to neuroscientists, analysing
electroencephalograms of people submmited to tests in order to research
the effect of decreasing the brain rythm, the attentive relaxation or the
deep relaxation, produce signficant increases in the levels of beta-endorphin,
noroepinephrine and dopamine, linked to feelings of enlarged mental clarity
and formation of rememberances, and that this effect lasts for hours and
even days. It is an ideal state for synthetic thought and creativity, the
proper functions of the right hemisphere.
As it is easy for the hemisphere to create
images, to visualise, to make associations, to deal with drawings, diagrams
and emotions, as well as the use of good-humour and pleasure, learning
is better absorbed if these elements are added to the study methods.
TOTAL USE OF THE BRAIN
The ideal situation is that we should use
all the potentialities of the brain, so rich and so surprising!
When we lead all our life exercising almost
exclusively the functions of the left hemisphere, or the right side, then
degenerative brain diseases, so feared such as Alzheimer Disease, for instance,
appear.
We need therefore, to stimulate the diverse
areas of our brain, helping the neurons to establish new connection, diversifying
our fields of interest, searching to know ourselves better to act with
more accuracy and precision.
Howard Gardner, the American psychologist
who created the Theory of Multiple Intelligence, has identified initially
seven types of intelligence in the human being which are stimulated and
expressed in different ways, according to each individual. They are:
verbal/linguistic; logic/mathematic; musical; corporal/cinesthesic; visual/spatial;
interpersonal; intrapersonal. Nowadays, it has been added the naturalist
intelligence and the existential intelligence, the latest being still under
study.
The theory of Multiple Intelligence must
be applied not only with different people, to reach each one of them, according
to their point of interest, but also in ourselves, trying to develop each
type of intelligence we bring in a dormant state.
It has been developped in the United States a system of evaluation of dominating brain aptitudes, used also by some Brazilian authors and that shows clearly which are the areas of the brain that we give preference and, then, a psychologic portrait of the person is drawn, the way this individual acts, in which place he/she prefers to seat in a classroom, how he/she learns better, etc. To this result, we have added other elements, within a holistic view of the human beings, which has helped people considerably.
As we know the areas which are more stimulated,
then we starting practising a series of exercises to activate the less
used regions, so, that with time, our capacity to act as a whole human
being will be much improved.
We will be logic and intuitive, practical
and dreamers, rationnal and emotive, we will obey the status quo
and we will use our creativity, we will have "our feet in the ground and
our head in heavens"... We will belong, at last, to the sky and to
the earth, capturing all teaching with ease, independent of age group.
This will make us more capable and self-confident.
EXPERIENCE WITH
THE RIGHT HEMISPHERE
Human picture of imagination (above) and observation (to the right) Author: Nazareth Bastos, 1994. |
Since 1992, when we started coordinating
the course called DLADIC Development of the right side of the
brain, where we use drawing as a pretext to reach our objectives, we
have been suprised by the rich potentiality that we have stored in our
brain, just waiting for the adequate conditions to manifest themselves.
In this period, more than 300 people enrolled in the course. Each one with a different interest, with their own motivation. Almost all of them, in the first contacts, stated that were incapable of making any kind of drawing, of creating anything, or paying attention or concentrating on something. Throughout the process of release, these
people are increasingly surprised with the visible results in their artistic
work and the discovery of a new way of seeing the world and seeing themselves.
|
In the drills aimed at developping
mental power, we see those that are accostumed to meditation, to the search
of spiritual growth, assume the task with determination, managing to transfering
to paper what they have visualized and thus giving strong colors, full
of contrast, and continuing at home with variations of the very same work.
To those that are not concerned with these issues, they have more difficulties
and need to be better guided and coached.
Working with creativity, we take advantage
of the observation drawing to make a new composition, where the object
of drawing is dissolved, and become an essential part of the creative process,
and thus becoming part of the whole. We take part of this work, or details
to produce news creations, as if it was a cornucopia where new ideas always
flow...
With this exercise we call attention about
team work. The importance of each member so that the group or enterprise
to outstand. When we backlight someone in the team, even if he is the most
humble, we can stimulate and witness the growth of a rich potential of
great utility and beauty. When we value a small group within the team,
the outcome also can be even better. We also outline the importance of
respecting the individual limits and spaces.
In a more advanced stage, we work with
the unblocking of the bad habits of observation and mental flexibility.
In the tasks given, the student is going
to forget the name attributed to things and tries to see precisely the
real thing that is in front of him, stripped of any symbolism. Because
we live far from the real, from what is true, we suffer so much! We imagine
so many things when confronted with a fact, a gesture, a happening, when
the real meaning was another, completely different from what we had imagined.
In this work, they are asked to see situation
from different perspective: the inside, the outside, comparing sizes,
apertures, distances... We move constantly from the part to the whole,
and vice-versa, in a state of attentive relaxation, forgetful of time of
worries that we had in the moment previous to the class. It is suggested
that this experience is taken to the daily life, trying always to
discover new solutions to the problems and challenges of life, avoiding
crystallizing ideas and points of view.
We stimulate the attentive observation
of the companion who walks the same path of life with us, making our mind
flexible to look at this companion without the concept and prejudices that
we have rooted in ourselves in the course of our common experience. Even
if we have known someone for a long time, we never know anybody deep enough,
since we all are in a constant process of change. And each person is always
an incognito that surprise us.
We use in this drill, the human figure
in drawings made with different techniques, charcoal, pencil or pen sketches,
During the course some people leave temporarily. Then they return and say
that a given task has shaken them so much that they decided to do therapy
of work their inner self in a given aspect they have never before given
the due importance...
Others, with a small stimulus, discover
the artistic potential they have and jump into the world of art, creating
and painting works that are exhibited even in other states of Brazil. One
of such students, took just one month of classes and started painting,
travelling later to several countries, discovering new things and has left
two of her panels in a New Zealand restaurant.
We see children managing to concentrate
at home to do their homework, teenagers managing to learn with more ease
school subjects, adults writing better, understanding non verbal communicaiton,
reading more and managing a better relaxation towards daily tensions. We
see elderly people employing their time in the acquisition of more knowledge,
in the fulfillment of old dreams, in the discovery of their potentialities...
Music, internal and external silence, the
drawing drills, the exercises of creativity, mandalas and in some occasions,
videotherapy, have been strong allies in the conquest of this inner wealth
that we all possess and did not know we possess it.
Thanks to the advancement of brain research,
we have added new approaches to this course, aiming at the usage of the
whole potential of the brain, trying to balance the left and right hemispheres.
The course has been named then Creativity and the Brain, when it is done
in a group setting, and named In search of harmony, to be happier,
when it is done individually.
Presently, there are available to all
those who want to be be prepared to the new millenium, the most diverse
ressources of inner growth, divulgated by different media, by means of
professionals concerned with the construction of a new society. You need
only to search...
Bibliography:
Desenhando com o lado direito do cérebro
Betty Edwards - Ediouro
Aprendizagem e criatividade emocional
Elson A. Teixeira Makron Books
Cérebro esquerdo, cérebro
direito - Springer e Deutsch Summus Editorial
Alquimia da Mente Hermínio C.
Miranda Publicações Lachâtre
Viver Holístico Patrick Pietroni
Summus Editorial
Revista Planeta, nº 201 junho 1989
Revista Globo Ciência, ano 4, nº
39
Revista Nova Escola Setembro 1997
Author
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Celeste Carneiro is a plastic artist, professor of the course Criativity and Brain E-mail: cel5@terra.com.br |