INCOMPLETE WORK IN PROGRESS - please contact: john@newschool futures

Head Learning

(also see whole learning, rigour and other key terms)

“the...phosphorus that is in the brain of a rat—and also in mine, and yours—is not the same phosphorus as it was two weeks ago. It means the atoms that are in the brain are being replaced: the ones that were there before have gone away.”
(Richard Feynman, 1989)

One of a quartet of terms

Here, the idea of HEAD is used in the context of three other categories intended to define the whole learner:

An umbrella term

In the NSF context the HEAD is merely a handy descriptor for certain aspects of human learning.
Admittedly, by itself the notion of head learning is neither precise nor comprehensive.
It complements discussions about knowledge and what we call wisdom.

A reductionist term

Having offered the above disclaimer about the brevity of our description we might venture to say that head learning is primarily a cerebral, intellectual mode of understanding the world. It is often, therefore, text-focused. As such, it is likely to call upon the skills and procedures of reading, inward reflection and writing, rather than by embodied insights or introspection. Heidegger attributes his peculiarly western idea of thinking to the halting nature of alphabetical writing. Kahneman's term ‘slow thinking’ (2011) reminds us that it often applies when weighing up, or ruminating upon things in a rational, deliberate, logical, analytical or critical way.

Characterising Head learning

The following examples are not exhaustive, nor do they take place exclusively in the head.
But we hope they will open up useful discussion and effective action:
- i.e. the scholastic tradition of teaching and learning emphasises learning characterised by:

reading and writing
rationality and appeals to reason
logic
deductive reasoning
critical thinking
- e.g. the idea of ‘slow thinking’ (Kahneman 2011)
- other intellectual approaches (c.f. auspicious reasoning.

The scholastic mind

The academic emphasis on scholastic habits probably emerged from book-based practices of mediaeval monastic scriptoria.
Erwin Panofsky (1968) observed that some of these processes, such as 'comparisons', ‘contrasts’ and 'clarification for clarification's sake’ became de rigeur within the academic culture.
Before the advent of the pre-printing press the copying of religious books required ‘'...a maximum of explicitness and a 'gratuitous clarification of thought through language.’' (Panofsky, 1968)
Iain McGilchrist and Jonathan Rowson speak of a widespread, collective misunderstanding of how the brain works. They argue that the "abstract, instrumental, articulate and assured world view of the left hemisphere is gradually usurping the more contextual, humane, systemic, holistic but relatively tentative and inarticulate world view of the right hemisphere" (Rowson & McGilchrist, 2013). This can also be applied as a criticism of the educational practice of expecting learners to pre-determine what they will learn.

Likely HEAD activities

Deriving values, principles and logistic pathways from actions, experiences and imagined futures.
Discussions in which rational argument is used to shape decisions and, where possible, to achieve consensus.

Why is it important to learning?

There has been a great deal of scientific research into brain functions for understanding how we behave.
This has led to the common scientific assumption that the brain is the seat of intelligence.
- c.f. Dunbar's theory