Episode 266: Dr. Mark Hobson

Episode 266: Dr. Luke Hobson 

[00:00:00] Fonz: Hello everybody and welcome to another great episode of My EdTech Life. Thank you so much for being here with us on this wonderful, wonderful day. Hopefully, wherever it is that you're joining us from or listening to this show on, I hope your day was fantastic. You've had a wonderful start to your week.

And I am excited to be back here with you all today. I know it's been a while since we've put on a show, but it's been a busy season for us. Being able to travel a little bit, do some conferences, do some professional development. But again, as always, I'm glad to be behind the mic and of course, bringing you some amazing conversations and amazing learning.

As you know, we do what we do for you so we can bring some great, uh, content into the education space, have some wonderful conversations and to continue our learning. As well. And before we get started with our wonderful guests, I also want to give a shout out to our sponsors lucid for education, goose chase, uh, digital, uh, excuse me, uh, content clips also, which is my friend, digital creator, Dylan Schmitz, a big shout out to you as well.

Uh, thank you guys so much for your support and of course, uh, doing what we do here for the show. So I appreciate it. And. Again, without further ado, I definitely want to get into this conversation because we've got a wonderful guest and this is the first time I'm going to announce it that we've had a kind of like a father, son, um, you know, as guests.

So I would love to welcome to the show. Dr. Mark Hobson, who, if you may be familiar with Dr. Luke Hobson, this is Dr. Luke's father. So thank you so much for being here, Dr. Hobson.

[00:02:13] Dr. Hobson: It's wonderful, Fonz. Uh, Dr. Luke Hobson is the new and improved Dr. Hobson. So we'll just go on record with that.

[00:02:21] Fonz: Hey, but nothing beats the original.

All right, Dr. Mark. No, well, thank you so much for joining us here. And I'm really excited to really get to learn a little bit more about adult learning theory. And, you know, as, as the education landscape continues to grow. There's so much to unpack and there's so much learning to be had still. And of course, we definitely know that we talk a lot about pedagogy, but we also want to talk about andragogy.

And so we want to make sure that we get as much learning done as possible. So I'm excited that you're here today. And before we get to our, uh, topic. I would love for you to give us a little brief origin story of your upbringing and coming in into this education space. And obviously doing the research that you have done in neuroscience.

[00:03:12] Dr. Hobson: Thank you very much, Fonz, for having me. I'm, you know, I'm, I'm here to share what I know and to help others to grow in the profession of curriculum design, learning design, and teaching and instruction. I started out as a K through 12 teacher. I taught middle school and high school, and then I moved into business administration, taking MBA courses, and I became a director of administration for a school district.

Uh, the largest school district in New Hampshire from there. I made a lot of business contacts. Makes sense. Right? So I, uh, matriculated into business for almost 20 years. But during that time, I taught. At Southern New Hampshire University, where Dr. Luke Hobson graduated from and, or it's also my alumni. Um, I achieved my PhD later in life in business administration in 2009.

And as I, um, grew into a full time position with Southern New Hampshire University as a dean in the School of Business, I realized that, uh, like a lot of people, I might have been a content expert, but that I really know how people learn. Do I really know how Uh, teachers should teach and so I continue my education with advanced graduate studies at Northeastern and at Johns Hopkins University and became totally enamored with neuro anatomy and I wish I had a brain in a box to share with us all tonight.

But I don't yet. I think the information that I'll share with my slide show tonight is sufficient. To show us just how, um, all human brains that are healthy and, and not experiencing injury or illness learn.

[00:05:01] Fonz: That is so interesting. Now, Dr. Hobson, I just want to add, you know, in, in a similar fashion. I mean, I, you started off K 12, but then you got your MBA.

Well, I kind of went backwards. I didn't get my MBA, but I went, did go to school. And so I do have a marketing degree, but then I came into education. And then now going through my doctoral studies is really also in a very similar way have become just really enamored. Like you said, with the learning process and how we learn, how our students learn and working through, uh, working with curriculum and working in curriculum and instruction.

And of course, with technology, seeing how those worlds can come together and obviously amplify the learning process and creating wonderful learning experiences. So I'm definitely really. Did about what you're going to be sharing today. So let's go ahead and dive right in. So I'll go ahead and bring in our slides here, and we're going to be talking about neurobiology and the learning and of learning and teaching.

So Dr. Hobson, we're all ears. So what are we starting with today?

[00:06:06] Dr. Hobson: Where are we going? Well, first of all, I should also say that I'm still teaching. I retired from Southern New Hampshire University last year, and I have been teaching in person and online at a community college, which is fascinating and really fun to teach freshmen and sophomores in college.

So this material that I'm going to share tonight Um, is from my own studies at Northeastern and Johns Hopkins, and I was very fortunate to meet Dr. Mariel Hardiman, who was one of the pioneers of, uh, mind, brain and education back in the year 2000, when lots of people were jumping on that topic, and she got together with, uh, neuroscientists and others at Johns Hopkins and, um, developed a product, um, that is, Open open access to anyone called brain targeted teaching, and it's for K through 20.

So it this material works in the K through 12 world. So I wanted to just reinforce that. So, um, you know, the brain has 2 functions, um, to live another day. and to learn. That's primarily what our brains do. And so we're going to talk about learning. And Fonz, what a beautiful picture of you on your, on your website.

Um, so real quickly, we'll talk about neuro anatomy. We'll discuss this concept of plasticity, learning, and memory. We'll talk about Mariel's model called the Brain Targeted Teaching Model. We'll think about how do we apply this to our own learning design, our teaching, even our own learning fonts as you're going through your doctorate program.

And so I just ask, um, the, the listeners to think about what you know now about curriculum. Learning design, teaching, learning strategies, and how can you add new information to your current learning? Um, also, I want people to be able to have some takeaways from this. So, my website is available, my email is available.

I am so happy to talk to anyone about this material, because it's critically important. I think for all of us, um, brain health, right? It matters. And learning is all about brain health. So, um, I will I love these two quotes. I hope you can see them. So Mariel used to say, uh, all learning is brain based. All teaching is not.

We don't teach people's feet. We teach their brains. And also, you probably all know Ernest Boyer, um, who was just an amazing, uh, human being. And Ernest Boyer talks about that learning. Always begins with what the teacher knows, right? And, um, Ernest Boyer was president of the Carnegie Foundation, and that's what I'm going to do.

Hopefully tonight is to share what I know. Um, 1 piece is that and I'm saying this, um, with kindness and love is that most instructors are subject matter experts. Especially as we go into higher ed, they may not understand the basics of brain anatomy. They may not understand teaching principles and methodologies.

And so We need to preach this gospel so all students at all levels. And here's an interesting thing. Muriel's research and other researchers have shown that students, even as young as 6, 7, 8 years old, if you teach them about how their brain learns, it helps improve their success. So just as with an athlete, if you teach them how to lift weights, how to throw a shot put or a javelin, it's the same thing with teaching people how to learn.

So let's go to the next slide and get into the nitty gritty of life. This is your brain or an image of it, your brain anyway. Um, and we'll talk. Uh, quickly about brain structure, brain facts, uh, the four brain lobes, um, and how they connect with the cerebellum. And so movement is so important, especially for, for young learners, being able to get up and get out and move, um, for, uh, for adult learners.

I talk about, uh, writing out material with your hands, uh, typing it in with the keyboard as you're reading and making your own notes. I'm a big, um, proponent of the Cornell note taking a method system. And our our brains all come down to this image on the right is the structure of a typical neuron. So we have hundreds of millions of these neurons in our brains.

They traveled down the Vegas nerve into our heart and into our stomach. So when we say we have butterflies in our stomach, that's because there are neurons on the lining of our stomachs that are teaching us, Hey, this is new. This is exciting. Or, Whoa, watch out. That bridge is really tall. Or maybe, maybe, maybe I'm driving too fast.

So, and falling in love. So when we learn, um, new information, if we see over here, there's something called a myelin sheath. So when we decide, when our brains decide this is important information, the myelin sheath attaches itself to the, to the dendrite structure. To protect the memory to make sure that we don't lose the information and I'll talk about the four R's of learning in a moment.

Um, but I want just everyone to know your brain is about the size is putting your two fists together. It's about 78 percent water, 10 percent fat and protein and has 100 billion cells. It is The fastest processing system in the known universe. And when the brain learns these neurons connect, they, they form that myelin sheath.

The memory takes place, and now what do we do with it as an instructor, right? How do we, how do we get it into where it needs to go so the students can use the information? One other thing is that I think we've all seen this. When you teach middle school and then you teach high school, you'll see students say, I've seen this before.

Of course you have. You need to see it again. So, so you'll remember it more and better. So what do we do? Scaffold, we add the material on top of what they already know. And that's how young adults and adults learn best. Um, if we design and we teach learning experiences with these very particular strategies.

Our brains will be more attracted to the learning, and so we'll remember it more. And I want to go to that next slide, if you're okay with that. We'll talk about the learning of more, and how to make that happen. So, we need to get the learning out of the center part of our brain and into these Parts of the cerebellum called the, the podif, the parietal, the occipital, the temporal and the, and the frontal when we say something is top of mind.

That's our frontal lobe. And that is where short term and working memory exists. And then long term memory gets into. The sides and the back of our brains, the brain is organic. It's not like we can just pull this out and oh, something is going to go wrong. Well, of course it will. However, the brain utilizes all of its room.

There's no such thing as that. We only use 10 percent of our brain that that's silly. So we use all of our brains all day, every day in order to get through life. Um, I'm going to go to my four hour slide if that's okay with you. Did you have any questions? Well, yeah,

[00:14:09] Fonz: actually, I wanted just to kind of go back to you said, uh, the way we're learning and the way that we take that learning process, that initial learning.

And then we have what was that part called? The myelin sheath. That's

[00:14:24] Dr. Hobson: the myelin sheath. It's

[00:14:26] Fonz: the myelin sheath. I found that so interesting. So I want to ask, you know, just kind of like with your experience in the classroom, my experience in the classroom, uh, when we engage our students. Yes. And I have always been that proponent of, I want to make sure that the learning experience that I created is something that is really internalized and that can be pulled from, you know, in years to come.

And it was so. Great that you mentioned, you know, when you've got a middle school student and then they go to high school. They're like, yeah, I've seen this before. And now we get that reinforcement. Like, how important is that? Like, as, as an educator going into pedagogy and just in regular practice, you know, within a classroom.

What are some things to help kind of like maybe fire that process to kind of just, Oh, let's get that, that, that memory, that learning going, what are some things with your experience and through the research that you can share with us?

[00:15:25] Dr. Hobson: Well, you, you hit it literally on the head, no pun intended, because neurons that wire together fire together and vice versa.

So, in an fMRI, when students learn, and I'll show you a slide in a second, there's a popping sound, and there's a small bit of, of a flame. because the brain is organic, right? And so when that learning takes place, we call it that aha moment. But that happens through something called, um, the four Rs. And I'll explain that in a minute.

And, um, If I can show my next slide, I think I'm going to answer a little bit more of your question. So, see this red part in the middle right here? This is the limbic system. And all learning begins with feeling. We're not thinking human beings. Sorry, Rene Descartes. We are feeling beings first, and then we think.

So, to get to your point, Fawn, If we get a student excited about learning, then they will remember it more and better because they'll be relaxed, and they'll be happy, and they'll feel like they're excited, like it's a journey. And yes, it's hard work, and yes, there's reading, and there's repetition, and there's You know, remembering and rehearsing.

There's my four hours and that takes work, but it doesn't have to be so arduous that the student falls asleep on you, right? We, we engage them by, um, by talking 90 percent when people say I'm a visual learner. Well, no kidding because 90 percent of all learning comes through our eyes. So we, and then the rest comes through the other senses.

So we hear. So there's something called dual coding. And this is, I hope I'm answering your question. Dual coding is all about showing and telling. So when we can use videos, when we can use artifacts, when we can use even a piece of paper with a graph on it that shows somebody, see this picture? Yeah, it is worth a thousand words because it's dual encoding in the brain, which is why Frankly, in my old age, I love watching television or movies with closed caption, so I can read the words as well as see the image, and so I will learn and remember more information about that film.

Oh my goodness,

[00:17:59] Fonz: alright, so Dr. Hobson, I gotta stop you there because it seems like even through this research, and honestly, like, it really is what, The conversations that we always have and how to figure out, you know, how the students learning and so on. But honestly, like you mentioned, it doesn't have to be that difficult.

I mean, there is some practice and as far as, uh, you know, an educator in delivering that practice. But the way that you describe this is. What I'm hearing is there has to be discourse. In other words, having discussions in class. Uh, I also feel that there needs to be processing time because oftentimes what happens that I see is, and I get it, you know, there there's schedules, there's, uh, you know, you have to be at a certain point in a curriculum by a certain time.

And sometimes it just feels that as educators nowadays, we kind of have to go full speed. And that speed sometimes may be a little too much and we don't allow enough time. To allow students to create, which I know when I was in the classroom was one of the most fundamental things for me is actually allowing students to create their learning experience.

And I was kind of seeing, I, Uh, my great friend, um, Kevin Doherty, he always said, you know, as educators, we kind of have to maybe change the term and see ourselves as learning engineers. We are engineering this learning journey for our students and they, you know, take that ownership they're able to create.

And you hit on so many things that right now in amongst my circle of friends and educators, the, the talk right now, big or big talk, I should say is. Portfolios, which will show that authentic learning that creation videos showing thought, or, you know, with the thought process of the student and how they're taking steps to solving something or explaining a story.

And I think that is so wonderful because I don't know about you, but I believe the way that. We all learned back in ancient times, it was like the drawing on the caves, but also then that storytelling process and speaking it and hitting those multiple modalities. So that's kind of what I'm hearing you reinforce through your research, you know?

So I absolutely

[00:20:18] Dr. Hobson: love that. Yes. It's, it's, uh, it just makes so much sense, right? It's dual coding. If I, if I touch something more than one time as a learner. I'm going to have more of a feel for that. And so therefore I will remember it more. Um, and. That limbic system is so important. We need to create a positive emotional climate in the classroom for learning where, um, of course learners are going to make mistakes.

Don't you? I do all the time. So we learn from our mistakes and as the instructor, as the mentor, as the learning designer, engineer. We show them what they did. Well, we show them what they did wrong and we show them how to get to where it's right or where it's correct. And then sometimes in master's degree programs and such for sure.

Many areas agree. There may be more than 1 right answer. And so if we're fostering creativity, critical thinking. Problem solving, therefore they will find that new piece of information that we might need for the next, the next big thing in higher ed or, or all ed, shouldn't say higher ed, sorry, I'm mostly a higher ed person, but, um, uh, yeah, all right.

If we keep going, yes, sir,

[00:21:43] Fonz: that is wonderful. I mean, really, it's just, you're just reinforcing a lot of the concepts that I've been learning. Firsthand through practice and, and honestly, I think, you know, even through your research, a lot of the, the practice that you've shared are things that I really never knew that had a name because of my background coming in from business into education.

What I never came full on as to understanding the practice of pedagogy and the learning. It was really kind of just either finding a way and experimenting, but I think it was that really that the for marketing that customer service approach and understanding how my students learn and kind of having them lead me to learn how they learn and allowing them to learn in that.

The environment that you said is also very important, giving them those opportunities. So thank you, that's just so wonderful to hear that, that reinforcement that, hey, you know, I kind of did a pretty good job. And I think there's a lot of educators out there that this will validate the work that they're doing for sure.

[00:22:49] Dr. Hobson: For sure. I mean, I, I, I can still recall my favorite teachers and in elementary school, and it's been a very long time. Um, we, I had a 5th grade teacher that practiced the neurobiology of learning where I'm sure she didn't know what that was, but she reinforced many of the practices that I'm going to speak up tonight.

[00:23:11] Fonz: Excellent. All right. Let's talk about plasticity now. Yeah, so

[00:23:16] Dr. Hobson: this, um, in that limbic system is where specifically a lot of plasticity takes place. Because when, uh, a learner is excited about the learning and it goes through the limbic system, so I'm looking at something on a, on a, on a board or on a grease board, it's going through the middle of my brain into the back of my head, where the occipital lobe lives, and it has to travel through the limbic system, and this is important for evolution because it's what's what tells us that that stick on the ground is not a snake.

That snake on the ground is not a stick. So it, it tells us what's good, what's right, or what is not. And there's short term memory, and that's how, that's how it all works. So short term memory is in the front part of our brain, and it's information that's for immediate use, and it lasts for about 30 seconds.

As an instructor, we need to get it into working memory. And working memory is where temporary information gets retained. But then becomes utilized because the student is seeing, okay, so there's directions for this assignment. Perfect, perfect example. The directions are clear. I don't have any questions. I can move on to the next place or the next pace.

That's now working memory. Now we want to, the gold, the gold standard in learning is something called long term potentiation or LTP, long term memory. This is where information moves, Um, from working memory into the lobe system, so students can recall it. And if the brain perceives that this information is worth retaining, then it will go into long term memory.

We need to think about the brain in two capacities. One, it is that organic system that keeps us alive and helps us to learn. And two is our mind and our brain informs our mind and that develops our, our personality, our knowledge, skills, abilities, our dispositions. And so we are teaching both, but truly if we think about the fact that like a gym coach.

Trying to build up that arm muscle. We're trying to build up the brain muscle and and make that stronger, better, healthier. And that comes through classroom teaching practices. Um, I'm going to go to the next slide if that's okay with you, because I want to show you these four hours. So this really captures what you were talking about earlier in the podcast fonts where I'm How do you make this learning stick?

And so 90 percent of our learning comes through our sight, through reading. Whether we're reading on a, on a board, reading in a book, reading closed captions in a movie. And then, if we recite it out loud. If, and I tell my college students to do that, and I said, oh, that's silly, Dr. Hobson. I said, no, it's not.

I said, it is nothing wrong with you reading information from your textbook about macroeconomics out loud, read to your cat or your dog and. The more you do that, the more you use the material through reading, through writing, through watching stimulation takes place in the brain. It becomes more interesting when you talk about inflation.

And then you talk about, you know, college tuition to a college student. They get it now that now they're getting it. And they used to pay two 90 a gallon for gasoline to drive back and forth to college. And now it's 3 and 10 cents a gallon. That's that teaching moment that we always talk about. Right. And, um, there's, The greatest way to learn something is to teach it to someone else, to apply the content to real life situation, and that forms something called LTP.

An example of LTP that's kind of fun for me is that you might forget where you put your car keys. But you don't forget how to drive your car. So you put the car keys down. That's in working memory. You're not thinking about it anymore, but you remember it when you got to go drive the car. Of course, a lot of cars don't have car keys anymore, but from an old school example, that's the difference between short term memory.

And long term. And why do we remember how to drive a car? Because we practice it and we do it over and over and over again

[00:27:58] Fonz: like this. This is this slide right here is, I think, so very powerful. I mean, it's gold. It really is. And honestly, like, it's not that our Okay. You know, just some slight tweaks and kind of just a slight change in practice and mindset and that little shift, incremental shift to adding this, because, you know, there's a lot of teachers that are out there and maybe there may be doing, you know, two of the four hours and, you know, they're not to say that there isn't any learning that's taken place, but then of course, you've got the teachers that are doing.

All four and maybe it's just in a natural sense, but I think, you know, one of the things that I feel is most important, like you mentioned, it's like, yeah, we're going to learn it coming through site. And then, but it's that, you know, speaking it out loud and going back to having those classroom discussions and that processing time and allowing students to rehearse and teach one another.

You know, I think that's one of the biggest things there that just making those small shifts in practice can definitely help just bring back those kind of aha moments between students. And I know one of the things that I've learned, you know, from my students is that I may be able to explain the content in a way that maybe I understand it and somewhat in a way that they understand.

But when there's that one student that kind of gets what I said, but puts it in terms that. He or she and their classmates can understand that is golden. And that goes back to that rehearsing part where, you know, at my age, you know, I'm using different terminology than they may be now and making those connections and so on, but I think that's so great.

I'm part of the learning process because. Even myself, Dr. Hobson, I want to add, and I always mentioned this in the podcast when I've had the opportunity, is working with my students, you know, I was never afraid to take risks as far as just sharing the, the little that I knew about something I was excited about, that I wanted them to try, allowing them to take that risk in the learning process and, and apply it.

Seeing what they came up with that I was learning from them too. So when that first class came in, I learned a little bit from them and then I shared that little bit with that second class and then I continued to learn from them because they took that to the next level. So by the time I got to the third class, I looked like an expert, like if I already knew what I was doing, but I was really sharing with sharing what the 1st and 2nd class had done.

But in a way I always saw it as, man, these students in an indirect way, we're still learning from each other because I was just passing on that knowledge that they shared with me, which again is that memorable knowledge. And of course, I'm having to recite it. I rehearsed it, you know, the first class going on to the second class.

Yeah. Now I'm able to share it with them, allow them. To do the same process. And that's when we saw like all those, um, light bulb moments and aha moments. So it, like, as you, you mentioned, you said it, it's gold and it seems so simple and, but it's, it's really there. That's, that's key. I love it.

[00:31:22] Dr. Hobson: Yeah, it's exciting.

You talked earlier about this course. And one of the things that I try to do in all of the course design I've worked on and programs and such. is to give the student the opportunity to speak what they know. What did you learn about inflation this week? Tell me and not, not putting them on the spot, just asking them to speak from, from their heart and their head.

Well, you know, I learned about this and I learned about that. And Oh my goodness. And I didn't realize the inflation rate was 4. 1%. And Oh gosh, what does that really mean? Well, it means that, you know, a dollar isn't worth a dollar anymore. It's worth 90. Um, so that type of application, um, so good, um, I am mindful of the podcast time, so here's another gold slide.

This is available on brain targeted teaching. org www. braintargetedteaching. org free and open information. This is Mariel's research. She's written 3 books. She's an incredible human being. Um, these are the 6 brain targets. I'm going to, Talk about them very quickly funds here. And then if we have an opportunity, um, I'll, I'll hover over each one for about a minute.

Um, and we need to appreciate and understand how powerful emotions are in the learning process, regardless of age. Um, a positive climate will always yield higher learning success and results. Second, what's the physical environment like? Whether it's in a classroom or online, how can we balance things that are new novelty with rituals that make the student feel comfortable and open to learning and fostering more attention?

And how can the learning experience number three Create the big picture. I always begin all of my lessons with telling the students where we're going. We're driving to Abilene and we're going to go here and here and here. But our end goal is to get to this place. So including things like concept maps, giving students a more global understanding of what the lesson is all about and repeating it beginning, beginning at the lesson.

Ending the lesson, the next lesson begins and you talk about what we learned the last time and that adds to the information. So. While it might feel funny to be repeating this information, it's important. We don't, we don't just learn like that because it goes in working memory and it might just leave because, oh, it's time for lunch.

So we need to repeat. Um, the mastery of skills is number four, and that is about two important concepts in memory. Uh, declarative and procedural memory. So this is where we encode and we process and we store and we achieve information because our brain is modular and it figures out ways to learn. Um, we see this with people with brain injuries, that they're still able to learn new information because the brain, the brain is plastic and it grows.

The Extension of, of teaching for application is to bring in real world concepts to the learner at an age appropriate level and all learners, all teachers, excuse me, all teachers. Of all ages can do that for all students of all ages based on what is appropriate for that age to, to assume and to, to handle.

And the last piece is assessments and we need to evaluate learning and we need to have students evaluate their own learning. We need to encourage them to self test to do the jeopardy thing, right? Where the answer is on one side of the piece of paper and then we turn it over and oh, there's a question or vice versa.

Here's the question and there's the answer. So self test, and we also need to allow students to have, as you mentioned earlier, self generated products and portfolios as well as performance assessments that are graded. But in that grading process, we also need to allow students. to revise. I've never had one boss in my business life of almost 25 years say to me, you know, I found an error in your spreadsheet.

Well, that's too bad. We're just gonna have to go forward and present that to the board of directors anyway, even though there's an error in it. Hopson, go back and do that again. If we make mistakes, if learners make mistakes, we need to allow them to revise and resubmit. It's important. At all ages.

[00:36:23] Fonz: Yes. No, you hit on so many great things there.

And especially, I want to touch on this last part too, as well. Like, you know, again, being a big proponent of having learning artifacts that are turned in, whether it's digital or something that, you know, is, is, you know, hands on and so on and something that's important because they're, they're hitting on so many of those.

Uh, learning modalities, but also like you mentioned that assessment component, I think now the way that assessment is done and is taking it, it's just Basically punitive. It's like, Hey, if you don't do well on this, either benchmark or this data point assessment, not only is it punitive for the student because it's like, Hey, now guess what?

You're going to have to come in for an extra day on Saturday for additional tutoring. For the teachers. Hey, guess what? You're not doing too well either. So we need to make sure that you are, you know, making sure that you're teaching, uh, properly. Maybe that you're putting in that extra time, things of that sort.

So it just becomes very punitive that I feel that even the, the environment also. It definitely, like you mentioned earlier, even having that, that environment, uh, that's so much tension and so much pressure and so on, you know, for student learning, that is something that we're, we're pretty much kind of, uh, we're standing in their way, you know, almost in that success.

I mean, I'll be honest with you is seeing a third grade student come out of the classroom, crying, bawling before a state test. That's something that I shouldn't see, or we shouldn't see. It's just, it's something that it's not a student just being a kid and just learning and so on, but they put so much emphasis on that.

And, uh, so like I mentioned, I love the fact that maybe just taking that little step and that incremental change in a classroom to, like you mentioned, as teachers, we have the ability to say, Hey, you know what? It's cool. Like you got a 70, Hey. No worries. Let's just, let's, let's see what we can do and fix it.

Let me give you another chance. You know, go ahead and make those corrections, and you show me you do those corrections. Hey, you know what? I can bump that grade up, but it's almost like, Nope, sorry. The highest grade you can get is a 70. Well, why am I even gonna wanna try again? Right. So again, that's, that's what I picked up from that slide.

And I think that you mentioned, you know, that assessment. Kind of changing things a little bit and making things a little bit better for our students to give them opportunities.

[00:38:49] Dr. Hobson: Yeah, Dr. Hardeman used to talk about, um, sometimes some instructors make their course, um, uh, an inch deep and a mile wide. And, um, that's actually a quote.

I had to look it up because I was like, man, that caught my attention. So, James Michener is one of my favorite authors. And he wrote about the Platte River out in the Dakotas and said, it's an inch deep and a mile wide. And because we sometimes say we got to run through this material. We get the textbook is 20 chapters.

We get to cover all 20 chapters in the next. Is that, is that realistic and best, or could we just look at the highlights of all 20 chapters and focus on what should be the takeaway for the learner instead of trying to cover the entire thing? Um, and that's where I think assessments can be. And as you said, allowing students to, I always tell my college students, I want you to make this perfect.

So you got an 86, but you've, you've missed this material. Take this paper back, revise it, send it to me. Let me give you some feedback on it, et cetera, et cetera. Right? So you really engage with them like a mentor. As opposed to just, you know, I'm the sage on the stage and everything I say goes, that doesn't work.

It's just not, it's not building brains. No,

[00:40:17] Fonz: it doesn't. And I just kind of wanted to add to that just because just speaking from my personal experience in, in even in the masters and now in the doctoral program, my professors have been so helpful in that sense of. Hey, one thing that I've loved is even in some of my coursework where it was just kind of, you know, intro to qualitative methods and we had to write, yeah.

What I loved is that week by week, we had one piece of our final paper that we were working on. So, okay, here's our literature review, here's our methodology, here's what we need to do, and we're submitting it to our professor and he's giving us feedback and saying, Hey. You know what, we, if you can change this, change this, change this.

So by the time we got to our end product, we knew that it was going to be a hundred because we were following all the feedback, but it took that fear of my high school life, elementary life of, of writing being so punitive to being like, Hey. This is a work in progress, and I'm getting that feedback, and although I didn't quite get it right the first time, I got that feedback.

I turned it around, fixed what I needed to fix, and it's that process going along the line that at the end, we all ended up getting an A because we followed the feedback. We got exactly what we submitted, what the professor wanted and needed from us, but it's It's not like he was making it easy for us. He was just giving us a feedback and we had to go back and, you know, go back to the drawing board, change some things, edits and so on.

And it was wonderful. And so I love that, you know, that you mentioned that. And again, it. I feel like for a student, if they come in and they get a 70, it's like, Hey, you know what, here's the paper. Let me give you some feedback. Let me give you some examples. We'll fix it again. I will happily change that grade, you know, because I knew that they understood the concept and they went back and put in the work.

So, you know, just little incremental changes. Aren't

[00:42:19] Dr. Hobson: we happy that Thomas Edison kept trying to perfect the lightbulb? Absolutely. You know, would his teacher have said to him, look, move on to something else. It's not working. Cause he failed like, I don't know, 2000 times or some ridiculous amount. But he kept working at it.

And that persistence, that grit, we want to foster that in our learners. And that's what brain targeted teaching is about.

[00:42:41] Fonz: We love it. Wow. Dr. Hobson. I mean, this has been enlightening. I may actually probably invite you back so we could do a part two. So we can definitely continue this and do a little bit more in depth and so on, because there's so much to unpack here because everything that you spoke today reinforces really what a lot of my colleagues within, you know, my circle of friends at presentations at conferences and so on, we're, we're trying to get this message across and.

But I think sometimes even within ourselves, we may overcomplicate things a little bit. I know that I do that sometimes, but the way that you explained this today and with your slides, it just really made things that much easier to understand and really to explain. And really, again, some validation for a lot of our educator friends that are out there listening and knowing that they're on the right track.

Sometimes that imposter syndrome hits and they think, Oh my gosh, I'm not doing well. But. You know, it's a work in progress and hopefully what you share today will definitely be something that is a breath of fresh air to them and they can sprinkle it on to what they're already doing great to go ahead and create it up and create those wonderful learning experiences for our, um, Uh, students as well.

So thank you, Dr. Hobson. I really appreciate your time with me and sharing your knowledge and hearing your story also as well, you know, MBA, and then going into, um, you know, the science of learning neuroscience. And I'm like, this is amazing. You know, that's

[00:44:11] Dr. Hobson: wonderful. I've, I have three master's degrees, so I'm trying to sell one to make a little bit of extra money, but you know, I don't think that's appropriate.

I've, my wife reminded me that I have been in, I have been in school. Uh, we've been married more than four in school, more than 37 of those 40 years. I love learning. And that was fostered in me, right? And so that's what I want to try to profess. That's my message. And I'd love to come back and I'd love to hover, um, over some of the material in a little bit more depth, um, for, for your folks who are interested.

And there's a really also one last acronym, uh, is there something called dose. So D O S C that's dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin, and endorphins. And That takes place in an exciting classroom environment. Where the learners are allowed to continue to strive and perfect it. They got it wrong this time, let me help you.

And so they get it the next time, and they get it the next time. And we want to put a healthy dose into our learning experiences.

[00:45:25] Fonz: That is so great. Oh, that is great. We definitely need to have a part two that way. We can definitely talk about that too as well. And Dr. Hobson. Also, I want to say, like, really, you know what you've been able to do, like you mentioned three masters is great degrees.

I was like, those are my life goals. Like I have been in school, like, you know, I've been married, you know, we just married eight years now. And, yeah. I've been in school for about six, you know, six and a half now. And I told my wife, I was like, you know, okay, you've got the master's. I say, Hey, you know what?

Let me just go get my doctorate. I was like, okay. And so recently I was talking to her and I said, you know what? You know, I, I don't know what I'm going to do once I get my doctorate. Like I'm going to feel bored. Like, so I said, I told her, I was like, I think I'm going to go back and get my MBA, you know?

And she's like, no, you've got to stop. But. In a very similar fashion like you, I absolutely just love the learning process and just putting those worlds together. And so it's just great. So thank you so much for what you do and all the learning that you shared today.

[00:46:28] Dr. Hobson: You're welcome. Thank you for having me.

All

[00:46:30] Fonz: right, but before we go, Dr. Hobson, I always end the show with the following three questions, and I know that these are the three questions that a lot of my audience members absolutely love to hear at the end, and especially question number one, because as we know, Every superhero has a weakness or a pain point.

And as we know, for Superman, one of his big pain points was kryptonite. Kind of weakened him. So, I want to ask you, Dr. Hobson, in the current state of education, with your experience and what you have seen, what would you consider your current edu kryptonite?

[00:47:10] Dr. Hobson: Um, you know, there's a mentality I think sometimes, Of, uh, where I hear people talk about grade inflation, and that really rubs me the wrong way, because what that means is that you're allowing the students to take.

multiple bites at the apple in order to perfect their work. And so don't we want everyone to get an A? Don't we want to truly achieve an A? We want to teach students to be at that A level. So that term annoys me and, um, it's, it's circulated in some higher ed circles because of some bad actors. Right. And, um, I think, We need to put it in the positive and say, I am teaching to bring all my students up to a

[00:48:04] Fonz: level.

I love that. I love that. Thank you for sharing that. All right. Dr. Hopson. Question number 2. If you could have a billboard with anything on it, what would it be? And why?

[00:48:19] Dr. Hobson: I would run a streaming video of the brain on learning, showing students, um, one of the things that was done at Johns Hopkins was students were put in, uh, fMRI tubes and they were given iPads and they did homework assignments in the fMRI tubes and their brain, where it lit up and what happened.

It is the most exciting thing for me that I can sometimes watch are those videos. And to just see the excitement that takes place in the brain because we're learning more information and better.

[00:48:55] Fonz: Love it. And you know what you, to be honest with you, you are the very first person who said that it would be a streaming sign.

Everybody else kind of, you know, says, Hey, you know, a quote and a phrase. So I picked up on that and that's wonderful. You are the first person to ever want to put kind of that video sign on there. Wonderful.

[00:49:15] Dr. Hobson: 30 seconds, right? Or a red light. 30 seconds. There you go. I love it. Let them see how our brains learn.

[00:49:22] Fonz: Excellent. All right. And the last question, Dr. Hobson, is if you had to write a book starting tomorrow. What would your book be about?

[00:49:33] Dr. Hobson: Hmm, that is a great, uh, question. Um, I would love to be able to, uh, write another book with Mariel Hardiman about her topic of brain targeted teaching for, Um, master's level learners because I have a soft spot for people who are in that master's level piece, especially learners that go back to school after working full time all day, taking care of their Children or their family members.

And they're learning at night and they're squeezing it in. And I just have a soft spot for those people. And I would like to write more research about the true adult learner, the master's level learner. I

[00:50:21] Fonz: love that. Hey, and if you ever need anybody to talk to about that. Feel free to reach out to me so I can share my experiences with you.

Cause boy, I tell you that is definitely something to juggle, you know, being at work eight to five and then, you know, coming back and going to class online. And then of course, you've got your papers to write and you've got your discussion boards and you better make sure that that's all done before Sunday and then you submit and everything.

So yeah, definitely. I think that that would be a great study. That would be a great study for sure, but if they have a, but if they do have professors such as yourself, they are definitely extremely lucky. I'll tell you that much. Dr. Hobson, thank you so much. I really appreciate you. Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge.

And again, the invite is definitely there for a part two. We'll definitely keep in touch so we can schedule that. That'll be definitely a wonderful thing to do. And to all our audience members, those of you that are listening to this on your favorite podcast player or watching us on YouTube right now, as we speak, thank you so much for all of your continued support.

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