Background & Rationale PDF Print E-mail
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Learning is a life-long process that involves the development of new pathways and circuitry within the brain

Recent advances in neurobiology have made it easier to study live healthy brains and clearer links are being drawn between our physical and emotional functioning and specific areas of the brain. Clinical progress in diagnostics and therapeutics of various brain disabilities has also broadened our understanding of the normal human brain. The boundary between brain and mind is becoming increasingly blurred and this has tremendous implications in the use of physical interventions to improve and enhance memory and cognition.

Contrary to previous concepts that learning occurs at specific periods of the developing brain, there is evidence that both the developing and the mature brain are structurally altered when learning occurs. Studies have found that direct contact with a stimulating physical environment and an interactive social group can alter the structure of nerve cells and of the tissues that support them. In short: the brain architecture is malleable; it is neuroplastic and can be reshaped according to the stimulus it receives throughout the entire lifetime. It can be reconstructed and rewired according to the stimulus it receives. Learning is thus a life long process that involves the development of new pathways and circuitry within the brain.

BRAINetwork aims to use this concept of neuroplasticity to create new, powerful paradigms for education: utilise cutting-edge discoveries in neuroscience to discover the influences of emotions, gender, culture and the arts on learning and to assess potential benefits and pitfalls of using pharmacology, technology and clinical interventions to boost brain performance. BRAINetwork will propose a Neuroplastic Curriculum © which utilises educational and clinical interventions to screen for learning abilities and suggests brain-based learning strategies which work in parallel and integrate with the existing curriculum, utilising the neuroplasticity of the brain to promote learning from early childhood until adolescence.