Learning – An Unconscious Natural Act
Since the 1990s (referred to as the decade of the brain) modern science has been committed to
making a positive, significant, lasting difference in the way individuals learn.
Let’s play with these insights:
• “What human beings do best is learn. The human brain seems perfectly designed for
learning.” (p. 25, Brain Facts – Eric Jensen)
• “Once an individual being is born, it starts to learn for itself.” (p. 18, How the Brain Learns,
John McCain)
• “Most of our learning doesn’t even require that we pay conscious attention, 99% of all learning
is non-conscious.” (p. 19, Brain Facts, Dr. Elmile Donchin)
• “The growth of intelligence is never a conscious process. Change always takes place below
awareness.” (p. 141, Magical Child)
• Intelligence is the capacity to develop more capacity.
• Information that is geared for helping you is not as valuable as information that is geared for
helping you help yourself.
• Individuals become smarter by making information more accessible.
• The unconscious can process up to a trillion bits of information per second, whereas the
conscious mind can only process up to 50 bits of information per second.
Keeping these insights in mind, in schools, business training courses, and sport instruction why are
more individuals not reaching their potential than those that do? This unfortunate reality has caused
some research into the nature of learning and some rethinking about how students best learn
anything, even golf.
Studies show that teaching-fixing to get-it-right approaches to learning give less return on the
investment of time and resources involved than “learning-developing” approaches that take place in
student centered environments. Efficient learning environments develop self-reliant individuals with
life long problem solving skills for use in real world ever changing environments beyond classrooms,
business training, and practice fields.
In a teaching-fixing to get-it-right environment, if a student said, “2 + 2 = 5” they would hear “wrong!”
and their self-image could be damaged. In a learning-developing environment they would be asked
to review how they arrived at that answer. Quite a difference in the approaches, isn’t it!
In teaching-fixing environments students often say, “You know what I learned today? I can’t spell,” or
“I am bad at math,” or “I can’t read,” or “I have a bad golf swing.”
In a teaching-environment individuals have concerns before the test, or before they perform; in a
learning-environment individuals self-access after they act.
The term “teach” is not used in Webster’s definitions of “education” or “learn.” Approaches to
education that see themselves as being in the information business are not as efficient as those who
see themselves as being in the student business. Information does not produce good education any
more than paint produces good art!
Teaching environments are often evaluating; learning environments are caretakers of learning
skills. Learning environments shine a light; they don’t try to get it right. Teaching environments are
often trying to manage failure; learning environments are supporting growth.
I have no first hand knowledge of how most individuals would define the terms “learning” and
“teaching.” But after gathering information for over 20 years from studies by leading educators and
scientists, it is now my guess that what many people believe about learning and teaching can
fragment long-term progress.
Are we given a good education, or do we earn and gain a good education? There is a difference,
and the latter is the point of view taken here. The information that follows is trying to reconcile, rather
than to contrast previous points of view about acts of learning and teaching with what modern
sciences has uncovered about the nature of learning and teaching with the brain in mind, (as Eric
Jensen suggests in his book with that title).
The Good News:
Modern science has uncovered previously unknown insights into the nature of the learning process
that allows individuals to have more influence over their own pace of progress when they are
learning anything, even golf. I’ve been invited to speak on this topic at Yale, M.I.T., The Charlie
Rose Show (TV), and in a number of school districts and business environments around the
country.
The Bad News:
Most individuals are unaware of this research into how they can enhance
their ability to learn. The views and research presented here put a light on the nature of learning
and brain compatible learning principles.
Seeing the following as filled with answers will diminish its value. This should be seen as a compass,
not as a map. The point of view here is that when we are learning receiving accurate information is
only one side of the story; an efficient student-centered brain compatible approach to learning and
teaching is also required. That results are founded on approaches is an insight that is so often
overlooked. Efficient approaches to learning minimize the extent to which students will perceive
themselves as falling behind other students.
Insights into the topics of learning and teaching can be enhanced by two questions:
How does one actually go from not knowing to knowing?
How do lessons provided become lessons learned?
The answers to these questions are found when there is a positive response to this question; Is the
approach to learning compatible with the brain’s information processing system? The gateway to
learning is the brain and any information delivery system should be brain compatible if it expects to
be efficient. “Meaningful learning involves acknowledging the brain’s rules for learning.” ( p 14,
Caine and Caine)
Why should we care about the brain? Because it runs the show. It’s the brain that recognizes
options, has problem solving skills and stores memories. While meaningful insights into the nature of
learning can be counterintuitive they are invaluable. “Education makes for better minds, and
knowledge of the mind makes better education.” (Daniel T. Willingham)
Educators, parents, coaches, employees, instructors, trainers, or any individuals who want to
efficiently support acts of learning anything (even golf) hopefully are using a brain compatible
student-centered information delivery system. Efficient approaches to learning are tying to change
poor insight, not poor habits.
Individuals learn the lesson to be learned more efficiently when the nature of learning is taken into
consideration before acts of learning and teaching go into motion. Play with this question: How could
any approach to sharing new information expect to be effective without taking into consideration the
nature of learning first? The process of learning and retaining information and skills is often over
looked in favor of the interesting content found in subject matter information, or how-to directions
from a perceived expert. Unfortunately, information can be intellectually interesting, but
educationally vacant.
A master of anything was first a master of Learning! Play with the idea that any school, coach,
parent, or employer who is trying to change poor outcomes without first enhancing learning potential,
will not be as efficient as they could be. It’s only after a student’s learning potential is enhanced that
their performance potential and self-confidence can improve.
Advancing a potential for learning requires insights into supporting the dignity of the individual
student. Enhancing such dignity improves the influence individuals will have over their own life.
America was to be the land of a free and independent will, where one could accomplish their own
visions. When some organized formal approaches to education started to use controlling acts of
teaching, this often birthed non-thinking students who no longer felt free to explore, discover, and
invent. Freedom allows individuals to invest in themselves (constructing personal knowledge), as
they gain an education for use in ever-changing real world environments. This kind of education
cannot be given, but it can be gained in student centered environments through the free will of using
self-skills including, self-discovery and self-assessment.
Freedom in all its facets preserves the very foundation upon which curiosity, observations, and
learning are set. Relevant learning, meaningful progress, and long term development support the
dignity of a human being’s self-image, growing their self-reliance skills. This is not a new reality, but
only a return to what has always existed at the core of fully experiencing what it means to be a
human being, and not a human follower.
In order for approaches to education to become more meaningful, it seems we should begin using
current findings from science about the nature of learning and change some of our traditional views
about making progress. Workable learning environments are founded on student centered/teacher
assisted approaches, not on “here’s my money, tell me what’s wrong and then tell me what you want
me to do.” approaches.
Efficient approaches to education are normally caretakers of learning skill and not teachers of
subjects. It’s by mobilizing and harnessing an individual’s natural resources for learning, without
consciously trying to learn, that they can reach their potential in sports, business, and all walks of life.
The views given here are based on mankind’s natural gift for learning without consciously trying to
learn. “Everyone is born a genius,” said R. Buckminster Fuller, (p. 15, The Birth of The Mind by
Gary Marcus). Human beings are conceived and come into the world with the ability to
instantaneously and simultaneously be a perfect self-learner and a perfect self-teacher.
For example, thousands of years ago when our ancestors learned that some animals were
dangerous, they learned to hide, or hunt, or stay out of harms way! Our brain is designed to first
learn (become aware), and then teach (adjust). But many approaches to learning are trying to teach
first with the hope that students will then learn. This subtle difference is at the core of progress that
does not last. Coaches, instructors, and educators should consider learning about the nature of
learning before they attempt to educate.
Teacher centered, content centered, non-active environments often fragment learning potential. If
the brain could talk we might hear, “help me learn on my own – Me do! Me do! Please do not give me
directions then stand there and watch to see if I am doing, or not doing what you want me to do.”
The best ingredients on earth for learning are curiosity, imagination, and improvisation.
Let’s go back in time, to the first exchange of advice or how-to direction. Was this first-ever offer of
advice requested or was it given without being asked for? It is my assumption that the first exchange
of advice was offered up without a request. Because of what we are learning about long-term
progress, we now know that well meaning how- to directions can fragment learning. Self-discovery
and self-assessment were the advice givers that guided the human race through its journey of
development for thousands of years.
Approaches to learning should help people gain an advantage they did not have. Gaining a good
education is more about acquiring tools and insights that can enhance one’s ability to construct and
expand our personal know-how knowledge, than about memorizing information or following how-to
directions. The joy that goes with doing things for one’s self arrives when nature’s plan for efficient
learning and the natural need to be independent are not being damaged by outsourcing the job of
gathering information about the environment to someone else’s impressions. Someone else’s
insights are a poor substitute for an education earned through self-discovery. Don’t go out for
dinner; stay home and create when it comes to learning!
“Telling has never been teaching, and listening has never been learning.” said Bob Barkley PGA
MP. Play with the idea that when students are not learning in schools, business training, or sports
instruction programs, it’s the approach to learning that needs more education, not the students.
When learning, individuals must be encouraged to be their own private investigators. (How-to
directions do not offer this opportunity.) Information becomes knowledge; often self-discovery turns
into know-how skills beyond the classroom.
Our Intelligence
In 1994, a group of fifty-two (52) respected scholars formulated a scientific consensus and defined
intelligence. Their definition of “intelligence” is in the article “Mainstream Science On Intelligence”
(Wall Street Journal), is as follows: “the ability to reason, plan, solve problems, think abstractly,
comprehend complex ideas, learn quickly, and learn from experience; the ability to ‘catch on’, make
sense of things, and figure out what to do.” Note that there is no mention of following direction!
Our brain is a malleable living organ, (not just a notebook to record information in) that can intuitively
assemble proper connections, and this insight is often overlooked. Efficient approaches to learning
draw individuals into acts of playful curiosity about their own questions. Efficient approaches to
learning do not ask us to merely follow directions, which does not fully engage the high cortex of our
brain where learning happens. Unfortunately, most of us have been ingrained with the Puritan work
ethic: “If you don’t try hard, you will not succeed.” Hopefully you will come to understand that the
very act of trying brings tension and rigidity. Once we understand how we learn through playing, we
will stop trying.
T R Y could stand for the mnemonic:
Talking and
Ridiculing
Yourself when learning.
Indirect Preparation
“One of the most important discoveries from learning science research is that learning always takes
place against a backdrop of existing knowledge.” (Past experiences are a form of indirect
preparation for new learning.) The term a “transfer of learning” makes reference to how past
experiences flow through new learning, allowing new information to be transferred more efficiently to
long-term memory. When we are encoding new information, depending on one’s past experiences, it’
s either useful or not – but it is always meaningful. Past experiences reveal our options, not the
answer.
Some deeply significant research has shown that individuals from all age groups (child to adult) can
indirectly enhance their ability to learn while they are in school, attending seminars, doing
workshops, or in any other organized learning environment, through what they experience and
interact with beyond formal education settings. In other words, what you learn in one setting can
greatly help you in other settings. Nature designed mankind to learn for doing, observing outcomes,
and then adjusting as we see fit, based on the indirect preparation of our past experiences.
This is the stage of learning that is called parallel possessing, as what is going on in the present is
paralleled to and cross-referenced with the patterns, sequences, perceptions, and classifications
that are formed from what we have already experienced. Again, when performing or learning a
particular activity or taking in new information, these acts are guided by the indirect preparation (or
memory of past experiences) encoded in our subconscious.
Sound studies from cognitive science have revealed how an individual’s ability to learn and retain
information and skills can indeed be indirectly improved in many unexpected ways. For example,
when learning to play golf or improve one’s golfing abilities a wide range of thinking-learning self-
discovery skills are being put to use that are indirectly transferred to every other learning opportunity
one may encounter. This process is referred to as indirect preparations through parallel processing.
Suggested Mission Statement for Efficient Learning Environment
• Promote self-reliance.
• Strive for personal growth.
• Honor each individual and their choices.
• Encourage curiosity and imagination.
• Support self-understanding and self-esteem.
• Support self-development, self-organization, self-discovery.
• Avoid judgments and corrections.
• Provide a positive environment.
• Enhance what already works.
• Improve observation skills.
• Uncover ordinary things that produce extraordinary results.
• Try for excellence with what you have, and what you have improves.
One goal of education is to make learning enjoyable. Students in S.A.F.E. learning-developing
environments (free of judgments and criticisms) will move forward, evaluating the experience after it
happens. On the other hand, in unsafe teaching-fixing to get-it-right environments, students have
concerns before they act. Efficient learning environments motivate individuals toward higher-order
thinking that is conducive to creativity, in fail-free conditions, producing unforgettable learning.
Copyright Michael Hebron, 2010, all rights reserved. Neurogolf Learning and Neuro Learning for
golf are trademarks of Learning Golf , Inc.
