There is no such thing as multi-tasking

You pre-GenXer's can stop feeling intimidated. The apparent ability of today's student to do six things at once is only an illusion. This is a key insight from the fourth chapter of “Brain Rules”: it is only possible for the brain to pay attention to one thing at a time.

"We are biologically incapable of processing (multiple) attention-rich inputs simultaneously."

Those who appear able to jump from English assignment to Facebook to iChat and back are actually disengaging and reengaging their brains at each shift, after the brain determines what is needed for the new task. This is highly inefficient.

The exception is that it is possible to do two things at once if one activity can run on 'auto-pilot' - that is, if you’re not really paying attention to it.

For example, a lot of people drive with their brain on auto-pilot, which is just fine until the person in the next lane does something unexpected. If you're going to talk on a cell phone while behind the wheel, you may as well have a couple of beers first.

But I digress.

Listening to music while studying might actually be a good idea. Apparently, this creates an association that the brain can later use to recall stored information.  An interesting implication of this principle is that a stimulating classroom environment – one perhaps, with a view of the outdoors – instead of encouraging daydreaming, is actually more conducive to learning than a room with four bare walls.

There is also a danger of force-feeding more information than the brain can fully process, such as might happen in some AP courses. (Did I say that out loud?)  It might be possible to retain information long enough to pass an exam, but how much will the brain retain a week later? A year later? (If the answer is "not much", how important was it in the first place? Something to think about.)  Further, the brain needs periodic breaks in order to digest any new information, which is why it is necessary to build time for reflection into the learning process.

A third insight is that the brain appears programmed to ‘tune out’ after about ten minutes – humans have a low threshold for ‘boring’.  So a good lecturer has to do something every ten minutes or so to reengage the audience.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the most effective way to get the brain to pay attention is to incite emotion – fear, laughter, surprise, etc.. The emotional trigger sends a message to the brain: “This is important! Remember this!”,  which is why events that are associated with intense emotion can be remembered in detail many years later.