How In-Service Teachers Perceive Neuroscience as Connected to Education : an Exploratory Study

This exploratory study is concerned about the extent to which a sample of 163 pre-school, primary and secondary Brazilian school teachers, expressed their opinion on how neuroscience might help their teaching and pupils ́ learning. Evaluation instruments for Brazilian pupils were analysed. Two questionnaires were completed by the teachers. Results of a quantitative analysis indicated that in general teachers believe that neuroscience may contribute to the teaching and learning of their subject matter. An outline for an elective neuroscience and education course is presented. Educational implications are discussed.


Imaging and Basic Neurophysiology
The development of modern techniques for recording the physiological activity of the brain (fMRI) when children, adolescents and adults are performing a cognitive activity have allowed scientists to localize of a more precisely neuronal circuits or areas which fire in synchrony within the brain (Gazzaniga & Ivry, 2002;Blakemore & Frith, 2005;Willingham & Lloyd, 2007).A multitude of neuronal circuits support basic functions of the human nervous system as well as those of the other animals.Human´s emotions expressed as fear, hatred and joy originated from specific areas of our brains with relevance to education (Del Nero, 1997;Damásio, 1999;Johnston, 1999;Le Doux, 2002;Immordino-Yang & Dámasio, 2007).
The human ability to think and retain memories depends on complex physic-chemical activities in the neuronal circuits of the pre-frontal cortex and hippocampus (Dudai, 1989;Rose, 1992;Fields, 2005).On the other hand, neural circuits in the brain and spinal cord program and fine tune our move-© 2012, European Journal of Educational Research, 1(4), 301-319 Methods of cognitive neuroscience such as reaction time studies, EEG and MEG, fMRI, lesions studies reveal a relationship between brain areas and cognition that might be relevant for education (Norton et al., 2007).The approaches listed above will allow better understanding of learning, early diagnosis of learning disabilities and the development of methods for special education (Markram & Markram, 2010).It will also allow to investigation of learning "abilities & cognitive styles" and the best way to introduce innovative teaching methods in school settings, as for example, the KVP model by analysing school texts ( Byrnes & Fox, 1998;Carvalho & Clément, 2007) .Further investigations are bringing new light to aspects of attention, memory, language, reading and writing, mathematics teaching, sleep and, emotion useful for education (Berninger & Corina, 1998;Byrnes & Fox, 1998;Stanovich, 1998;Brown & Bjorklund, 1998;Geake & Cooper, 2003;Geake, 2004;).
Education researchers are very optimistic that findings in neuroscience might contribute effectively to the improvement of educational practices.Therefore, a massive quantity of narratives and stories in daily newspapers, popular science magazines and even scientific journals has been exaggerating the benefits of "neuropedagogy" a recent fancy neologism.These articles vary from totally speculative and esoteric to those in the line with the late "new wave" movement in California (Bruer, 1997(Bruer, , 1998,),).Examples are the development of new primary & secondary school curricula partially based in neuroscience and, exercises for the "right and left" hemispheres of the brain.Thus, building on "neuromyths" without empirical data to support the allegations offered to improve education, are taking us nowhere (Williams, 1986;Springer & Deutsch, 1998;Crossland, 2008;MacNeilage et al., 2009).Against claims that neuroscience will not contribute to education due to lack of integration, other voices argument that with the introduction of a "level of analysis" performed by computational neuroscience it might find commonalities similar to studies of biology and physiology (Bruer, 2002;Connell, 2004;Nomura, 2010).Thus, neuroscience, psychology and cognitive neuroscience plus pedagogy may produce a new way to frame and integrate these areas of knowledge with mutual benefits (Anderson, 1992;McKnight & Walberg, 1998).The advances in neuroscience research by itself will not introduce new educational strategies.However, neuroscience provides concrete and not speculative clues why certain educational approaches might be more efficient than others (Reynolds, 2000;Ramos, 2002;Smilkstein, 2003).

Teaching Strategies
Teachers from preschool to graduate school apply pedagogical strategies on an everyday basis in the process of teaching and learning their subject matter (Jonassen et al., 1993;Novak, 1998;Michael & Rovick, 1999).Although neurobiological changes occur in the brain and "fixation" of knowledge occurs in the cognitive structure of the individual´s mind, few know how the brain and peripheral nervous system as a whole works as a relevant factor in the educational world (Claxton, 1995;Calvin, 1998;Rocha & Rocha, 2000;Relvas, 2009).Therefore, if neuroscience is to have any meaning for the teacher, it must move far beyond what is available in teaching techniques which emphasize cognition (McGilly, 1994;McNeal & D´Avanzo, 1997).It is not enough to describe how the human brain is functioning during a task or why it is difficult to learn something.One must be take into consideration the level of analysis undertaken to survey the task and the thought process involved (Dehaene, 2007).For instance, attention and learning do not occur in isolated brain structures but are due to various layers of neuronal nets interconnected in complex and instable links (Edelman, 1987;Pozo, 2005;Edelman, 2006).A further understanding how information is "translated" by sense organs and turned into perception and later stored in long term memory, might be a rich strategy to improve pupil´s school success (Rosenfield, 1988;Lieury, 1997;Izquierdo, 2002;2004 a, b;White, 2012).
The early elementary school teacher is particularly concerned with the concept of "critic period" or better said "sensitive periods" when dealing with her pupils.It is a period of brain development shaped by a genetic program and by environmental experiences (neuronal plasticity) induced by a va-© 2012, European Journal of Educational Research, 1(4), 301-319 riety of stimuli such as colors, movement, sounds, and affectivity (Bartoszeck, 2006;Penn et al.,, 2008).However, the lay press and media created a catchy phrase "windows of opportunity" which could shut if urgent educational methods are not utilized with children in early infancy.Experimental data from publications were interpreted optimistically and transferred straight to education.Bruer, (2001) reviews this event critically.
On the other hand, some researchers argue that certain kinds of students do not get full advantage from curricula developed from studies on learning and educational strategies.For example, there are some clues that male students get better grades than female students in mathematics and science as a function of their skills in visual-spatial orientation as they grapple with problem solutions.It seems that gender counts (Brizendine, 2006;Selçuk et al., 2007;James;2007).Neuro-imaging is pinpointing brain areas involved in the visual-spatial processing and thus suggest an integration of our understanding of these skills in mathemathics education as a means to develop more efficient methods of teaching (Dehaene, 1997;Simons. 2003;O´Boyle et al., 2005;Geake, 2006).Additionally, further studies in neuro-genetics and neuro-imaging may help understand if the visual and phonological processing in brain areas are the roots of dyslexia and other learning problems (Fisher & Francks, 2006;Plomin et al., 2007;Scheneps et al., 2007;Grigorenko, 2007).
Unfortunately, undergraduate courses in Education (Pedagogy) do not carry in their curricula "Educational Biology" or "Neurobiology of Learning" as subject matters in Brazil, with exceptions (Scaldaferri & Guerra, 2002).However, there is interest in universities to offer outreach courses to inservice teachers covering further aspects of literacy, numeracy and conceptual change (Guerra et al., 2004;Blake & Gardner, 2007;Cosenza & Guerra, 2011).
Although teachers are interested in the cognitive development of the students they teach, there is a lack of knowledge about the biological basis of learning.Thus, the main purpose of this exploratory study is due to the scarcity of other Brazilian studies on the topic, is to survey what teachers really know about brain and mind, what misconceptions they might have and propose to remediate this situation with outreach courses and suggest practices based on sound neuroscience findings.

Research Questions
The main purpose of this exploratory study is:  To evaluate teachers´ knowledge of how the brain works;  To highlight potential contributions that educational neuroscience might offer;  To survey how much pre-school, primary school, and secondary school teachers know about brain, mind and their educational implications.

Methodology Participants
The authors developed a questionnaire with 10 items to measure the perception of a sample of inservice teachers from pre-school, primary school and secondary school have of how the brain works, and how this knowledge might contribute to the teaching and learning of their pupils.The items were rated on a 7 point-Likert-type scale with anchors of 1=strongly disagree to 7=strongly agree.The ques-© 2012, European Journal of Educational Research, 1(4), 301-319 tionnaire was anonymously answered by 83 teachers (74 women and 9 men) whose ages range from 25 to 54 and who have at least 5 years of teaching experience.

First Questionnaire
The contents of the sentences vary from a basic knowledge of the brain and central & peripheral nervous system to "critical" and " sensitive" periods during infancy, and experiences in the environment, neuroplasticity and learning, "enriched" environments, development and learning, biology of memory and teaching, emotion & teaching, sleep & memory & learning, zoo and museum visits and learning, PBL and mental models and learning (TABLE 1).Twenty-four questionnaires were collected from pre-school teachers, twenty-six from primary school and 33 from secondary school teachers.The sample was collected at the schools in the town of Curitiba, Paraná State, southern Brazil.Previously the project was reviewed and approved by the Research Committee of the Institute of Biological Sciences and the Ethical Committee in Research of the University of Paraná, Brazil.Teachers signed the Consent Term before the data were collected at one private and two public schools located in downtown and in the outskirts of the town as to reflect the social-cultural strata of the teachers.
Table 1.First questionnaire to evaluate how the brain might contribute to teaching and learning (Partially Adapted from Herculano-Houzel, 2002; Howard-Jones, 2010).
1.A better knowledge of human brain and nervous system might contribute to teaching and learning.2. There is a "critical period" which is crucial in the early years learning.3.There is a "sensitive period" in developing which is influenced by environmental experiences.4. The brain is subjected to changes in neural circuits (neuroplasticity) during one´s life span.5. Do "enriched" school settings improve learning and brain development in children? 6. Visits to natural history museums, zoological and botanical gardens might promote informal learning and greater pupils´ sociality.7. A better knowledge concerning the molecular mechanisms underlying learning and memory might improve teaching?8. Does knowing the molecular mechanism of human emotion might contribute to better teaching?9.There is a close relationship between sleep, memory and school learning.10.Using problem-based learning, case method and concept map might facilitate management of new information?
The findings of the first survey provided the topics for a short course (20 h) entitled "Neuroscience meets Education" delivered at the Department of Physiology, University of Paraná to 20 participants in February 2007.Teachers from public schools and graduate students for the Master of Biology degree attended this course voluntarily.The same outreach course was delivered at the "Support Group for People with Special Needs", University of Paraná to 60 participants as compulsory course attending for public secondary school in-service teachers during September to November 2007.The topics covered were: basic neuronal and neuroglial mechanisms, neuronal plasticity and environment experiences, critical and sensitive periods in brain development with relevance to education, "enriched envi-© 2012, European Journal of Educational Research, 1(4), 301-319 ronments" and school settings, synaptic development, pupils´ age and education, sleep, circadian rhythm and learning in infancy and adolescents pupils.

Second Questionaire
Therefore, a second questionnaire with 10 questions was developed by the authors and data was collected from 42 teachers (aged 28 to 45 year-olds) and all teachers returned it.All teachers were from public secondary schools and answered the questionnaire anonymously.The items were rated on a 6 point Likert-type scale with anchors of 1= strongly disagree to 6=strongly agree.Again, because females represented more than 95% of the sample, the role of gender could not be meaningfully analyzed.The topics covered in these lectures (20 h) were: brain development and environment experiences, neuronal communication, information, chemical and electrical synapses, molecular mechanism of learning, age range and learning, neuromyths (e. g. one only uses 10% of one´s brain capacity), and potential educational implications of neuroscience (TABLE 2).
Table 2. Second questionnaire to evaluate how the brain might contribute to teaching and learning (Partially Adapted From Herculano-Houzel, 2002;Howard-Jones, 2010).
1. Brain development from fetal to adult stage is totally under control by genes independent of environmental experiences.2. Brain and peripheral neurons communicate by neural circuits similar to home wire electrical design.3. Cranial and spinal nerves communicate by action potentials and release of neurotransmitters at synapses.4. Learning occurs through changes of the brain´s nervous connections.5. Brain areas are progressively involved for learning during developing stages.6. Brain nervous connections are fully active during 24 hours a day even when one sleeps.7. Holistic teaching techniques should be use to compensate for the 10% brain capacity.8.The mind is a product of brain electrical activity and not from soul stimulation.9. Neuroscience research has direct implications for educational practices and science teaching and learning.10.Only teaching methods, intuition, and teacher skills can improve education in spite of neuroscience research.

Results
The responses were put together in a table to simplify analysis (Table 3).Because females represented more than 89.0% of the sample, it precluded any meaningful analysis of the role of gender in the perception of the relevance of neuroscience to education.The raw scores for each participant across the 10 questions are reported.In this way, the data have archival value and can be readily compared to other studies in which the questionnaire might be used in other regions in Brazil and elsewhere.
Answers for the 1 st .questionnaire Question 1 asked teachers if a better knowledge of the brain function could contribute to teaching and learning of their subject matter.Analysis indicated that 68.7% of this sample strongly agree (category 7) that knowing more about the brain function could contribute to their teaching.This percentage in-© 2012, European Journal of Educational Research, 1(4), 301-319 creased to 87.4% when the data for the adjacent Likert category was included (Category 6).Question 2 asks if the teachers think there is a "critical period" in infancy for learning.Only 30% of the sample strongly agrees (category 7).This percentage increased to 34.8% when the adjacent category "agree" was included.However, there was a larger disagreement (36.14%) with the statement when middle category 4 is included.The answers for question 3 which asks about the importance of "sensitive periods" indicates that 44.5% of the sample strongly agree, which increases to 59.0% when the adjacent category 6 is included.The relationship between neuroplasticity and learning over the life span is acknowledge by 66.2% of the sample which strongly agree with the statement of question 4 which increased to 80.7% when the adjacent category 6 is included.Question 5 deals with "enriched environment" and learning.Ratings indicated that 74.5% of the sample strongly agrees (category 7) with the statement which increased to 80.0% when the adjacent category 6 is included.When teachers were asked about the importance of visiting museums, zoological and botanical gardens (question 6) as factors which improve learning and sociability of the pupils, 72.2% of the sample strongly (category 7) agree with the statement which increased to 79.4% when adjacent category 6 is added.Question 7 evaluates teachers´ opinions about whether having a better grasp of the physiological mechanisms responsible for learning and memory would improve teaching.Analyzing the data showed that 66.2% of the sample strongly agrees (category 7) with the statement which increased to 79.5% when the adjacent category 6 category is added.Question 8 assesses teachers´ opinions about the influence of emotion on learning.61.4% strongly agree with the item which increased to 84.2% when category 6 is added.Question 9 asks about the relationship between hours their pupils sleep and, learning.Sixty-four percent strongly agree (category 7) and when category 6 is included it increased to 87.0%.Finally, when teachers were asked whether using the techniques of PBL (problem-based leaning, case study) and concept mapping and mental mapping could be factors to modify the "cognitive structure of the mind" of their pupils (question 10), the ratings indicated that 44.5% strongly agree (category 7) which rose to 57.8% when the category 6 is included.However, 20.5% of the middle category 4) in this sample disagrees.Table 3 depicts the number of participants and their ratings of each of the 10 questions.

Answers to the 2nd questionnaire
Item 1 of the second questionnaire asked participants if the development of the children´s brain from fetal phase to adult age is entirely controlled only by genes and is independent of environmental experiences.The data indicated that 59.5% of the sample strongly disagreed that brain development is only controlled by genes.The percentage increased to 78.5% when the adjacent Likert category is included (category 2).Question 2 asked for the teachers´ opinions about whether information travels in neural nets via of electrical impulses and release of neurotransmitters at the synapses.59.5% of the participants strongly agreed and the percentage increased to 85.6% when the adjacent category 5 is included.
Question 3 asked the teachers if they were aware that communication between different areas of the brain and cranial and spinal nerves are carried out by electrical impulses produced by the movement of ions across the neuronal membrane and the release of neurotransmitters at the synapses.42.8% of the participants strongly agreed and the percentage increased to 85.6% when the adjacent category is included (Category 6).Question 4 asked the teachers if they agree (or disagree) that the learning process results from molecular mechanisms and structural changes in neural connections at different sites in the brain.The responses showed that only 21.4% of the sample strongly agreed but this percentage increased to 90.3% when the adjacent categories 5 and 4 are included respectively.Question 5 asked the teachers if they were aware that different areas of the brain are ready for learning at different ages of the pupils.Only 28.5% of the sample strongly agreed but this percentage increased to 85.6% when the categories 5 and 4 are included, indicating a degree of disagreement with the statement ( M=4.50, SD=1.40).Question 6 asked teachers if the brain is in active 24 hours a day even when we sleep.88.0% of the sample strongly agreed and this percentage increased to 95.1% when the adjacent category is included (Category 5).Question 7 asked teachers if they believed that we only use 10% of our brain capacity.Fifty percent of the sample strongly disagreed but 28.4% strongly agree with the statement (Categories 5 and 6).It is noteworthy that 21.4% were in doubt on the brain capacity issue, M=2.81, SD=1.60, (Categories 3 and 4).Question 8 asked teachers whether mind is the result of the supreme action of soul over the brain structure.45.2 % strongly disagreed but surprisingly 42.7% of the sample strongly agreed with the statement.Question 9 asked teachers if research in neuroscience could contribute to the understanding how the brain codifies and records information, providing valuable implications to teaching and learning in schools settings.All respondents (100%) of the sample strongly agreed with the statement (Categories 5 and 6).Finally, question 10 of the questionnaire asked teachers if only pedagogical methods, teacher´s intuition and will power could improve education doing without neuroscientific knowledge.64.2% strongly disagree but 33.2% of the sample ( M=2.45, SD=1.45) strongly agreed that pedagogical methods and teacher personality would suffice.Table 4 depicts the number of participants and their ratings of each of the 10 questions.

Discussion and Conclusions
Recent evaluations by the Brazilian Ministry of Education (MEC) of current teaching and learning in Brazilian schools indicated disappointing results nationwide.These evaluations are based on instruments such as the SAEB (National System of Evaluation of Basic Education , ENEM (National Examination of Secondary School) and Pisa.Brazilian evaluation results are very poor as compared to foreign pupils of the same grade and age (Bonamino & Franco, 1999;Waltenberg, 2005).For instance, pupils 15-years-old with more than 12 years of schooling present modest academic performance, but lack scientific literacy, are unable to understand a text (functionally illiterate) or are unable solve a simple arithmetic problem (Castro, 2002;Ireland, 2007).The SAEB mission is to evaluate a sample of pupils © 2012, European Journal of Educational Research, 1(4), 301-319 enrolled at 4 th grade and 8 th grade of Primary School (Ensino Fundamental) and 3 rd grade of secondary school (Ensino Médio) from public and private schools in urban and rural areas nationwide.The exam is compulsory and composed of questions selected by a committee in Mathematics and Portuguese.
The score runs from 0 to 10 points.On the other hand the ENEN test (Exame Nacional do Ensino Médio) which is non-mandatory evaluates students at the last grade of secondary school (3 rd grade).The objective of this test is to assess the students´ academic accomplishments before entering a College or University undergraduate course.Some Brazilian Universities take the score as a partial or total mark for enrolling students in their undergraduate courses (Peixoto Costa et al., 2010).Only a few secondary school graduates and the first year of undergraduate in College or University courses, showed outstanding performance in deep understanding of mathematical and scientific concepts crucial to the whole economic and social development of an emerging country like Brazil.Since the introduction of scientific techniques for recording and imaging brain activity during the performance of cognitive tasks, it has been possible to look at the brain in action surpassing the traditional approaches of using behavioral measures as patterned tests and interviews (Geake, 2009).Although there are technical limitations in these methods they provide a useful link between neuroscience and education.Another "limitation" is that most of the neuroimaging data comes from adults, not from children whose brains are developing (Howard-Jones, 2010).However, mathematical reasoning can establish a key partnership between cognition and brain function at school settings (Changeux & Connes, 1991;Changeux & Ricoeur, 2000;Varma & Schwartz, 2008b).
These non-invasive technical procedures provide plenty of data about the electrical activity in brain layers of the brain responsible for the information communication, oxygen and glucose metabolism at the moment a mental activity is being carried out (Blakemore & Frith, 2005).In addition to, the relevant data applied in neurological and psychiatric settings, cognitive neuroscience is increasingly able to identify brain areas responsible for failures in reading and language and mathematics learning by means of educational practice (Butterworth, 1999;Byrnes, 2001).Further command of neuroscience © 2012, European Journal of Educational Research, 1(4), 301-319 principles would enable educators to assess their pupils´ academic performance.Could it not be related to poor cognitive stimuli during the early critical period of brain development?This seems to be worldwide concern (Bayley et al., 2001;Goswani, 2004;Doidge, 2007).Therefore, more than 80.0% (M=6.42,SD=1.10) of the sample of the educators who completed the first questionnaire believed that a better knowledge of the workings of the brain could contribute to improve teaching and learning of their pupils, but might be misinformed or even mistaken ( Howard-Jones, 2010 p.p. 3-19).On the other hand, findings of a similar survey with teachers in US indicated that only 57.0% are believers that neuroscience has value for education and 24.0% of the sample has reservations (Zambo & Zambo, 2011).Chedid, ( 2006) emphasized this point concerning child literacy as a "mirror image" of neuroscience literacy among the Brazilian public, yet undergraduate pedagogy courses list few educational psychology courses and an almost no brain science in initial teacher training in Brazil (Herculano-Houzel, 2002).Zaro et al., (2010) list principles that could be followed by the teaching community.In addition, undergraduate students of psychology are uncertain about whether psychology can be viewed as a science (Bartoszeck et al., 2005;Morales et al., 2005).There is a concern about the full endorsement of the concepts of "critical" and "sensitive periods," (M=4.70,SD=1.91;M=5.54, SD+1.69 respectively) although researchers favored cognitive plasticity and to a lesser degree "enriched environments" (M=6.28,SD=1.81) as the former related to "windows of opportunity" and the latter to rats rearing not educating human beings (Bailey, 2001;Medina, 2008).
Results showed that almost 80% of the teachers in this sample favored outside the classroom education such as visits to zoos and museums as a means for improving academic performance and sociability amongst the pupils (Braund & Reiss, 2004;Uitto et al., 2006).When looking at the items of emotion, sleep, and memory, more than 85% of the teachers in the sample agreed that these are factors that if properly investigated could improve learning in the school settings ( Börsch-Haubold, 2006;Golombek & Cardinali, 2008;Menna-Barreto & Wey, 2008;Griffith & Rosbash, 2008;Schwartz, 2009).Finally, more than 50% (M=5.46,SD=1.83) of the teachers in the sample believe that the methodology of PBL, case method (Novak, 1998;Bartoszeck, 2005) and concept mapping and mental mapping (Margulies, 1991;Trifone, 2006) might be able to change the synaptic net and as a consequence the cognitive structure of the minds of their pupils (Goldberg, 2001;Buzan & Buzan, 1993;Buzan, 2004;).
After the second outreach course on Neuroscience and Education, a new questionnaire was completed by a new group of teachers.Results indicated that 88.0% of this sample considered that neuroscience research might help understand how the human brain codifies, and store information and this could be applied to improve pedagogical methods.Many neuroscience and education workshops around have generated lists of research questions in need of answers, for instance: what are the neural bases of individual differences in learning and development?, or "is there any neural reality to so-called learning styles?(Geake, 2009).However, 28.4% ( M=2.81, SD=1.60) of the teachers in this sample still believe that we only use 10 percent of our brain and that thus educators should apply holistic techniques for teaching their subject matters to the pupils in the classroom.This neuromyth and the "left-and right-brained thinking" are hard to erase from the teaching community (Springer & Deutsch, 1998;Geake, 2008;MacNeilage et al., 2009).
Although, similar questionnaires were used in both surveys but with different groups of educators, the audience was up-to-a-point receptive to the applicability of neuroscience knowledge for improving in teaching and learning.Pickering & Howard-Jones (2007) using a questionnaire and in-depth interviews found after a seminar series, that teachers in the UK "show a high level of enthusiasm for attempts to interrelate neuroscience and education".But doubts still persist about how to do it and various learning strategies are being researched (Willis, 2006;Varma et al., 2008a).On the other hand, there is some persistent notions that the soul stimulates the brain (question 8, 42.7% agree with the © 2012, European Journal of Educational Research, 1(4), 301-319 statement, M=3.02, SD=1.65).It seems that not many teachers believe about the immaterial basis of the soul, or that the "mind results of brain process which emerged gradually in both development and evolution" (Bloon, 2004 pp. 189-198).Furthermore, the worldwide research community and particularly educators are cautious on the straight forward application of neuroscience to education (Geake, 2003;Geake, 2009 pp.15-20).
However, papers are being published to generate discussions and potential collaborations between neuroscientist and educators worldwide mainly in the journal "Mind, Brain, and Education", since 2007.In conclusion, the results of the 2 surveys and the content of the lectures delivered to the teachers allowed the development of the contents of the elective course BF-054 Neuroscience applied to Education for trainee teachers enrolled in the undergraduate course of education (pedagogy), that is being carried out by the first author since the first semester of 2009 in the Department of Physiology, University of Paraná, Curitiba, southern Brazil.The main topics are listed below complemented by a selected bibliography (not included herewith):  Brain development and school children;  Brain in school and neuroplasticity;  Emotional states and learning;  Social brain and school environment;  Learning and recalling;  Adolescent brain and learning;  Brain, words and numbers, emergent science in pre-school;  The "mathematical" brain, literacy, and reading;  Sleep deprivation, learning, memory and attention.

Educational Implications
Therefore, educators should have easy access to the following particulars which might have potential application to their subject matter teaching creating stimulating learning environments (adapted partially from: Rushton et al., 2010).
* Practice with drawings and coloring (Kapit et al., 2000, p.p. 15-30;83-112).* Practice with "schemas" as knowledge is stored in human memory as a semantic network conceiving learning as a reorganization of networks in semantic memory (Jonassen et al., 1993).* Practical classes in the laboratory or field trips and could provide associations between previous experiences and the understanding of a present topic (Braund & Reiss, 2004); * Teaching should fine tune motivation and patterns of academic performance to the age range of students by adopting integrated thematic units, such as for example reasons for spread of Dengue Fever in Brazil (Kachar et al., 2001;DeAquino, 2008).* The brain shows neuronal plasticity as the individual matures but greater synaptic density in certain areas of the cerebral cortex do not correlated with larger capacity for general learning.
Selected learning activities where the student can choose one of them may attach him to the theme when he feels it is relevant for his life out of school (Mintzes & Leonard, 2006); * During a novel learning experience sight and hearing are involved.Therefore, curriculum should include scenarios, that reflect real life "simulations" in a way that new information may "anchor" to previous information in the cognitive structure of the mind ( de Jong, 2009;della Chiesa, 2009);

Table 3 .
First questionnaire.Ratings for neuroscience and education scale by pre-school, primary and secondary school teachers, N=83 (M=mean, SD=standard deviation).

Table 4 .
Second questionnaire.Ratings for neuroscience and education scale by secondary school teachers, N=42 (M= mean, SD=standard deviation)