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ScienceDirect Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 174 (2015) 1933 – 1940

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Primary and secondary school teachers’ knowledge and misconceptions about the brain in Turkey Karakus, O.1, Howard-Jones, P. A.2 and Jay, T.2 1 Faculty of Education,Sinop University, 57000, Turkey Graduate School of Education, University of Bristol BS5 8HZ, United Kingdom

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Abstract Neuroscience adds a new perspective to the field of education. However, it is challenging to bridge the gap between those deeplyrooted fields. Historically, the gap has generated certain neuromyths and these can be quite damaging. In order to prevent this situation, teachers should be sufficiently informed. Thus, there are some efforts in some countries to prevent the spread of neuromyths, such as UK, Netherlands, Brazil, US, Greece, Portuguese etc. However there have been no studies in Turkey. The present study took a two-stage mixed-methods approach to explore primary and secondary school teachers’ concepts about the brain in Turkey and to identify potential sources of misconceptions. 278 primary and secondary school teachers were surveyed and 6 of them were interviewed for in depth responses. Analyses revealed that teachers held many misconceptions about concepts related to brain that have been observed elsewhere in Europe. On the other hand the comparison between Turkey, UK and Netherlands revealed some interesting differences. For instance the conceptions about the neuromyths on second language learning and plasticity were differentiated between countries. This could show the differences between cultures. There is a need to do distinctive scientific research in Turkey as well. © Published by Elsevier Ltd. Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license © 2015 2014The TheAuthors. Authors. Published by Elsevier (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer-review under responsibility of the Sakarya University. Peer-review under responsibility of the Sakarya University Keywords: Neuroscience in education, Neuromyths, Turkey, Teachers' knowledge on brain

1.Introduction In 2002, the OECD’s Brain and Learning Project (1999-2006) drew an international attention to the destructive effects of neuromyths (OECD, 2002: 69), defining these as “misconception generated by a misunderstanding, a misreading or a misquoting of facts scientifically established (by brain research) to make a case for use of brain research, in education and other contexts” (OECD, 2002: 111). There are various possible reasons why neuromyths * Corresponding author. Tel.: +00 -000-0000-0000 E-mail address: [email protected]

1877-0428 © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

Peer-review under responsibility of the Sakarya University doi:10.1016/j.sbspro.2015.01.858

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O. Karakus et al. / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 174 (2015) 1933 – 1940

have spread in education. Firstly, neuroscience is alluring. For instance, a study shows that the representation of brain images in an article is more persuasive than other data representations for readers (McCabe & Castel, 2008). The persuasiveness of “brain-based” explanations appears to add to the marketability of educational products, whose attractiveness can be enhanced simply by including “brain” in the titles, and further enhanced when an irrelevant brain image added (Lindell & Kidd, 2013). Secondly, the gap between neuroscience and education which adds difficulty to the process of transferring knowledge between neuroscience and education promotes condition which promotes neuromyths and allows them to endure. According to Goswami (2006), part of this gap arises from miscommunication between neuroscientists and teachers. As the field of neuroscience in education evolves and brain-based educational products are developed, the hunger for `brain-based` knowledge among teachers is likely to increase and it will become increasingly important for teachers to be critical consumers. Understanding teacher’s ideas and common misconceptions about the brain will be crucial to professional development initiatives aimed at developing their critical awareness. That is one reason why several research studies have already focused on teachers perceptions regarding neursocience, including in the UK (P.A. Howard-Jones, Franey, Mashmoushi, & Liao, 2009; Pickering & Howard-Jones, 2007), the Netherlands (a comparative study with teachers in the UK) (Dekker, Lee, Howard-Jones, & Jolles, 2012), Brazil (Bartoszeck& Bartoszeck, 2012), the USA (Serpati & Loughan, 2012) and the Portugal (Rato, Abreu, & Castro-Caldas, 2013). Thus, there is an urgent need to ground the field in Turkey, regarding the importance of teacher training for a successful teaching-learning environment; because teacher education is one of the most effective mechanisms for improving neuroscience literacy in education (Ansari & Coch, 2006) with many voices calling for a modest inclusion of neuroscience in teacher training (e.g. Royal_Society, 2011). On the other hand, the last comprehensive revision to teacher education in Turkey was made in 1997 (Yuksel, 2012). Although some further updating was made in 2007 and 2009, it is still hard to consider Turkey has a coherently formulated and implemented set of standards for teacher education. According to Yildirim (2011) attempts to improve the quality of teacher education often have been undermined by new initiatives that appear contradictory with each other. Moreover, it can be questioned to what extent evidence has been used to change the curriculum for teacher training and how evidence-based decisions have been made. As Yildirim (2013) has indicated, teacher education research has a narrow scope in Turkey that creates deficiencies in the theoretical and conceptual dimensions of teacher education. Consequently, a lack of high-quality teacher education research hinders the development of an effective, consistent and research-based teacher training curriculum. In addition problems with the teacher training curriculum, poor working conditions of many qualified teachers and the gap between schools and university-based teacher training may also contribute to difficulties in experienced teachers helping to mentor and train new teachers. This study was undertaken to examine the ideas about the brain that are held by teachers in Turkey, and particularly those related to learning that are likely to influence their practice in the classroom. In this way, we hope to draw attention to the need for teacher-training and professional development in Turkey to consider inclusion of authentic neuroscience. This may help inoculate teachers against the most common misconceptions, as well as to provide a basis for considering, in scientifically meaningful ways, how neuroscience may inform educational theory, policy and practice. 2.Method Participants The research participants were primary and secondary school teachers. In this mixed-methods study, a total of, 278 teachers (124 primary and 154 secondary school teachers), whose ages ranged between 23 and 64 (M=36), participated to the first part of the study. 51.8% of participants were female and 48.2% was male. For the second part of the study, 3 female and 3 male (3 primary and 3 secondary school teachers) participants were randomly selected for in depth interviews.


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Procedure The translation and suitability of the survey was first validated through an electronic pilot study which included 38 participants. The questionnaire was revised according to the feedbacks from pilot study. A total of 14 schools were personally visited for the first part of the study and 2 schools were visited for the interviews. The research was held in two cities of Turkey, Istanbul and Mersin. Informed consent forms, which had detailed information, were gained from participants at the outset of both parts of the study (survey and interviews). The voluntary nature of participation and the right to withdraw were highlighted, along with how the data would be anonymised. The research was presented as a study of what teachers know about the brain and its influence on learning, and what are their misconceptions about the brain. Instruments In the first part of the study, a questionnaire was used which was applied in Dekker et al.’s (2012) paper before. This included 32 statements about the brain and its influence on learning. Of these 32 statements, 15 statements were defined and accepted as educational neuromyths by the OECD (2002) such as “we only use 10% of our brains” or “differences in hemispheric dominance can help to explain individual differences amongst learners”. The other 17 statements were general scientific information about the brain such as “learning occurs through modification of the brains’ neural connections” or “production of new connections in the brain can continue into old age”. The participants could answer these statements by choosing “correct”, “incorrect” or “do not know”. Respondents to the questionnaire were also asked some questions about their background, including age, sex, level of education (either undergraduate, Masters or PhD) and whether they were primary or secondary school teachers. A further 11 questions (using a likert scale) were asked the extent to which they read either scientific or popular scientific articles, attended conferences, in-service training courses or private certificate courses, in order to identify the sources of their information about the brain. After analysing the data from the questionnaire, a subset of the respondents were chosen for in-depth interview. The first part of the interview was based on the analysis of the questionnaire results and focused on the most popular neuromyths identified in first part of the study, with questions aimed at identifying possible sources for the myths. In the second part of interviews, respondents were asked about their views, perceptions and knowledge of the potential relationship between education and neuroscience.

3. Results Participants answered correctly a mean average of 14.56 (M= 43.92%) statements out of the total 32 (SD= 9.7) statements. Our Turkish teachers held 53.02% (SD=27.80) of the 15 neuromyths (see Table 1). This statistic is lower than the UK (49%) and Netherlands (49%) (Dekker et al., 2012).Teachers’ mean average score on the 17 statements regarding general knowledge about the brain was 56.9% (SD=25.7), somewhat lower than teachers’ average score from UK (M = 67% correct, SD = 13.5) and Netherlands (M = 73% correct, SD = 12.7) (Dekker et al., 2012). Independent t-tests between groups (age, sex, branch, education level) showed no relation between teacher characteristics (such as level of education and sources of information) and general knowledge.

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O. Karakus et al. / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 174 (2015) 1933 – 1940 Table-1: 15 Neuromyths about Brain and Brain Functions about Learning with Correct Answers in Brackets and Teachers’ Responses from Turkey, UK and Netherlands by Percentages (C = Correct, I = Incorrect, D.K = Do not Know)

15 Neuromyths in the Questionnaire

Turkey

1-Individuals learn better when they receive information in their preferred learning style (e.g.,auditory,visual,kinaesthetic). (Incorrect) 2-Environments that are rich in stimulus improve the brains of pre-school children. (Incorrect) 3-It has been scientifically proven that fatty acid supplements (omega-3 and omega-6) have a positive effect on academic achievement. (Incorrect) 4-Differences in hemispheric dominance (left brain, right brain) can help explain individual differences amongst learners. (Incorrect) 5-Short bouts of co-ordination exercises can improve integration of left and right hemispheric brain function. (Incorrect) 6-There are critical periods in childhood after which certain things can no longer be learned. (Incorrect) 7-Children must acquire their native language before a second language is learned. If they do not do so neither language will be fully acquired. (Incorrect) 8-Exercises that rehearse co-ordination of motorperception skills can improve literacy skills. (Incorrect) 9-We only use 10% of our brain. (Incorrect)

C% 97.1

I% 1.1

86.7

10-Regular drinking of caffeinated drinks reduces alertness. (Correct) 11-Children are less attentive after consuming sugary drinks and/or snacks. (Incorrect) 12-Extended rehearsal of some mental processes can change the shape and structure of some parts of the brain. (Correct) 13-If pupils do not drink sufficient amounts of water (=6–8 glasses a day) their brains shrink. (Incorrect) 14-Learning problems associated with developmental differences in brain function cannot be remediated by education. (Incorrect) 15-Individual learners show preferences for the mode in which they receive information (e.g., visual, auditory, kinaesthetic). (Correct)

UK

Netherlands

D.K% 1.8

C% 93

I% 4

D.K% 3

C% 96

I% 3

D.K% 1

6.8

6.5

95

1

4

56

29

15

79.1

3.6

17.3

69

12

20

54

16

30

78.8

5.4

15.8

91

3

6

86

4

11

72.3

2.9

24.8

88

0

12

82

5

13

67.3

26.6

6.1

33

53

14

52

38

10

58.3

32.4

9.4

7

82

11

36

61

3

56.8

15.8

27.3

78

3

19

63

11

27

50.4

31.3

18.3

48

26

26

46

42

12

45.7

34.9

19.4

39

26

35

41

36

23

43.9

22.3

33.8

57

24

20

55

24

21

39.9

20.9

39.2

69

6

26

58

14

28

24.8

35.6

39.6

29

46

26

16

49

35

21.6

64.7

13.7

16

69

15

19

62

19

94.6

2.5

2.9

95

4

2

82

13

5


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4. Discussion The analysis of the teacher responses for each neuromyth indicates several neuromyths whose high level of popularity in Turkey echoes those levels seen elsewhere in Europe. These include the myths regarding learning styles, hemispheric dominance and the possibility of using exercises to integrate left-right hemispheric brain function. An extensive review of educational evidence has been unable to support the educational value of identifying learning styles (Coffield, Moseley, Hall, & Ecclestone, 2004). Moreover, although individuals may show preferences for the mode in which they receive information, a psychological investigation of VAK (visual, auditory, kinaesthetic) learning styles tested recall of information presented in all three different styles and concluded that focusing on VAK learning styles was “wasted effort”(Kratzig& Arbuthnott, 2006). Hemispheric dominance (left brain, right brain) is also commonly used as a learning style approach to categorizing learners and as a means to differentiate teaching strategies accordingly. It is true that some tasks can be associated with extra activity that is predominantly in one hemisphere or the other (e.g. language can be considered in most individuals to be left lateralised). However, no part of the brain is ever normally inactive in the sense that no blood flow is occurring. Furthermore, performance in most everyday tasks, including learning tasks, requires both hemispheres to work together in a sophisticated parallel fashion. The division of people into left-brained and right-brained takes the misunderstanding one stage further and there is no reliable evidence that categorisation based on hemispheric dominance is helpful for teaching and learning. The idea that that co-ordination exercises can help integrate the functions of left and right hemisphere is also popular in some commercial educational programmes, but cannot be supported by reviews of the scientific literature (Arter& Jenkins, 1979; Bochner, 1978; Cohen, 1969; Hammill, Goodman, & Wiederholt, 1974; Kavale & Forness, 1987). 97% of our Turkish teacher considered that individuals learn better when receiving information in their preferred learning style, comparable with the figures of 93% and 96% recorded by Dekker et al. for UK and Dutch teachers. 79% of our Turkish teachers considered differences in hemispheric dominance could help explain individual differences amongst learners, again comparable with figures of 91% and 86% recorded by Dekker et al. for UK and Dutch teachers. In a recent survey in Portugal, less than 20% of teachers succeeded in identifying similar statements about learning styles and hemispheric dominance as myths (Rato, et al., 2013). These myths feature in many commercial programmes and literature claiming a brain-basis and this may help explain the global nature of their popularity. Such ideas appear to have gained the type of international currency warned about by the OECD (OECD, 2007: 124). Interestingly, however, our data also indicated some potential variation between the prevalence of neuromyth amongst Turkish teachers and those in other countries. The most outstanding differences related to notions around neuroplasticity. For instance, the neuromyth about second language learning ‘Children must acquire their native language before a second language is learned. If they do not do so neither language will be fully acquired’ was agreed by 58.3% teachers in Turkey, while it was believed by only 36% teachers in Netherlands and by just 7% of teachers in the UK. This neuromyth could have arisen from people’s attitudes to multilingualism in Turkey. There is no official figure about how many languages spoken, but a research conducted (by KONDA, a research company) in 2006 showed that there are 10 languages spoken in the country. Although the majority speaks Turkish, many different races and languages are represented in the population. There has been controversy regarding whether education should be in Turkish or whether multilingualism should be embraced more widely. In reference to similar arguments in contemporary Germany, Gogolin suggests the idea of the nation-state tends to support monolingualism (majority language) over multilingualism (Lengyel, 2011) such that language becomes closely tied up with ideology (Ayan Ceyhan, 2012). In contrast with the situation in Turkey, over 300 languages are spoken in London and over 40 languages are spoken in London schools by more than 1000 pupils (Von Ahn, Lupton, Greenwood & Wiggins, 2010). This may demonstrate differences in ideology and perceptions around multilingualism underlying responses between Turkish and UK teachers regarding the neuromyth of second language learning. 67% of Turkish teachers (compared with 33% in the UK) also agreed with an over interpretation of the idea of sensitive periods for learning, i.e. that “There are critical periods in childhood after which certain things can no longer be learned.” The current notion amongst neuroscientists is that sensitive, rather than critical, periods exist for learning, such that there is no clearly defined window of opportunity for learning outside which progress is

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impossible, just periods when learning can be more efficiently achieved. However, it is also worth noting that the contexts of learning for which even sensitive periods have been observed are chiefly those involving primary sensory or motor function, rather than the higher types of learning process that are usually the subject of formal education (for further discussion, see Blakemore &Frith(2005, p26-36) and Howard-Jones et al. (2012)). Our Turkish teachers were also less willing to believe in structural neuroplasticity, with only 40% believing “Extended rehearsal of some mental processes can change the shape and structure of some parts of the brain.” compared with 58% and 69% for the Netherlands and UK respectively. Yet examples of such plasticity abound, with changes occurring over as little as 3 months (Draganski et al., 2004), and even in relation to informal learning related to social network sites (Kanai, Bahrami, Roylance, & Rees, 2012). This is an important issue, since notions of plasticity amongst students have been linked to their theories of knowledge formation, self-concept and academic achievement (Blackwell, Trzesniewski, & Dweck, 2007). Although the brain is not a muscle, it can be enhanced with physical exercise (Dweck, 2007). However, the results demonstrated that there are false beliefs amongst teachers in Turkey about neuroplasticity and these could affect student achievement – since they relate to a more entity-based theory of achievement. This situation might be ameliorating through improved teacher training programmes that address neuroscience. For instance according to Akdag and Haser (2010), in Turkey 49 faculties of education have early childhood education teacher training programmes; however “most of them lack sufficient instructors, physical condition and materials”. On the other hand, it can be claimed that the gap between theory and practice, in other words working conditions of teachers also could cause those false beliefs. For instance classrooms are overpopulated compared to all OECD countries (Ozturk, 2011). Teachers struggle with both structural quality problems including space, lighting, safety and materials; and process quality problems including poor parent involment, poor interaction and poor educational activities (Akdag&Haser, 2010). In interviews, the seven most popular neuromyths, which attempted to establish the potential sources of misunderstanding, were used for in depth responses. Having established that the participants believed in a particular myth, they were asked where they remembered acquiring the information. For our analysis of the transcripts, we found that they often believed it had arisen through experiences and observations of their own, other people’s or their students’. This echoes the proposal of Johnson and Wellman (1982), who suggest one of the ways we develop the concepts about our brain depends on the observations about our own and others’ cognitive processes. However, many participants also indicated that they could not remember the source of their knowledge. To obtain further insight, we also asked our interviewees "How do you improve yourself with regards to your profession?" Responses to this question usually involved tales of searching the internet and sharing information and experiences with their colleagues. One of them mentioned attending in-service training courses, two of them indicated that they read books, and only one of them mentioned anything about reading scientific articles. In brief, responses suggest only very vague awareness of where their neuromyth had originated from, and quite informal sources for general information about the role of the brain in education and learning. This may also be reflected in the results of our regression analysis involving teacher characteristics and neuromyth, since those who had been able to acquire more general information about the brain were also those more likely to possess neuromyth, suggesting that the sources accessed by the teachers may have encouraged some important misunderstandings. Enthusiasm for the relevance of neuroscience in education was high, as reported in studies elsewhere. 93.2% of the sample (n=259) were supportive of the idea that neuroscience is relevant to education, 90.3% expressing a desire to have more knowledge on the brain. This result echoes previous results for the UK and US, with Pickering and Howard-Jones (2007) reporting a similar majority of UK teachers rating the role of the brain in the design of educational programmes as very important or important. In a US study, Serpati and Loughan (2012) stated that 94% (n=221) teachers agreed that it is significant to know the knowledge on neurological underpinnings of learning, cognition and behaviour. Conclusions x Myths regarding the brain are prevalent amongst teachers in Turkey


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x

Some of those myths associated with commercial brain-based programmes have high levels of popularity similar to those recorded in other European countries. x Some myths around neuroplasticity were very popular for our Turkish teachers, with higher levels of popularity than recorded in countries such as the UK and Netherlands. x There is a clear enthusiasm for brain-related ideas amongst Turkish teachers and a belief in the relevance of neuroscience to education. Recommendation: x Given the high levels of neuromyth amongst Turkish teachers, their enthusiasms for including neuroscience in educational thinking, and increasing international developments in the field of neuroscience and education, we recommend greater attention is paid to the brain in initial teacher training and continuing professional development of teachers in Turkey. References Akdag, Z. & Haser, C. (2010). Beginning early childhood education teachers’ problems in Turkey. 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