The Motivated Brain Quotes

“teachers should have two goals: All students are able to connect new learning to their prior knowledge and experiences. All teachers relate new learning to students' everyday lives and culture.”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance

“Thought requires concepts, and analogies are perhaps the best way to gradually understand a concept. Analogical thought associates common elements between an understood concept and one that is not yet understood.”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance

“Showing a personal interest in students is important, costs nothing, and requires little planning.”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance

“Cognitive psychologists have long suggested that people fit into different learning styles, yet neuroscience does not support this notion (Sousa & Tomlinson, 2011).”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance

“Ask students what norms are important to them in school and in the classroom. Giving them a voice and then listening and acting on their needs gives them a sense of emotional, psychological, and cognitive safety. This trusting environment lessens the chance for stress and anxiety and prevents cortisol (stress hormone) release.”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance

“Thus, in education we need to encourage productive seeking as much as the satisfaction of goals achieved.”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance

“Predictable, consistent, and shared procedures for arriving at and starting class, distributing materials, and accomplishing daily routines lower stress and provide a comfortable environment. If we can set up routines and procedures so that the brain does not have to resort to the fight, flight, or freeze response, we will alleviate a lot of stress and distraction.”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance

“Unfortunately, because of a lack of hardware and sometimes teacher confidence and creativity, students are denied access to the very strongest engagement resource we have—technology.”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance

“if we do nothing more than replace textbooks and encyclopedias with Google or Bing, or use the computer or tablet for nothing but writing exercises, technology in the classroom is not as motivating as using these tools to SEEK, find, and use information for problem solving and creativity.”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance

“Seven Caring Habits Supporting Encouraging Listening Accepting Trusting Respecting Negotiating differences Seven Deadly Habits Criticizing Blaming Complaining Nagging Threatening Punishing Rewarding/Bribing to control”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance

“If learning is interesting, challenging, and meaningful, doing the work is its own reward. Students should not have to be coerced or manipulated to complete it.”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance

“Praise is also not helpful, because it supports the idea of "fixed mindset" or intelligence (Dweck, 2006). More effective is corrective and supportive timely feedback and the encouragement for effort.”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance

“Plasticity is the term neuroscientists use to describe the brain's ability to grow and change.”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance

“Many students with a high intelligence may decide to take the safe route and are not particularly successful in life, whereas students with average intelligence and a good level of grit often far surpass their high-ability peers as grit predicts success beyond talent.”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance

“In general, students with high self-efficacy are more likely to give more effort to complete a task and to persist longer than a student with low self-efficacy”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance

“designing educational experiences without knowledge about how human brains learn naturally and most efficiently can be compared to designing a glove without any knowledge of the human hand.”
― Gayle Gregory, The Motivated Brain: Improving Student Attention, Engagement, and Perseverance