Completed BBCSS Project

Committee on Developments in the Science of Learning

Publications: How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School (1999), How People Learn: Bridging Research and Practice (1999), How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School: Expanded Edition (2000),

The Committee on Developments in the Science of Learning conducted a comprehensive study of new developments in the field of learning sciences, based on research from developmental psychology, cognition, cognitive neuroscience, sociology, anthropology, learning, educational technology, and the design of educational environments. Although there have been major developments in cognitive science, learning theory, and cognitive neuroscience, these findings have not been synthesized, nor have they generally been reflected in classroom teaching and learning. Current efforts to engineer broad-based education reform--changing curricular content, adopting education standards and assessments, making various kinds of structural changes, and rethinking education finance or teacher training--will be strengthened and more effective if well informed by the emerging science of learning and its practical applications.

Human learning was the committee's primary focus. The principal purpose was to distill the insights and knowledge of related learning sciences and draw out the implications for educators, school officials, parents, and policy makers within the context of standards-based education reform. The committee's work was organized around six broad tasks: review and synthesis of theory, research, and applications in the cognitive sciences; review and synthesis of theory, research, and applications in collateral fields that can contribute to the design of educational environments in order to foster effective teaching and learning; analysis of research on the uses of technology to promote learning; a coherent distillation of the knowledge and its implications for pedagogy, teacher training, classroom practice, and the development of supporting structures; analysis of a variety of education programs and approaches that purport to be grounded in the science of learning, explicating the underlying principles, and exploring how these principles can or have been brought to life in applied settings; and a research agenda to guide the Department of Education and its Office of Educational Research and Improvement (OERI) in developing program directions and funding priorities.

This National Research Council report, entitled How People Learn, provides government and private research organizations, as well as researchers, with a synthesis of the most important lines of research bearing on cognition and learning; it provides authoritative guidance on science-based models of learning and approaches to instruction that can inform research program initiatives, as well as guide research agendas and priority-setting. The study is addressed also to teachers and school officials who influence the conduct of education by communicating solid information about various instructional programs or methods currently exciting public interest, and helping teachers improve their craft by explaining the underlying principles for research-based innovative methods.