Temporal Dynamics of Learning

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It is commonly accepted that there is a crisis in education in the US. There are too many struggling learners, too many students who cannot read or do basic arithmetic, let alone advanced mathematics. What is not commonly accepted is what to do about this crisis. The researchers at the Temporal Dynamics of Learning Center (TDLC) believe that part of the current crisis in education is the lack of scientific understanding of how the brain learns, and the lack of translation of this scientific understanding to the classroom. An essential, yet understudied, component of learning that could have a strong impact on education is the role of time and timing in learning. TDLC brought together an interdisciplinary team of over 40 investigators from 16 different research institutions in order to focus research energy on this goal. TDLC's purpose is to achieve an integrated understanding of the role of time and timing in learning, across multiple time and spatial scales, brain systems, and social systems, to 1) create a new science of the temporal dynamics of learning; 2) to use this understanding to transform educational practice; and 3) to create a new collaborative research structure, the network of research networks, to transform the practice of science. Why study timing? Timing is critical for learning at every level, from learning the precise temporal patterns of speech sounds, to learning when to give feedback in the classroom, to the optimal frequency and timing of studying new material. Moreover, a decade of neuroscience research demonstrates that the intrinsic temporal dynamics of the brain itself also reinforce and constrain learning. For example, work at TDLC has shown that measurements of the brain waves of a toddler-the temporal dynamics of thought - can predict how well that child will perform at language tasks years later. This provides the possibility that early intervention could overcome these difficulties, demonstrating the usefulness of studying temporal dynamics. A research program of this size and scope is clearly only possible through the Center Funding model, in order to provide resources at the scale necessary to coordinate the large team of researchers. The work is organized by dividing the personnel into four research networks, where researchers from multiple disciplines are interested in common questions, and who synchronize their research around experiments that can be carried out in humans, animals, and computational models, allowing unprecedented convergence of techniques on a single question.