Split Brain or Integrated Brain ?

Abstract

MicroWorlds is a derivative of Logo, and also belongs to a family of computer tools known as multi-media applications. Such applications have a visual richness that is highly attractive to children with a visual learning preference. Through brain hemisphere theory some would characterise these children as having a dominant right brain hemisphere, or at least as strongly preferring to use the right hemisphere in most learning situations. Certainly, many children with strongly visual expressive and learning characteristics seem to also have language deficits, suggsting that the left hemisphere is playing a lesser part in their learning. A number of the children reported on here, for example, scored very low on verbal reasoning tests, displayed severe spelling deficits and had difficulty writing in conventional non-computer environments. The same children scored very high on a non-verbal test, and continually indulged in visual play (such as constructions, drawings, cartooning, three-dimensional modelling etc.), often to a very advanced level. It has taken neuro-psychology over 100 years to unpack the secrets of brain hemisphere specialisation through the so-called “split-brain” research, but in the last few years of the 20 century neuroscience began to reveal the importance of the integration of the hemispheres for effective learning. This report will examine some cases of Grade 5 children (10 years of age) with a strongly dominant right hemisphere (visual) learning preference who demonstrate considerable advances in language and mathematical skills when problem setting using a visually rich computer medium such as MicroWorlds. It draws on work by Harel and Papert (1991) with Logo and building a constructivist environment, and on the ideas of neuro-psychologists such as Ornstein (1997) and Beeman and Chiarello (1998). The initial observations arose after the introduction into a coeducational primary school in Melbourne, Australia, of a scheme of universal notebook computer ownership and the consequent learning outcomes that occurred after the implementation phase. The observations led to a research project involving children’s writing, and classroom observations of both writing and mathematical outcomes. It suggests that the unfolding knowledge of brain hemisphere integration should underpin educational planning for the very important role for the computer for children with visually preferred learning styles. The study also suggests that a very strong importance should be attached to the availability of visually rich, creative and openended software, and a constructivist environment in the classroom where children are allowed and encouraged to dare to set their own problems within the learning framework. Copyright © 2002, Australian Computer Society, Inc. This paper was presented at the Seventh World Conference on Computers in Education, Copenhagen, July 29–August 3, 2001. Reproduction for academic, not-for profit purposes permitted provided this text is included. Split Brain or Integrated Brain? In 1863 Paul Broca (Broca 1863, cited in Joy 1964) announced to a sceptical audience of Parisian scientists that the brain was not a unitary organ, but that it had localised function zones. In particular, he had found that speech was located in the left front lobe of the brain. What followed was over a century of controversy and research about localised functions in the human brain. When Roger Sperry received the Nobel Prize for his work on the split brain, the matter seemed to have been resolved. From research into brain damaged patients, and from so called “split brain” operations to cure severe epilepsy, we now know that brain functions are strictly localised. One major finding is that it appears that visual, holistic thinking and learning takes place in the right hemisphere, and logical and linguistic functions are located in the left hemisphere. The left hemisphere is specialised for language functions, but these specialisations are a consequence of the left hemisphere’s superior analytic skills, of which langauge is one manifestation. Similarly, the right hemisphere’s superior visuo-spatial performance is derived from its synthetic, holistic manner of dealing with information. (Levy and Sperry 1968) Bogen (1977) proposed that there were implications for the education process from the understanding of the differentiated functions of the brain. He commented on the one hand that It is now quite clear that one or the other hemisphere will tend to dominate depending on the nature of the task. (Bogen 1977) He also saw that there is potential for asymmetry and that this could lead to different outcomes for different people, but that external factors may also have an impact on how people respond to such asymmetries. It is likely that some anatomical asymmetry underlies the potential for hemisphere specialisation; but it is also clear that the extent to which capacities are developed is dependent upon environmental exposure. (Bogen 1977) It was Bogen who coined the now widely accepted term “hemisphericity” to describe an individual’s greater reliance on one cognitive style of processing over another. It is not surprising that because the knowledge of the hemispherical nature of the brain came from split brain research and from the research with brain damaged patients, the understanding focussed on what the regions of the brain could process independently. It was the revisiting of the brain function research by some neuropsychologists in the 1990s that has been of crucial importance to education, for the new viewpoint in this area has been an integrational one. Ornstein (1997) and Beeman and Chiarello (1998), for example, have reexamined the split-brain research for evidence that the two hemispheres are working in cooperation and that each is dependent on the other for a complete understanding of the world. Thus Ornstein (1997), drawing on both his own work with the richness of contextual language and with jokes and metaphor, and also that of Winner, McCarthy and Gardner (1980) on metaphor, finds that while the left hemisphere is indeed the primary source of language, without the input of the right hemisphere there can be no understanding of the complexities and nuances of speech or written text (Ornstein 1997). Beeman and Chiarello (1998), drawing on their own research with language functions of the brain as well as bringing together the recent research of many others, support this view. The entire palette of language includes metaphor, connotation and inference, and these may place special demands on the right hemisphere’s mode of language comprehension (Beeman and Chiarello 1998). MicroWorlds and the Hemispheric Brain MicroWorlds, is one of a family of computer software applications generally known as multimedia. Designed as a true successor to the Logo environments of the 1980s, it still bears the stamp of Seymour Papert whose original idea for Logo was to give the power of the computer to children. Designed as a child-friendly piece of software, it is visually rich, has a good text editing facility, can manipulate text as well as graphics in a graphical way, and has the full Logo implementation as its scripting language. It is deliberately designed to fit into a constructivist classroom environment, or, using Papert’s construct of constructivism, “constructionist.” One may surmise that a piece of software that fits a description of being both verbally and visually rich, as well as providing the platform for logical-mathematical investigation by linking in the Logo language, can offer messages to both halves of the brain. Can it be used to help children who tend to access one side of the brain to the detriment of the other side? Can MicroWorlds or other multi-media applications be the stage upon which hemispheric integration can be performed? An Example of MicroWorlds in a Classroom A class entered Year 5 and met the author who was to be their teacher for the next school year. They brought with them the usual baggage from Grade 4, including learning difficulties, spelling deficits and mathematical low self esteem as well as behavioural problems and some huge talents. One particular group very quickly stood out. These children built, they drew, they played with pencil cases. Later in the year they proved to be very adept at three dimensional planning, at creating visual displays, some at drawing or cartooning (but not all). And they all resisted verbal expression of every sort. In written work their outputs were minimal and of low linguistic complexity. In oral work it was very difficult to persuade them to verbalise at all, and prepared talks of any kind were a trauma. All had a spelling deficit. They all (there were 5 of them out of a class of 26) either were currently, or had recently been, receiving special help of a remedial nature. Their mathematics was variable. The visual-spatial work was competent, but anything that contained words, involved reading or listening to an instruction was too hard. Most (but not all) had severe weaknesses in rotelearned elements like tables and other number bonds. There were children with mathematical talent in this group, but they were in severe danger of sinking under a low self-esteem due to the dominance of words. Anyone who has been a primary teacher should at some time try to analyse the amount of verbiage used to teach maths. The torrent of words we think we need is astonishing. Some children drown in the wash. We are a very verbal profession and we expect our students to be verbal too. The other fact to know about this class is that it was a “notebook computer class.” Every child had access to a leased notebook computer, with very basic open-ended software. The core of this software was MicroWorlds. What happened next astonished the teacher. After a term of struggling to meet the needs of these children, with their acute visual senses but equally acute language deficits, the