What does a teenage brain need in order to learn?
In order to make any progress, a child’s brain has a list of priorities. At the survival rate, kids are not learning anything. For a kid walking through South Central Los Angeles to get to Locke High School, for instance, just getting there is a real concern. In the big herding high schools where they have 2,500 or 3,000 students, many of their emotional needs are not being met. And the brain, in order for learning and thinking to occur, must fulfill those two categories first: You’ve got to survive, and you’ve got to have your emotional needs met. And good teachers have always known this. When you walk into a good classroom, you see a comfortable, pleasant place, a place where people are welcome.
