Aims of the course:
- Improve understanding of what the neuroscience and psychology of learning and memory can (and can’t) tell us.
- Raise awareness of how the brain changes throughout life and how this affects our behaviour.
- Help develop strategies that can be used at home to improve learning & memory.
Learning outcomes:
As a result of the course, within the constraints of the time available, students should be able to:
- Know what happens in the brain when we learn.
- Recall what psychological studies have taught us about learning & memory, and their limits.
- Understand how the brain changes as we grow and age.
- Use this understanding to improve the efficiency of their learning & memory.
Target audience:
- Anyone with an interest in the brain, learning and memory. Teachers, parents, those with elderly relatives.
Course content overview:
Research in Psychology and Neuroscience progresses rapidly; we discover more about how we learn and how our memories work. This online course will provide a guided tour through the brain, looking at the changes that occur on a cellular level when we learn new information or store a memory. We will examine the way the brain changes from child to teenager to adult, and how these affect the way we learn and remember information. By understanding more about the way memories are stored and recalled, we can explore different ways to help improve this process, at any stage of our lives.
The study of how learning happens in the brain is a popular emerging field, but it is filled with misinformation. The course will tackle common misconceptions and look at ways in which we can use our understanding of the brain, as well as the tricks psychological research has uncovered, to help everyone learn more quickly and efficiently. We will finish with a practical session covering memory tricks and exercises anyone can use to learn and remember information more effectively.
Schedule (this course is completed entirely online):
Orientation Week: 7-13 July 2025
Purpose/Learning outcomes: By studying this week the students should have:
- Become familiar with navigating around the VLE and from VLE to links and back
- Tested their ability to access files and the web conferencing software and sorted out any problems with the help of the eLearning Helpdesk
- Learnt how to look for, assess and reference internet resources
- Used forums to introduce themselves to other students
- Contributed to a discussion forum to introduce themselves to other students and discuss why they are interested in the course, what they hope to get out their studies and also to respond to News item sent out on behalf of tutor
Teaching Weeks: 14 July-17 August 2025
Week 1 Learning in the brain
Purpose: To introduce students to the neuroscience of learning and memory, and our limitations in its understanding. We will cover the reconstructive nature of memories, false memories, and their implications. By studying this week the students should have:
- Understood what neurons and synapses are, and their role in memory formation.
- Know the main brain regions implicated in memory and learning.
- Learnt that memory is fallible and changeable, and thought about what this means for e.g. eyewitness testimony.
Week 2 Types of memory
Purpose: To discuss the distinctions that can be made between different types of memory, and their usefulness. By studying this week the students should have:
- Understood the difference between short term and long term memories.
- Explored different types of long term memory, including explicit and implicit, and the brain regions involved.
- Looked at how recall and recognition memory differ.
Week 3 Brain changes through the ages
Purpose: To cover the way the brain changes as we progress from babies to children, teens, and adults and as we age. We will explore how these changes impact our ability to learn at each stage in our life. By studying this week the students should have:
- Understood how the infant’s brain is primed for learning, and how different abilities mature at different times. Examined the evidence for critical periods in human learning.
- Looked at the teenage brain, and its implications for teen behaviour.
- Gained knowledge about healthy aging, and the brain and behaviour changes associated with it.
Week 4 Memory problems
Purpose: To cover a variety of conditions that can affect memory, including traumatic brain injury, stroke and dementia. We will look at the portrayal of amnesia in the media and its accuracy and discuss what happens in the brain to cause these symptoms. By studying this week the students should have:
- Understood that damage to different areas of the brain can cause different types of memory problem.
- Looked at psychological causes of amnesia and the controversies surrounding them.
- Covered childhood amnesia, and our limits in explaining it.
- Become aware of the limits in our understanding of dementia, and the direction future research is likely to take.
Week 5 Brain Boosts
Purpose: To provide practical, science-based tips and tricks that students can use in their daily lives to help improve their memory and learning. By studying this week the students should have:
- Understood that psychology, not neuroscience, currently provides us with the most practical guidance.
- Tried a variety of memory boosts to determine which work best for them, and thought about how they could apply them in their lives.
- Analysed how the information they have learnt in the course can help make them better learners.
Feedback Week: 18-24 August 2025
Purpose:
• Assessment of student learning
• Assessment of student satisfaction
• Encouragement of further study
Each week of an online course is roughly equivalent to 2-3 hours of classroom time. On top of this, participants should expect to spend roughly 2-3 hours reading material, etc., although this will vary from person to person.
While they have a specific start and end date and will follow a weekly schedule (for example, week 1 will cover topic A, week 2 will cover topic B), our tutor-led online courses are designed to be flexible and as such would normally not require participants to be online for a specific day of the week or time of the day (although some tutors may try to schedule times where participants can be online together for web seminars, which will be recorded so that those who are unable to be online at certain times are able to access material).
Unless otherwise stated, all course material will be posted on the Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) so that they can be accessed at any time throughout the duration of the course and interaction with your tutor and fellow participants will take place through a variety of different ways which will allow for both synchronous and asynchronous learning (discussion boards,etc).
Certificate of Participation
A Certificate of Participation will be awarded to participants who contribute constructively to weekly discussions and exercises/assignments for the duration of the course.
What our students say:
"I’ve really enjoyed the course. Ginny, you have made quite complex topics really clear and easy to understand. The quality of your weekly presentations have been excellent and I’ve benefited from being able to work at my own pace. Additionally, the reading lists have been helpful in expanding my understanding of topics."
"Thank you for this great course Ginny. I enjoyed it all... It was good to be able to try live experiments on ourselves too!"
"Ginny responded so well to our forum answers and questions and even supplied further material on it. Ginny made the course really interesting and understandable."
"The course was well structured, thorough and well-presented and the tutor engaged in conversations, sharing her opinions and insights."
