We're Born to Learn: Using the Brain's Natural Learning Process to Create Today's Curriculum

"This is an important and useful book―readable, practical, and inspiring advice for the practicing teacher. This is a great translation of theory into practice, and Rita′s stories of her own work are especially compelling."
Jean MacGregor, National Learning Communities Project
The Evergreen State College, Olympia, WA

"This author not only summarizes the theories and research regarding how the brain functions in the process of learning―natural learning―she also shows how she has continued to apply it in her own teaching and learning."
Robert Pinney, Director
Extension Teacher Education Programs, Western Washington University

Make it possible for all students to realize their potential as natural learners!

We all have an innate, natural ability and motivation to learn. We are natural pattern-seekers, thinkers, and learners from birth―and the brain uses the same innate processes throughout life. This exciting new resource provides parents and educators of students of all ages with important information about how the brain learns.

In We′re Born to Learn, Smilkstein reframes traditional education, transforming the student who "can′t" into the student who is simply not experiencing his or her birthright as a naturally motivated learner. This book provides research-based, concrete strategies for creating a student-centered curriculum in which every student can learn!

Smilkstein has broken down the Natural Human Learning Process (NHLP) into six stages from foundational knowledge through higher-level thinking. She then provides guidelines and models showing educators how to create learning experiences at each stage of the process for individuals, small groups, and whole classes so all students can experience the joy and satisfaction of success.

We′re Born to Learn includes:

• Detailed field/classroom and neuroscience research combined into principles for developing brain-compatible, natural-learning curricula for any classroom
• Simple charts detailing the six-stage Natural Human Learning Process
• Practical methods for developing curricula and selecting pedagogical strategies that are most effective in helping students utilize their innate learning processes
• Guidelines and models for how this theory can be applied to the development of classroom-proven lesson plans and curricula

This extraordinary book provides the missing link between brain research and the classroom-the author′s unique research with almost 7,000 students and educators, revealing how people experience their own natural learning. It shows teachers how to create and deliver curriculum that helps all students become the motivated, successful natural learners they were born to be!

Dr. Smilkstein speaks nationally and internationally on brain-compatible education. She has taught in middle school through graduate school including 28 years at North Seattle Community College. Currently Professor Emerita North Seattle Community College and invited faculty in Educational Psychology at Western Washington University′s Woodring College of Education, Everett Campus. Publications include articles and books on brain-based curriculum and pedagogy. Author of We’re Born to Learn: Using the Brain’s Natural Learning Process to Create Curriculum (Corwin Press, 2003), which won the Delta Kappa Gamma International Society’s Educator’s Award of the Year, 2004; the second edition will be published in 2011. She is a co-author of Igniting Student Potential Using the Natural Human Learning Process (Corwin Press, 2007). M.A. (English, Michigan State University), Ph.D. (Educational Psychology, University of Washington). She has received many teaching awards, including the National Institute for Staff and Organizational Development’s Excellence Award, 1991, 1995; the College Reading and Learning Association’s highest honor, the Robert Griffin Award, 2005; Induction as a Fellow of the American Council of Developmental Education Associations, 2006, the highest honor in the field of Developmental Education.