#89: Jim Lang — Author of “Small Teaching: Everyday Lessons from the Science of Learning,” Speaker, and Workshop Leader for Teachers and Writers

Want to learn about cognitive psychology that affects teachers and students?

Then this is the episode for you.

Jim Lang has delivered conference keynotes and conducted workshops at more than a hundred colleges, universities, and high schools in the United States and abroad. The Jim Lang Foundation, which he formed and leads with his wife, provides grants to non-profit organizations dedicated to alleviating poverty; supporting and funding the arts, libraries, and public education. He has written six books in total. His latest is, “Distracted: Why Students Can’t Focus and What You Can Do About It” (Basic Books, 2020).

Lang first became interested in the science of learning at Northwestern’s Searle Center for Advancing Learning and Technology. There, while promoting better teaching techniques for university faculty, he discovered a growing body of research about how the brain worked, how human beings learned, and how best to translate those discoveries into teaching recommendations.

His book, “Small Teaching: Everyday Lessons from the Science of Learning,” emerged from that work, and since its publication in 2016, its message – premised on the idea that teachers, by implementing small, manageable techniques, could revolutionize the way students learn– has been embraced by higher and secondary education faculty around the world.

As Jim says, it’s not “a charisma contest.” Great teachers aren’t always the most confident people in the room, but they are the ones thinking the most about the learner – whether that’s their student, or their employee– and that’s what makes the difference.

Now, with that… Let’s bring it in!