Engage in intensive training on the topics of attention, retention, and learning that have applications in classrooms.

Cost: $1,695 per person through May 23, 2025 and $1,795 per person after May 23, 2025
Save $100 per person when registering a group of 3 or more.

Join Us This Summer in Boston for a Hands-on Workshop

From July 14 - 18, 2025, Learning & the Brain is offering a Summer Institute on the campus of Boston University.
 

How can we design lessons that truly captivate students, sustain their focus, and build lasting knowledge? Join us for a dynamic, hands-on institute where you'll explore the latest brain research and transform the way you teach.

Over the course of a week, we’ll study and build three essential pillars of learning: schema theory, attention, and memory.

• Schema Theory: Discover why schema formation is the hidden key to deep understanding: it explains how to structure lessons that help students organize and retain new knowledge.
• Attention: Rethink traditional views of focus by exploring a scientific understanding of attention. The building blocks: alertness, orienting, and executive attention.
• Memory: Learn how working memory serves as the brain’s construction zone and how to optimize long-term memory through powerful encoding and retrieval techniques.

This institute balances cutting-edge research with practical classroom applications—ensuring you leave with strategies you can implement immediately. With a highly interactive format and a limited cohort of 50 participants, you'll engage in discussions, activities, and collaborative problem-solving with fellow educators.

Join us this summer and reimagine how learning happens! This institute is hands-on and is limited to 50 participants.

The Summer Institute Is for:

• K-16 Teachers and Academic Administrators
• School Psychologists, Learning Specialists, and Counselors
• Academic Support Staff
• Independent Learning Consultants

At This Institute, You Will:

• Understand and apply the core concept of “schema formation” at the heart of learning
• Develop insights and strategies to anticipate, identify, and mitigate working memory overload
• Nurture long-term memory formation—that is, learning—with research on encoding, retrieval, and consolidation
• Explore the science of attention to focus on alertness, orienting, and executive attention
• Apply these concepts to your own professional work
• Understand psychology and neuroscience research articles, with a particular focus on developing effective and informed skepticism
   

About the Institute

This Learning & the Brain Summer Institute will be led by Andrew Watson. The program translates well-established psychology and neuroscience findings into specific classroom strategies. We will especially emphasize the practical teaching application of brain research, with a consistent focus on healthy skepticism. The program offers participants frequent opportunities to discuss their own teaching practices, and to apply research findings to their lesson-plans, syllabi, assessments, and classroom practices. Active participation is expected throughout this Institute through group discussion. Participants will be expected to bring in material and questions from their own experiences to share with the group, and to share brief presentations on the final day of the institute.

Attendees will be housed and all sessions will take place at 10 Buick Street, Boston University. Lodging, some meals, and course materials are provided. See the online schedule for meals provided.

About Andrew Watson

Andrew C. Watson, MA, EdM, began teaching in 1988, studying psychology and neuroscience in 2008, and combining those interests in 2012. He currently works as a consultant—explaining the classroom implications of brain science to teachers, students, administrators, and parents. Since 2016, Andrew has written and edited the Learning & the Brain blog. He has also written 3 books: The Goldilocks Map, Learning Begins, and Learning Grows.