Neuroscience & Learning English 🧠 11 Surprising Facts [1002]

Luke's ENGLISH Podcast - Learn British English with Luke Thompson

In this episode, Luke Thompson explores how neuroscience can transform English language learning by examining how the brain processes lingui

Key takeaways

• Dr. Gianfranco Conti's research highlights that language is not localized in one center but involves a widespread network including motor and auditory regions.
• Vocabulary is stored in declarative memory (facts), while grammar relies on procedural memory (skills/habits).

Main topics

• Neuroscience and Language
• Procedural vs. Declarative Memory

Notable quotes

English is about what you can do, not just about what you know.

Conclusion

Listeners gain a scientifically-backed framework for moving language f

Transcript preview

Speaker 2 (0:00) Thank you for choosing Luke's English Podcast. For more episodes with specific vocabulary and pronunciation teaching, plus ad-free listening, access to the Premium community, and to show your support for the podcast, sign up to LEP Premium at teachaluke.co.uk slash premium. You're listening to Luke's English Podcast. For more information, visit teachaluke.co.uk. Speaker 2 (0:35) Hello listeners, welcome back to Luke's English Podcast. This episode is all about neuroscience, that's the study of the brain and the nervous system, and what findings from neuroscience can tell us about the best ways to learn English. The episode title is this, what can neuroscience tell us about how your brain processes English? 11 surprising and revealing facts. There's a PDF for this episode. which you can download directly from the episode show notes. So this is all about what neuroscience can tell us about what is happening in your brain when you're using a language and what this means in terms of how you should learn English effectively. Take a moment now to consider your brain and what's going on in there, if indeed there is anything going on in there. Hopefully there is. Use your brain. to think about your brain. More specifically, use your brain now to just think about what's happening inside your brain when you use your brain to speak English. Think about all of those synapses flashing, those neural networks fizzing, if indeed synapses do flash and neural networks fizz. Think about those connections and nodes and all those little grey cells buzzing and doing whatever they do in various parts of your brain, inside your skull, in your head, even right now as you listen to this in English. How exciting. What if we knew what was really going on in there? Where is all the English being processed? Is it all happening in one single... language center somewhere, or does the brain use different areas for different tasks? How does the brain deal with remembering grammar and vocabulary, formulating English when you speak, decoding what you're reading and listening to? I've found a very interesting article which I'm going to go through and I'll explain it as I go and then I'll summarise all the main conclusions in the article and I'll make absolutely sure that the information is delivered to you and your brain very clearly so that you can go away and make any necessary changes to the way that you use your brain to learn English, like maybe just taking your brain out, giving it a wipe. blowing on it, running it under the cold tap for a while, turning it off and turning it on again, maybe whacking it against the wall a couple of times before popping it back into your head and just carrying on, but much more successfully and effectively than before. So the article in question is called 11 Surprising Facts About How the Brain Processes Language That Every Teacher Should Know or Learner. in this case, and it was written by Gianfranco Conti, PhD, and published on his website. Now, I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, Luke, this is great, but who is this Gianfranco Conti, and why should we believe anything he says or writes? Well, here is this from his website. Dr. Conti has nearly 30 years of experience teaching French, English, German, Italian, and Spanish. across various levels, including primary, secondary, further education and university. He's also served as head of languages in secondary schools in Britain and abroad. He is currently a visiting fellow at the University of Reading, and I hope he's enjoying his visit. Speaker 2 (4:11) No, visiting fellow just means that he's been invited by the university to be a professor at the university for a sort of period of time. It doesn't mean that he's just visiting the university. Like, here's the library, here's the cafeteria. Very nice. No, he's actually working there as a professor at the moment. Yes, Dr. Conti holds the following academic credentials. He has a PhD in applied linguistics. Not just linguistics. but applied linguistics. He's applying those linguistics to stuff. He's got a master's degree in TEFL. That's teaching English as a foreign language. He's got another master's degree, just in case one wasn't enough. He's got two. The other one is in English literature. He's got a PGCE, which is the qualification that you need in the UK to be able to teach in schools. Speaker 2 (5:04) He has a PGCE in modern languages and PE, that's physical education. So we can see that Gianfranco Conti is widely respected and influential in the language teaching community, especially among classroom practitioners. And on the PDF, you'll see a photograph of him. He's the one on the left, by the way, in the photo. For some reason, he's got his arm around the shoulder of a chef who is... holding a big platter of cheese and ham. I don't know if that makes any difference to the language learning process. Maybe Gianfranco, why do I keep mispronouncing his name? I can't pronounce anyone's names, can I, on this podcast. Maybe Gianfranco used his language skills effectively to make this chef give him loads of cheese and ham. I don't know. Anyway, but I think that we can see that Gianfranco's words and wisdom on this topic are certainly valuable and definitely worth paying attention to. Also, the article has references to about 20 academic sources to back up everything he says. So it's solid stuff. But listeners, if you have anything to add as you listen to this, any differences of opinion, differences of opinion, things that you disagree with or whatever, of course, you can express them in the comment section. I mean, you'll be wrong. Speaker 2 (6:30) I'm just kidding. Genuinely, if you've got other things to add, jump into the comments. So, the article. Let me read through this and stop sometimes to give my thoughts and explanations. I'll draw specific conclusions about learning English from this in a moment and I'll give you some specific practical advice based on all of this science. As you read, think about what these facts about the brain mean in terms of how you learn English. So here's the article, which is on Gianfranco's website. Let's have a look. I'm not going to read absolutely all of it. I'm going to read just some selected bits. Okay, so let's go to his website, which is, by the way, Gianfrancoconti.com. You'll find a link for this particular article. 11 surprising facts about how the brain processes language that every teacher should know. So the introduction. In recent years, neuroscience... has begun to reshape how we think about language learning, not just in theory, but in practical terms that can transform classroom teaching. Speaker 2 (7:37) OK, so this is not just theoretical science, but stuff that we can actually apply to the way that we teach and indeed learn English in this case. We now know far more about how the brain perceives, stores and retrieves language than ever before. And yet many of these discoveries haven't filtered down to everyday classroom practice. This article explores 11 of the most surprising and educationally relevant facts about how the brain processes language with a particular eye toward their implications for second language instruction. These are findings that challenge long-held assumptions and offer new research-informed pathways for making language learning more efficient, engaging and brain-friendly. Yet many of these discoveries remain under the radar. for most language teachers. I could go into that and just pick out some bits of language. I think you understand the general idea. I can't necessarily stop and explain every little phrase. I mean, under the radar is quite a nice one, though. These discoveries remain under the radar for most language teachers. If something is under the radar, it just means that people are not aware that it's there. You know, radar is that thing that's used to track I guess, planes in the sky. And if something is under the radar, it means it can't be seen. So like when planes fly really close to the surface, it means they're under the radar and people can't see them. So if, in this case, scientific discoveries about how the brain works, if these things are under the radar for most language teachers, that means language teachers just aren't aware of how these scientific findings can actually tell us the truth about how we should be teaching and learning a language. So this is stuff that I guess the point here is these things are proven to be true and yet they haven't found their way into the classroom yet. And apparently we are still teaching and probably learning languages in perhaps the wrong way. So let's get into the details. And there's a... There's a diagram in this article which shows the main regions involved in language processing. There's a G that's missing. Should be a G. Anyway, and this is a complicated diagram showing the brain and the different regions. Now, I'm not a neuroscientist. Speaker 2 (10:15) Not really a linguist. I'm an English teacher. I know some stuff about language, of course. But when you look at the diagram of the brain, the point is that there are many, many different regions in the brain. And these regions are responsible for doing different things. There is a table actually later in this article which shows us in more detail what those regions are actually responsible for in terms of processing language. Let's continue the article. What does neuroscience really tell us about how the brain handles language? Much of what we once believed about language learning has been upended by findings in neuroimaging and psycholinguistics. Neuroimaging, this is when basically we are able to see parts of the brain which are working while they're working. So I suppose in laboratory tests, people are given different tasks to do, I'm assuming. and then their brains are observed, and we can actually see which parts of the brains are active during different tasks. I suppose this is what neuroimaging means, you know, taking pictures or looking at the brain while it's doing different things. So much of what we once believed about language has been upended. If something's been upended, it means it's been kind of flipped over. A bit like maybe if a car crashes on the motorway. And there's a really bad crash and the car actually flips upside down. Obviously, that car is no longer able to drive. It's been completely flipped on its head. So if something has been upended, it just means it's been completely flipped over, kind of stopped and even kind of broken. So it can't actually work anymore. So our previous assumptions about language learning have been changed. Speaker 2 (12:06) kind of broken by these scientific findings. For example, the idea that grammar needs to come before meaning, or that listening and speaking are separate skills, has little basis in how the brain actually processes language. So those are just two examples of things that we assumed before, like, for example, that grammar needs to come before meaning. So this would be like traditionally how grammar would be taught. For example, here is the present perfect tense. Here's the form of it. Have or has plus a past participle. Here is the meaning of this form. You know, that kind of thing, like teaching the grammatical form rather than allowing learners to notice present perfect being used in a meaningful context. And then. pulling it out, understanding the meaning, like, for example, looking at a paragraph or listening to someone speaking in which they're using present perfect and then understanding the meaning of what the person is saying first and then pulling out the grammatical forms that they have used to do that and then studying. So meaning coming first and grammar coming second, a traditional approach would be starting with the grammatical structure and then kind of... meaning coming second, or another assumption being that listening and speaking are separate skills, right? That listening and speaking are two distinct, different skill sets. Although, okay, I'm going to move on. I'm going to sort of try and get into the 11 points. Okay, so let's start with the first point, and that's this. Language is not stored in a single language centre. Although Broca and Wernicke's areas were once thought to be the sole language hubs, so these are different parts of the brain, Broca's and Wernicke's areas, they're named, those parts of the brain are named that. So although these areas were once thought to be the sole language hubs, sole meaning only, like only one, language hubs, a hub is... I guess, a place where lots of information all is exchanged. You can have a transport hub, like, for example, Frankfurt Airport is a transport hub because lots of different aviation routes or planes, you know, come into Frankfurt Airport before then transferring to other places. Heathrow Airport is a transport hub. Or something like Châtelet Metro Station in Paris is a... transport hub because so many different metro lines and bus stations all meet there right in in terms of the brain also you can have a let's say in this case a language hub a part of the brain that deals with different language processes so although there was one area that was thought to be the the only or sole language hub processing center Modern neuroscience reveals that language engages a widespread network of regions across the brain. These include areas responsible for motor control. That means basically controlling the way that your body moves. And I suppose mostly that means the vocal tract, you know, the mouth, the tongue, the throat, the vocal cords, but also, you know, your hands and your head and your body. controlling the way your body moves that's motor control so that's dealt with in one area auditory processing that means processing the information that comes through our ears memory retrieval that means remembering things and even visual perception that means understanding the information that's coming through our eyes all dealt with in different parts of the brain this interconnectedness supports the use of multimodal input in the classroom and challenges the long-held idea of a single language processing centre. So... I'm going to go into more detail about the conclusions of this, but essentially this kind of means that we should try to understand language processing as a complex interconnected system of us using different skills all at the same time. Multimodal input means trying to get English in a variety of different ways all at the same time, through our ears, through our eyes, through... body movements, right? Rather than just like sitting down and just looking at words on a page, we need to try and mix it up a bit more. In the article now, we have a table which shows different brain regions and the functions of those brain regions. For example, Broca's area. The function there is that it produces speech, grammar processing, and syntactic structuring. That's like the word order in sentences. Then we've got other Areas are the regions of the brain that do other different things. Wernicke's area apparently is responsible for processing language meaning and semantic comprehension. That's essentially the meaning of words. The motor cortex supports articulation and the planning of physical speech actions. The auditory cortex detects and decodes spoken language input. There's more. There are more regions that handle different things. The main point here is that... There are different regions of the brain responsible for different processes. OK, we'll get into the conclusions of that in a moment. Let's move on to the second thing. The second point. Grammar and vocabulary are processed in separate but coordinated systems. Neuroimaging shows that grammar is largely handled by procedural memory systems. For example, in the basal ganglia and frontal cortex. While vocabulary relies more on declarative memory, for example, in the temporal lobe structures, this dissociation helps explain why students may show uneven development between grammatical accuracy and lexical knowledge. This has important implications for second language instruction. OK, so the point here is, which I'm going to explore in more detail in a bit, is that essentially your brain deals with grammar and vocabulary in two separate... ways. And there are two different types of memory system involved in learning and using grammar and vocabulary. One of them is procedural memory. This is basically how you remember how to do things. And it's kind of like almost subconscious memory. For example, remembering how to ride a bike. That's handled by procedural memory. Apparently grammar is in that category. And then there's declarative memory, which is... how your vocabulary is processed, and that is a more explicit form of remembering. Like, for example, when you have to remember names and dates in history, that is through your declarative memory. I'll go into more detail about that, but that's really, really important to understand, especially the way we learn grammar. It's not like learning facts in a history book, but it's more about learning how to do something. And that is often about trying to make grammar a subconscious, intuitive thing. Okay, more on that in a bit. The third point is this. Complex grammar is processed differently from simple grammar. More complex grammatical constructions, such as embedded clauses, passives, and subject-object reversals, recruit, I guess meaning use, additional frontal and parietal regions of the brain compared to simpler syntax. That basically means... Complex grammatical constructions involve more parts of the brain and more complex brain processes. Not necessarily a surprise. But as the article continues, this suggests that more demanding structures impose greater cognitive load. Basically, more complex English is just harder for your brain to deal with. Again, not a surprise. But this requires more time and practice to proceduralise. to make it just a natural, habitual instinct. The complexity of the input directly influences which neural systems are taxed, meaning challenged, during language comprehension. This is key when considering inclusivity and differentiation. Okay, I'll go into that in more detail in a moment, as I keep saying. We're going to break all this down. The fourth point, and consider how this can affect the way you consider learning English. Fourth point is this. Listening and speaking activate overlapping neural circuits. If something overlaps, it means they sort of, they're connected. Overlap means that they occupy more or less the same space, one on top of the other. So they're not separate, but they're kind of partially connected. Speaker 2 (21:30) They have overlapping neural circuits, right? Research shows that hearing language activates many of the same regions as speaking it. This is key as it helps explain why frequent listening can strengthen oral fluency and makes it imperative, meaning extremely important, at lower levels of proficiency especially, to provide lots of aural input. prior to staging speaking activities. Right, so basically your brain uses, to a large extent, the same parts when listening and when speaking. And so we mustn't underestimate the importance of activating listening in order to help with speaking. The fifth point is this, formulaic chunks are processed more efficiently. A chunk is like a sort of a piece of something. Okay. Yeah. Like for example, not just an individual word, but a phrase could be considered a chunk. So not just depend. But it depends on is a chunk. Those words all kind of go together. That's a chunk. So actually, the brain processes little groups of words or chunks of vocabulary more efficiently. Speaker 2 (22:58) The brain stores frequently used expressions as single units, reducing the processing load and speeding up retrieval. So the brain basically lumps together groups of words because it's just quicker and easier. This makes chunking, meaning grouping words together, learning words in little phrases, not just helpful, but neurologically efficient. So it takes less time and energy. If you deal with words in little groups, this is crucial when considering how to promote oral fluency. OK, right. Moving on to the sixth point. Bilinguals, obviously, that's people who speak several languages, use both languages even when speaking one. The bilingual brain constantly activates both linguistic systems, requiring inhibition of the irrelevant one. This cross-activation explains why interference happens and why it's normal, not a failure. This also speaks to the importance of staging priming tasks prior to productive retrieval aimed at mitigating L2 interference. There's academic language there. But essentially, when you are bilingual, and I consider you to be bilingual if you speak English, even if you don't speak