Intersection of EdTech and Brain Science

How does our understanding of the brain influence the technology we design for our classrooms? We have 4 exciting talks and a chance to network with leading practitioners in this this field. We will follow the talks with an fun and inventive team game of Neuro-Jeopardy!

Dr. Sarah Lytle is the Director of Outreach and Education at the Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences at UW. Sarah will present - Screens are everywhere! Learn what, when, and how infants and toddlers are learning from screens and how to support children’s media activities. She will also discuss important cognitive advances that impact children’s ability to learn from screens and the impact of adult technology use around children.

Dr. Kaitlyn Casimo will be presenting on teaching neuroscience with big data: conducting virtual experiments with the Allen Brain Atlas. She works on training programs for scientists to learn how to use the Allen Institute’s open scientific resources in their research. She also helped launch the Allen Institute’s offerings for educators, including lesson plans and other materials to help high school and college teachers conduct digital experiments in their classrooms using research-grade data.

Kristen Bergsman will help us understand how the Center for Neurotechnology has incorporated various educational technologies into K-12 education programs, and how SpikerBoxes, SnapCircuits, EMG Robotic Gripper Claws, Arduino Uno microcontrollers and other technologies actively engage students in learning about neuroscience, neural engineering, and engineering design.

Eric Chudler will talk on the Promises and Perils of Neurotechnology. Neurological disorders affect approximately 1 billion people worldwide. There is a clear need for technologies to assist people with neurological problems and tremendous progress has been made by researchers to build systems and devices that interact with the nervous system to assist these people. Although scientists and engineers “can” develop these new neurotechnologies, many ethical concerns and questions about how researchers “should” proceed are raised. These questions revolve around issues related to Privacy/security, Normality, Authority/control, Identity, Responsibility and Justice.

And some more about our speakers:
Dr. Sarah Lytle’s team at the UW i-Labs communicates the latest science of child development to those who can act on it. Under her leadership, the Outreach and Education team launched an online library of free training modules designed to make science accessible to a broad audience. Dr. Lytle has a B.A. in Psychology and Spanish from the University of Notre Dame and a Ph.D. in Developmental Psychology at Temple University.

Dr. Kaitlyn Casimo is the Training and Outreach Specialist at the Allen Institute. She has a BA in Neuroscience from Pomona College, where she also studied theater, and a PhD in Neuroscience from the University of Washington.

Kristen Bergsman,is the Engineering Education Research Manager at the Center for Neurotechnology, where she supports K-12 education programs, including the Research Experience for Teachers program. She is also the owner of Laughing Crow Curriculum, that has been designing STEM curriculum materials since 2001. Kristen is a doctoral candidate in the Learning Sciences & Human Development Program at UW. Her research focuses on collaborative approaches to STEM curriculum design within a research-practice partnership model.

Eric Chudler, Ph.D, is a neuroscientist at the University of Washington where he is a research associate professor in the Department of Bioengineering. He is also the executive director and education director at the Center for Neurotechnology. In addition to his work investigating the neuroactive and potential neuroregenerative properties of plants, he is involved with neuroscience education and outreach.