Supporting Student Minds: Clarity, Fatigue, and Outcomes - #IMW27008

Graduate-Level Credit / Non-Credit Hours
3 Semester Credits or 45 Clock Hours

Early enrollment is now open for the new self-paced course:
Supporting Student Minds: Clarity, Fatigue, and Outcomes

• The course will be available in January 2027.
• You’ll receive an email notification as soon as it’s ready.

Course Description

This course examines the factors contributing to student overwhelm during lessons, particularly when excessive information is presented simultaneously. Participants will investigate the reasons for student disengagement and analyze the three types of cognitive load: intrinsic, extraneous, and germane. The course will provide strategies to mitigate memory overload and effectively manage cognitive load within classroom settings. The course will also address digital fatigue and its neurological effects, emphasizing how prolonged screen exposure can alter the neural mechanisms involved in attention, memory, and emotional regulation. These changes impact students' capacity for sustained engagement and effective learning. Participants will gain an understanding of brain function and learn evidence-based strategies they can implement to enhance memory and support information retrieval.

Educational research in this course is grounded in the work of Dr. John Sweller, an educational psychologist who developed cognitive load theory, which explains how learning suffers when working memory is overloaded. Dr. Dylan Wiliam, an education researcher known for his work on formative assessment and assessment for learning, contributes to the course through his emphasis on using what we know about working memory to make classroom instruction more effective. Dr. Michael Rich, a pediatrician whose work focuses on how the "interactive media environment" affects children's physical and neurological development, is also explored. Dr. Daniel T. Willingham, a cognitive scientist and author of Outsmart Your Brain, offers research-based insight into how attention and memory work and how students can study and learn more effectively. Together, this research informs the course's examination of student overwhelm, digital fatigue, and classroom outcomes.

Participants will synthesize these paradigms and develop a deeper understanding of an educator’s role in the classroom, along with the latest tools, methods, and techniques for cultivating students’ learning and a state-of-the-art teaching approach to meet their educational goals.

Global Outcomes/Goals of the Course

To deepen and/or apply the content and skills of the teacher’s existing professional knowledge base by meeting the following global goals of the course:

1. Evaluate course-related research, literature, content, and strategies and formulate connections and applications to teacher practice.
2. Develop learning experiences that foster an engaged student learning environment by analyzing current brain-based instructional practices.
3. Develop an effective learning environment that incorporates brain-based learning frameworks for students with special needs.
4. Explore research-proven frameworks and lesson planning that foster higher rates of retention from classroom experiences.
5. Collaborate and lead other educational professionals to improve student learning using brain-based teaching models.

• Interactive