Don't start with the details. Start with the key ideas, and in a hierarchical fashion, form the details around these larger notions.

Change often involves loss, so change can be a risky experience.

Every brain is wired differently from every other brain, and learns in ways unique to that wiring.

Most brain scientists have not taught 4th grade, and don't know very much about the classroom, even though they might study learning in some detail. Most education professionals, who often know a tremendous amount about the classroom, don't know much about the brain. That is one of the reasons why I am so skeptical about applying brain findings to the classroom.

If you wanted to create an education environment that was directly opposed to what the brain was good at doing, you would probably design something like a classroom.

We are human because we can fantasize.

Our ability to adapt came from our East African birthplace, a meteorologically unstable place. If you couldn't adapt, you'd be dead. But once you've found a solution, there is no need to continue the adaptive behavioral parrying, which is bioenergetically very expensive to maintain. We are built to find answers, then hang on to them as long as we can.