The World of Working Memory: Part 1 with Andra Smith

Series Introduction

Working memory (WM) is part of our brain’s management system that describes our capacity to keep information actively in mind while we carry out processing tasks like organizing things, making plans, or tracking with our friend’s conversation. Mason students use their WM when they narrate, read, do dictation, carry out various written tasks, do mental math or take end-of-term exams. If we liken WM to our brain’s workbench where we temporarily store and manipulate mental information, we know some people have larger mental workspaces (more robust WM) while others have smaller cognitive space, more limited WM (LWM). LWM shows up in difficulties with forgetfulness and problems with self-management in home, work, and school life. With no WM science available in Mason’s day, it is not surprising to find some of her methods assume a medium- to high-capacity WM.

So how do we support Mason students with LWM? To answer this, we must look beyond Mason’s volumes and the Parents’ Review to see what research in the cognitive and neurosciences can offer us and then import some of these insights into Mason’s model. Some of these suggested strategies diverge with some of Mason’s recommendations. For Mason educators to navigate this conflict and confidently know when and how to apply some of these strategies, a robust conceptualization of WM is needed with which they can evaluate WM demands of their students’ tasks. Building this foundation will be addressed throughout this three-part WM series beginning with understanding WM and its relationship to self-control in everyday settings and then broadening to academic settings of how LWM specifically impacts narration and reading comprehension. Strategies and practical tips to help persons with LWM of various ages will be given throughout. This series, first recorded for the CMI 2022 conference, assumes a basic knowledge of Mason’s educational paradigm as addressed in these YouTube videos. ‍‍

Part 1 : The World of Working Memory Questions and topics addressed in first session:

• What is working memory (WM), its role in our memory and executive systems, and how do we use it in everyday life?
• What does limited WM capacity (LWM) look like and what conditions commonly impact WM?
• Since WM changes as kids grow, what does it look like functionally across a child’s development?
• As Mason wanted childhood to be “a growing time which should make a self-dependent, self-ordered person,” how do we use WM for increasing self-control?
• What are some general strategies and practical tips to support those with LWM?
• How do habits relate to WM?

Bio: Andra Smith

In previous decades Andy taught English to international adults, and also trained those with vision problems to get around their communities. Her work took her into all kinds of classrooms from preschool to college where she saw so many students disengaged, bored with worksheets, and cramming for tests–so many “born persons” hungering for the life-giving paradigm that Charlotte Mason offers. During her children’s younger years, Andy tried to homeschool her two children with CM methods but, to her overwhelming disappointment, found that “air traffic controlling” all those layers was beyond her personal limits. At the time, she did not understand her attention deficits and how they can be mistakenly attributed to moral failure. In the 1990s, Andy was diagnosed with ADD but it was not until recent years when she immersed herself in the research of how ADHD is a disorder of diminished executive functioning that she was able to make sense of much of her life and gain new freedom. She is currently burrowing into Mason’s theory of attention as it relates to current research and feels like she is birthing a dissertation! Her great joy in her 60s now is helping others understand this complex disorder, how to detoxify its shame, and how to find freedom by using compensatory strategies to overcome challenges. Introduced to a relationship with Christ in college, Andy is grateful to God for the tremendous stability and blessing that walking with Christ has brought to life and now is so grateful for executive functioning understanding that allows her to more faithfully steward the neurochemistry she has been given.