EPPP Step 2: Graham Taylor Answers Your Questions on Facebook Live Next Thursday

Next Thursday, June 8, at 12:00 PST, Dr. Graham Taylor will be on Facebook Live to answer your questions about EPPP Step 2.

The free event will be hosted on the TSM Facebook Page and can be accessed by anyone with an internet connection.

EPPP Step 2 is a new competency-based exam that is being developed by ASPPB to complement the existing EPPP. The test will become part of the licensure process starting January 2019.  In next Thursday’s event, Graham Taylor will be fielding questions such as the following:

  • Why is EPPP Step 2 being introduced?
  • How much will EPPP Step 2 cost?
  • Will candidates be required to take both exams?
  • How will EPPP Step 2 be administered and what will its format be?
  • How does EPPP Step 2 relate to the original EPPP?
  • What areas EPPP Step 2 intended to assess?

Everyone is invited to watch next Thursday’s event and to ask Dr. Taylor questions in real time.

 

Full Links to Graham Taylor’s Conversation with Robin Phillips on Brain Fitness

Interview with GrahamBelow are the full links to Graham Taylor’s interview with Robin Phillips about brain fitness.

In this conversation, Phillips suggested that the notion of “being smart” often invokes a one-sided paradigm of mental ability that may not be consistent with overall cognitive health. He explained how a proper understanding of brain fitness should also include such things as a well-developed imagination, intellectual curiosity, mental focus and self-control, the ability to think outside the box, the ability to exercise emotional intelligence, the ability to connect knowledge into overarching schemas, the ability to avoid common thinking errors, and many other aspects of a healthy brain that tend to be insufficiently emphasized in our culture.

Brain Fitness Interview (Part 1)

  • In this first installment of the conversation, Phillips explained why the category of brain fitness is helpful in emphasizing a holistic approach to cognition, which has implications to how we approach the whole learning process. He highlighted certain under-valued mental assets such as being able to think outside the box as well as the skill of emotional intelligence. He also highlighted how the avoidance of thinking errors is integral to developing a healthy brain.

Brain Fitness Interview (Part 2)

  • In this second installment of the conversation, Robin Phillips and Graham Taylor talked about the way the human brain organizes what it learns into a series of schemas. Schemas are networks of associations through which the brain organizing everything into meaningful patterns. These patterns then serve as hooks on which to hang new information. In order for the brain to build up schemas effectively, we need to reflect deeply about life in a slow and undistracted manner and remain open-minded to new models of understanding our world. They discussed some factors in modern life that make it difficult to form schemas and instead orient us towards shallowness and oversimplifications.

Brain Fitness Interview (Part 3)

  • In the third part of the interview, Phillips and Taylor looked at some theories of memory and learning. They discussed how a good memory is not a gift but a skill and that we can develop this skill through learning the right techniques. They also talked about the important role that focus plays in the learning process and in career success.

Brain Fitness Interview (Part 4)

  •  In the final part of the conversation, Dr. Taylor asked Robin about the role imagination and intellectual curiosity play in having a healthy brain. Phillips shared concern that recent developments in the American school system are diminishing the importance of imagination as learning is reduced to simply a utilitarian tool. Phillips closed by pointing out some areas in which the ancients understood brain fitness better than we do.

 

 

Best Kept Secrets About Brain Fitness: a Conversation with Graham Taylor and Robin Phillips (Part 4)

This is the fourth of a 4-part series covering Dr. Taylor’s conversation with Robin Phillips about the brain. To read the other posts in this series, click here.

 

Robin Phillips: Can I just share a few more ingredients that go into a healthy brain?

Graham Taylor: Go ahead.

RP: Another element that should be absolutely front and center of any discussion of brain fitness is intellectual curiosity and imagination. These are really two separate skills but since they are closely related I find it useful to discuss them under the same rubric.

When I used to teach high school history, I often found myself puzzled why some students would diligently take notes about all the different historical figures I discussed in class but then as soon as the final test was over they would throw away a year’s worth of notes. Why was it that some students were genuinely interested in the material while others didn’t care and only learned for the test? We could probably think of lots of different reasons for this, but one important factor seemed to be the total lack of intellectual curiosity in some students. Continue reading

Best Kept Secrets About Brain Fitness: a Conversation with Graham Taylor and Robin Phillips (Part 3)

This is the third of a 4-part series covering Dr. Taylor’s conversation with Robin Phillips about the brain. To read the other posts in this series, click here.

 

Graham Taylor: At TSM we do a lot of work with the various theories of memory and learning. In fact, we have seamlessly integrated over a dozen theories of memory and learning into our learning platform. I’m curious to have your take on the relationship between these mental fitness skills and the various theories of memory and learning, such as Mind-Mapping, Method of Loci, Spaced Learning, Neuro-Transmitter Depletion Avoidance, and so forth?

Robin Phillips: Great question, Graham. It’s when we start looking at some of these theories of memory and learning that we realize just how mentally unfit most of us are today. How was it that medieval monks were able to memorize the entire Psalter while we struggle to even memorize our closest friends’ phone numbers? It wasn’t that people in the past had more time on their hands, although that’s part of it. And it also isn’t that we’re more stupid than our ancestors. Rather, we have a tendency to focus exclusively on content while neglecting the actual mechanisms of learning. Mary Carruthers has a great book called The Book of Memory: A Study of Memory in Medieval Culture in which she documents various techniques prevalent throughout the Middle Ages that people used for training their memory. One example of this is the Method of the Loci that you mentioned, which has received some recent popularity because Sherlock Holmes uses it in the series featuring Benedict Cumberbatch. Sherlock’s “mind palace” is basically the Method of Loci, whereby memories are stored in the rooms of an imaginary palace. This memory technique goes back at least as far as the ancient Greeks. A very enjoyable book about this technique is Moonwalking With Einstein by Joshua Foer. Foer tells how he went from being an ordinary guy with an ordinary brain to becoming America’s #1 memory champion. He did this simply by following ancient methods of memory and learning, especially the memory palace method.

Continue reading

Best Kept Secrets About Brain Fitness: a Conversation with Graham Taylor and Robin Phillips (Part 2)

This is the second of a 4-part series covering Dr. Taylor’s conversation with Robin Phillips about the brain. To read the other posts in this series, click here.

 

Robin Phillips spoke to Graham Taylor about brain fitness.
Robin Phillips spoke to Graham Taylor about brain fitness. We published Part 1 in the series last Friday.

Graham Taylor: What would be some other examples of what you are calling ‘brain fitness skills’?

Robin Phillips: Another brain fitness skill—and this is one that I feel very strongly about—is the ability to create schemas. In a world where all of us increasingly have access to the same information, the successful people will increasingly be those who can connect the various fields of knowledge and create frameworks for integrating different ideas, fields and facts. All of our minds do this naturally to some extent since the ability to create schemas is one of the most fundamental ways the human brain organizes the vast array of data stored in our long-term memories. You see…


GT
: Sorry to interrupt you Robin, but can you explain for our readers what exactly a schema actually is?

RP: Oh, sorry. Yes, the brain’s long-term memory stores information in schematic structures that provide a framework by which we simplify and find meaning in what would otherwise be a vast warehouse of disconnected facts and memories. Schemas are the networks of associations by which the brain organizing everything into meaningful patterns.  The brain often does this when we sleep, which is why sometimes the things we find confusing make more sense in the morning after a good night’s sleep.

Continue reading

Best Kept Secrets About Brain Fitness: a Conversation with Graham Taylor and Robin Phillips (Part 1)

This is the first of a 4-part series covering Dr. Taylor’s conversation with Robin Phillips about the brain. To read the other posts in this series, click here.

 

Graham Taylor: Thank you so much for joining me this morning, Robin.

Robin Phillips: It’s a pleasure. I love what you’re doing here at the Taylor Study Method and I consider it an honor to speak with you this morning.

 

GT: Excellent. I want to jump right into the topic of this interview about brain fitness. In your writings you’ve suggested that brain fitness rather than smartness should be the goal of learning. Why is that?

RP: Great question, Graham. In our culture the notion of “being smart” often invokes a truncated and one-sided paradigm of mental ability that may not be consistent with overall cognitive health. I prefer using the term “brain fitness” as a way to emphasize a more well-rounded and holistic approach to cognition, which has implications to how we approach the whole learning process.

Continue reading

EPPP Study Schedule

The following advice on developing an EPPP study schedule is taken from Dr. Graham Taylor’s post ‘How to Develop an EPPP Study Schedule (and other advice after a two-time fail

…be proactive and deliberate in creating an effective EPPP study schedule. If you try to just study whenever life allows you to, without a clear schedule and plan, the chances are you will constantly be alternating between exhaustion and frustration. Because everyone’s life is different, no two person’s study schedule will look the same. But there are some general principles that can guide us in creating a study schedule. One principle is that little and often is preferable to long periods of concentrated study. This is called the “Spacing Effect” and has a lot of research to back it up. Of course, everyone needs to make their study fit their schedule, but in general we should keep in mind that research shows that spreading out your study generates a greater likelihood for effective learning then trying to do it all at once.

In an earlier article I explained the principle of spaced learning by comparing it to watering a plant. Imagine there is a plant you’re taking care of for a month, but you only have one gallon of water. Would it be more effective to use up the entire gallon of water at the beginning to give the plant a big drenching, or what it be better to water the plant little and often throughout the entire month? Obviously the second would be preferable. The human brain is like that plant. Just as spaced watering, interspersed with periods of dryness, is the most effective watering strategy, so spaced learning is the most effective strategy for cementing long-term memories in the brain.

Another principle that should guide your EPPP study schedule is something called the Principle of Neurotransmitter Depletion. I have explained about this in my blog post on the EPPP study break, but in general what it means is that your study schedule should include within it regular structured breaks to prevent mental fatigue.

Interview With Dr. Graham Taylor

Earlier this year Robin Phillips had the opportunity to speak with Graham Taylor about the origins and future of the Taylor Study Method, and why the method has such a phenomenal pass rate. Below is the text of this interview.

 

Interview with Graham
Graham Taylor talks to Robin Phillips about the origins and future of TSM and why the method can guarantee an eppp passing score

Robin Phillips: Thank you for joining me this morning, Dr. Taylor, to talk about the Taylor Study Method and the EPPP.

Graham Taylor: It’s always a pleasure to get together with you Robin.

Robin: For the sake of those who may not be familiar with the work you do, can you tell us what the Taylor Study Method is and how you got started with it? Continue reading