Conference | Teaching Whole Learners

Price

The price listed is for registering as an individual, Late Registration (from November 08, 2025 through November 14, 2025). Other pricing options are available:

Individual
Special Early Registration (through August 15, 2025) - USD 599
Early Registration (from August 16, 2025 through September 26, 2025) - USD 679
General Registration (from September 27, 2025 through November 07, 2025) - USD 749

Group
Special Early Registration (through August 15, 2025) - USD 499
Early Registration (from August 16, 2025 through September 26, 2025) - USD 579
General Registration (from September 27, 2025 through November 07, 2025) - USD 649
Late Registration (from November 08, 2025 through November 07, 2025) - USD 679

For further information, please visit Learning & the Brain® website.

Date

November 14-16, 2025

Facilitators

1. What the Science of Learning is Not Telling You: How to Make a Memory and Get It Out
David B. Daniel, PhD, Conference Chair
Professor Emeritus of Psychology, James Madison University

2. The Memory Paradox: Why Our Brains Need Knowledge in An Age of AI
Barbara A. Oakley, PhD, PE
Ramon y Cajal Distinguished Scholar of Global Digital Learning, McMaster University

3. Belonging: The Science of Creating Connections
Geoffrey L. Cohen, PhD
Professor of Psychology, Stanford University

4. The Entangled Brain: How Cognition, Motivation, and Emotions Are Woven Together
Luiz Pessoa, PhD
Professor of Psychology

5. Joined Up Thinking: The Science of Collective Intelligence
Hannah M. Critchlow, PhD, HonDSc
Internationally Acclaimed Neuroscientist

And many more featured speakers at this conference.

Description

Applying science to create social, engaged, thriving, curious, and critical thinkers.
Westin Copley Place, Boston, MA or virtually via Zoom.

Conference registration is now open for the annual Fall Learning & the Brain conference in Boston held at the Westin Copley Place the weekend of November 14-16, 2025.

This conference will be run as a hybrid conference. Whether you attend in-person or remotely, recordings will be available for 45 days after the conference.

Teaching Thriving, Social, Curious, and Critical Thinkers

The purpose of education is to guide the development of whole, thriving, informed, and thoughtful human beings. Human development and learning are not separate domains, but part of a deeply interconnected whole that is influenced by culture, context, safety, relationships, and the world. Cognitive Scientist Scott Barry Kaufman has reframed Psychologist Abraham Maslow’s “Hierarchy of Needs” not as a rigid pyramid (which Maslow never created), but as a sailboat—where a secure base of safety and social relationships supports the sail of curiosity, exploration, and purpose for human thriving. Similarly, brain systems related to belonging, emotion, motivation, meaning, and thinking don’t operate in isolation—they work together as a dynamic, integrated neural network. This interdisciplinary conference will explore how these core human needs are linked with learning and brain function.

Discover science-informed strategies to improve a sense of belonging in schools; build social connections, collaboration, and collective intelligence; foster critical thinking, creativity, and curiosity in students; promote academic motivation and purpose; and enhance science and reading skills. Learn how to nurture and guide child development for whole, thriving, knowledgeable, social, collaborative, engaged, curious, creative, critical thinkers.

Learning Objectives

You will gain knowledge about:
- The science of human needs, learning, and thriving
- Creating creative, critical thinkers and problem solvers
- How cognition, emotion, and motivation are interwoven
- The science behind, and strategies for, collaborative classrooms
- Ways to foster a sense of school belonging, culture, and community
- Connecting brain-to-brain synchrony with collaboration and learning
- Using social psychology to build trust, connections, and competence
- Linking mindset, meaning, and relationships to engagement
- Cultivating curiosity, inquiry, innovation, and knowledge
- Promoting thinking, collaborating in reading and STEM
- Social-emotional influences on teens and learning

Who Should Attend

- Educators, parents
- Curriculum, staff developers
- Speech-language pathologists
- PreK-12 teachers, administrators
- Psychologists, school psychologists
- Learning specialists, special educators
- Early childhood educators, professionals
- Social workers, mental health, school counselors
- SEL, reading, social studies, STEM teachers
- Superintendents, principals, school heads
- College, university professors