Roots of Knowledge Speaker Series: Acacia Overoye

800 West University Parkway,Orem UT 84097

07 April, 2022

Description

Join us for a presentation by Acacia Overoye in the beautiful Roots of Knowledge stained-glass gallery! Free and open to all! “Watering the Roots: How Understanding Memory Informs Education” - Presented by Acacia OveroyeHuman knowledge is shared and passed on to each generation through our memory. Plato compared memory to a wax tablet, one in which impressions are made through our perception of the world and then serve as the basis of our recollections. Modern psychologists use different metaphors to understand memory, such as computers or the storage and retrieval of items in space. These metaphors not only shape psychological research on memory, but how the findings of such research are applied in education. When memory is treated as storage and retrieval of bits of information, the act of learning can become mechanical and prioritize the memorization of facts and their access with little room for other aspects of knowledge. In my talk, I review a brief history of memory and its influence on education in the U.S., explore how popular understanding of memory can lead to teaching practices that are potentially harmful to students, and suggest some alternative ways of thinking about memory that can reshape classrooms to be more holistic in developing our students’ knowledge about the world.About Acacia OveroyeAcacia is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at Utah Valley University. Her research focuses on how multimodality and retrieval influence the way we learn and remember information. Her research and teaching mutually inform each other, with creative and evidence-based practices in her classroom and with research in collaboration with students in her lab.______________________Roots of Knowledge is a stained-glass panorama of history and human drama. The intricate details incorporated into every window represent years of painstaking research on the events and people that shaped humankind from the days of wooly mammoths and cavemen to the iPhone. Created by Holdman Studios and installed at the UVU Fulton Library in 2016, this artistic landmark comprises 80 individual panes and took 12 years to complete.For information on where to park at UVU, please visit https://www.uvu.edu/parking/visitor-parking.html.