The CORE work for this research was meant to investigate and assemble a set of ideas that may be useful to teachers, through examining the expressions of numerous institutions and authors who have participated in this conversation over time. Saturation evaluation techniques were employed and the summary results show below. For a technical report on the research, all citations, and the final version of the Framework of the CORE, see Scalise, Kathleen; Felde, Marie (2017). Why Neuroscience Matters in the Classroom (What's New in Ed Psych) (Pages 292-307 Technical Report; Pages 24-35 Framework of the CORE). Pearson Education.

Table 2.

Guiding Principle 2: Mastering the learning sciences empowers teachers with the resources to identify, argue for and support decisions that impact their professional lives and the success of their students.

Idea	Description
2a	The principal organ involved in learning is the brain. Concepts about it need not be memorized by teachers but should be understood as "big ideas" of the brain. The first anatomical concept is that the brain is the seat of our mental functions, controlling not only vital functions such as breathing but also reasoning and learning. It can be pictured as a spongy, three-pound mass of tissue. The brain and the spinal cord compose the central nervous system (CNS).
2b	The brain has three basic units. The first, the forebrain, is the largest part of the human brain. It consists of the cerebrum and numerous structures hidden beneath it. The cerebrum is split into two halves, each with four lobes: occipital, parietal, temporal and frontal. The surface layers of these lobes comprise the cerebral cortex, believed critical to higher level thought processes in humans.
2c	Brain cells come in primarily two kinds: nerve cells, also called neurons, and glial cells, providing support services. There are more glial cells than neurons in the brain but the neuron will be the primary focus for teachers. Neurons specialize in communication.
2d	An electrical signal is propagated within a neuron and a chemical process usually transmits from one neuron to the next, across the synapse, or gap between cells.
2e	The neuron consists of five main parts. These need not be memorized but the overall flow should be understood. For neurons, (i) dendrites are tree-like structures that detect signals, (ii) they connect to the main cell body which collects signal information, (iii) a cord-like axon extends away from the cell body to deliver the accumulated signal, (iv) the axon ends in a section that can release chemicals to the next neuron.
2f	The electrical signal involves opening and closing of small channels through which charged substances move. When a signal is sent, or "fired," positively charged materials rush in across the membrane. This produces tiny voltage changes, temporarily switching local internal conditions from negative to positive. The result is an "action potential" — the signal — swiftly passing along the membrane.
2g	Through learning and more frequent triggering of certain sets of neurons, specific brain activity improves over time, via physically changing the structure of the brain. This is one example of the process "what gets fired, gets wired."
2h	Myelin insulation of neurons makes signals operate faster and more consistently. Some diseases such as multiple schlerosis result from the myelin deteriorating.
2i	A neuron combines information in order to determine if a signal should be sent on. This is like collecting a sample of information rather than relying on a single source. Some information collected may encourage a neuron to fire and some may inhibit it.
2j	As many as 80-100 billion neurons in the human brain are organized in extensively interconnected networks. If neurons were people, a single brain could populate the entire world more than 10 times over. A large and broadly distributed set of neural networks are used during any routine task you complete.
2k	Functions such as vision, hearing and speech are distributed in certain specific regions of the brain involved with these interconnected networks. Some regions are associated with more than one function.