BUILDING AN ATTENTION REPERTOIRE
Attention level is determined by the interaction of various factors: sen- sory input (sources of information such as textbooks, videos, field trips, etc.); data’s intensity or perceived importance; and the brain’s “chemical flavor” of the moment. (Jensen, 2000, p. 123)
That teachers need to build a repertoire of ways to capture the brain’s atten- tion is the important consideration here. Wolfe (2011) points out that although novelty is an innate attention getter, it is also short lived. Repeated use of any particular strategy or format can result in habituation—the natural tendency of the brain to ignore a stimulus once it has become familiar.
Teachers need to consider the types of input or explanatory devices to employ when presenting information and ensure that they enable students with differ- ent modality strengths (auditory, visual, kinetic, and kinesthetic) equal oppor- tunity to absorb and process information. (This is discussed in more detail in Chapter 11, “Clarity” and Chapter 21, “Assessment.”)