Brain rewiring: A solution to transforming bad behaviour into good behaviour

Australian teachers can expect students in some classes to verbally and physically assault fellow students and possibly teachers, throw furniture and punch windows – that’s according to a recent Senate committee report on worsening classroom behaviour.

The report reveals that Australia ranks 69 out of 76 countries for having some of the most disruptive classrooms in the world, with teachers spending much of their teaching and learning time managing behaviour.

While some suggest a return to traditional "explicit instruction" as a solution to poor classroom behaviour, CQUniversity Adjunct Senior Lecturer Dr Ragnar Purje argues that students are responsible for their thoughts, words, actions, choices, and learning. 

He said students must be taught boundaries where their choices have real consequences.

Dr Purje's documented Responsibility Theory emphasises this self-empowering approach, providing students with essential self-management skills and knowledge to take control of their thinking, learning, and behaviour, and teachers with the language to support that. 

Research on brain plasticity also supports the idea that students can 'fire and rewire' their brains. Responsibility Theory uses scientific insights from the fields of neuroscience, education and psychology. 

Dr Purje's pedagogical epiphany occurred 15 years ago when he started teaching at a new school. 

He realised that traditional psychology and education-based theories from the last century often used in schools today were waning and that to improve behaviour he needed new ways where students positively use their brain to change their thinking and behaviour.

According to Dr Purje, forcing students to learn has little value. Instead, he believes that students should be motivated to engage in learning willingly. It's their choice.

He states, "There is no value in me pointing the finger and telling the students that they had to learn because it was good for them!"

This realisation led to the development of Responsibility Theory. Over the years, Dr Purje and CQUniversity pre-service teachers have successfully applied this in classrooms. 

“It positively impacts the lives of students and teachers,” Dr Purje explained.

“Students inside and outside the classroom have embraced Responsibility Theory, often exclaiming, "(Name of teacher)! I've got the power!" 

“Indeed, they alone have power over their choices, and they need to be explicitly taught positive behaviours and knowledge of consequences for behaviour – good and bad.”

Responsibility Theory is an immersive, systematic, self-talk sequence learning method in which students learn about the positive power they can access and use in what they think about along with their actions. This results in rewiring their brains to attain greater achievements and better mental health.

Dr Purje's interest in brain plasticity began in the 1990s when the concept was relatively unknown in academic journals. 

He researched brain plasticity during his PhD in Cognitive Neuroscience at CQUniversity under Professor Ken Purnell, Head of Educational Neuroscience at CQUniversity.

Dr Purje informs students he teaches from prep to Year 12 that he will not force them to pick up their pencil or pen to write or force them to read. Instead, he emphasises that their choices and behaviours have consequences for which they are responsible.

Dr Purje believes that students celebrate their newfound power because they understand that their choices lead to consequences they own and control.