The Reason Is Simple--Feelings

Too many teachers feel instead of think.  That explains why so many fall for bogus theories:

Almost all teachers believe persistent myths about learning, a new survey finds.

More than three-fourths of teachers think that people are either right-brained (creative) or left-brained (analytical), and that those designations affect how they learn. And nearly all teachers endorsed the idea of "learning styles"—meaning that students learn more when their teachers tailor instruction to their individual styles, such as auditory, visual, or kinesthetic.

But research doesn't back up these ideas, said Ulrich Boser, a researcher who leads the firm The Learning Agency and conducted the survey.

So-called learning styles theory has done more damage to more kids than just about anything short of so-called Whole Language (and its cousin, Balanced Literacy) or Fuzzy Math.

The closing was clear:

"Many schools of education don't embrace the cognitive sciences," Boser said.

Yet they have a responsibility to prepare teachers to stay abreast of the current research in the cognitive sciences: "It would be weird if large swathes of American doctors believed in bloodletting," he said.