Remaking Memory
After information has been processed and made meaningful through association with previously stored information and experiences, stored knowledge can be retrieved and brought back into working memory to be re-made or updated (Jewitt 76). Through retrieval, memory traces can be strengthened and simultaneously made "modifiable again, enabling them, for example to connect to more recent learning" which is a process referred to as reconsolidation (Brown, Roediger, and McDaniel 74).
Memory, then, is not stagnant, but, rather, is malleable and flexible to change. When we recall or retrieve a stored memory and bring it back into working memory, it can be influenced, or updated, by new information, feelings, or experiences (Klemm). Memory can be synthesized, consolidated, reconstructed, molded, modified, and recreated as a means of updating it to new understandings and landscapes. Retrieved memories can grow in learning, just like your computer needs updates to survive extinction. Tuomi-Grohn et al affirms this understanding when they assert, “What is transferred is not packages of knowledge and skills that remain intact; instead, the very process of such transfer involves active interpreting, modifying, and reconstructing the skills and knowledge to be transferred” (4). Giuliana Mazzoni coins this phenomenon as "imagination inflation" where "experiences from pieces of retained information combined with knowledge, beliefs, suggestions, and the information provided by situational cues" is recreated into new representations of memories (25-27). William Klemm, a professor of neuroscience at Texas A&M University, supports this interaction within memory when he says "Experimentally, it has been proven that when a student calls up a memory from long-term storage, it is temporarily placed in the short-term memory. At that point, there is an opportunity to enrich that memory before it gets reconsolidated" (Klemm as cited in Schwartz np). What we can take away from these scholars is the understanding that memory in use always re-travels through working memory and, in so doing, creates an opportunity to be remade. This opportunity provides a point of entrance into a store of previously learned material where real growth in learning can take place and transfer is prepared to occur. Working memory is key for successful transfer which can only occur if we are able to trigger recall or retrieval of critical information to be brought into working memory where it can be remade and used in new contexts. This critical process can be facilitated through many of the activities used in composition, which I will discuss further in a later section. For now, remember that memory is a "persuasive construct" that undergoes transformation in working memory (Lacey 122).
However, despite the benefits of a malleable memory for future transfer and learning, the persuasive nature of memory can also serve as a disadvantage when considered within the larger network of complex neurological systems. While my focus in this research has been to magnify the system directly involved in the facilitation of transfer and learning, there are other systems that interact with memory and can distort the understandings of experiences or information. While I am not adequately educated in neurology to explain all of these systems and their complex interactions here, I do think it is important to mention a few of the interactions that more frequently impair transfer and learning in composition studies. Although, truly much more individual research is necessary to gain a full understanding of these complex interactions.
Memory, then, is not stagnant, but, rather, is malleable and flexible to change. When we recall or retrieve a stored memory and bring it back into working memory, it can be influenced, or updated, by new information, feelings, or experiences (Klemm). Memory can be synthesized, consolidated, reconstructed, molded, modified, and recreated as a means of updating it to new understandings and landscapes. Retrieved memories can grow in learning, just like your computer needs updates to survive extinction. Tuomi-Grohn et al affirms this understanding when they assert, “What is transferred is not packages of knowledge and skills that remain intact; instead, the very process of such transfer involves active interpreting, modifying, and reconstructing the skills and knowledge to be transferred” (4). Giuliana Mazzoni coins this phenomenon as "imagination inflation" where "experiences from pieces of retained information combined with knowledge, beliefs, suggestions, and the information provided by situational cues" is recreated into new representations of memories (25-27). William Klemm, a professor of neuroscience at Texas A&M University, supports this interaction within memory when he says "Experimentally, it has been proven that when a student calls up a memory from long-term storage, it is temporarily placed in the short-term memory. At that point, there is an opportunity to enrich that memory before it gets reconsolidated" (Klemm as cited in Schwartz np). What we can take away from these scholars is the understanding that memory in use always re-travels through working memory and, in so doing, creates an opportunity to be remade. This opportunity provides a point of entrance into a store of previously learned material where real growth in learning can take place and transfer is prepared to occur. Working memory is key for successful transfer which can only occur if we are able to trigger recall or retrieval of critical information to be brought into working memory where it can be remade and used in new contexts. This critical process can be facilitated through many of the activities used in composition, which I will discuss further in a later section. For now, remember that memory is a "persuasive construct" that undergoes transformation in working memory (Lacey 122).
However, despite the benefits of a malleable memory for future transfer and learning, the persuasive nature of memory can also serve as a disadvantage when considered within the larger network of complex neurological systems. While my focus in this research has been to magnify the system directly involved in the facilitation of transfer and learning, there are other systems that interact with memory and can distort the understandings of experiences or information. While I am not adequately educated in neurology to explain all of these systems and their complex interactions here, I do think it is important to mention a few of the interactions that more frequently impair transfer and learning in composition studies. Although, truly much more individual research is necessary to gain a full understanding of these complex interactions.