As pressures on students intensify and classrooms become increasingly complex, well-being can no longer be treated as an add-on to academic learning. Drawing on insights from the Science of Learning in Education Centre (SoLEC) at NIE, this article explores how research at the intersection of cognition, emotion and social connection is reshaping how we understand learning, flourishing and the role of schools in nurturing the whole child.

Learning Begins with Human Flourishing 

When educators talk about learning, achievement is often the first word that comes to mind. Yet, at the 2025 Science of Learning Symposium hosted by NIE’s Science of Learning in Education Centre (SoLEC), the message was clear: learning cannot be separated from well-being.

Opening the symposium, NIE Director Prof Liu Woon Chia situates this focus within a broader moment of reflection and renewal. As Singapore marks 60 years of nation building, and NIE celebrates 75 years of transforming teacher education, the science of learning has emerged as a strategic growth area that bridges neuroscience, psychology, technology and education.

“Evidence shows that well-being is the engine of learning,” Prof Liu emphasizes. When students feel psychologically safe, socially connected and emotionally supported, they are better able to engage deeply with ideas and persevere through challenges. In contrast, stress, anxiety and a lack of belonging can inhibit learning, no matter how carefully lessons are designed.

This year’s symposium theme, Nurturing Minds: Fostering Holistic Well-Being through the Science of Learning, reflects a growing recognition that classrooms must attend to cognitive, emotional and social dimensions together. For SoLEC, this is not a departure from academic rigour, but a more precise understanding of how learning actually happens.

A Science-Informed Lens on Flourishing

According to Prof David Hung, Centre Director of SoLEC, the science of learning offers educators a powerful lens to understand student well-being and flourishing because it brings together how people think, feel and relate to others.

At the heart of this lens is SoLEC’s 4 LIFE framework: Lifelong, Lifedeep, Lifewide and Likewise learning, with self-regulation at the centre. “Human flourishing requires all four LIFEs,” Prof Hung explains. “Self-regulation is the heartbeat that sustains them.”

Traditional schooling has often focused narrowly on academic outcomes, but research in the science of learning shows that students do not learn despite their emotions and relationships. They learn with and through them. Stress, anxiety and psychological threat can shut down learning, while a sense of purpose, connection and safety opens students up to challenge and growth.

Flourishing, Prof Hung adds, goes well beyond test scores. It includes developing the capacity to think deeply, regulate emotions, appreciate diverse perspectives, persist through failure and pursue meaning. “These capacities are not peripheral. They are foundational to resilience, character and lifelong learning,” he explains.

Given how rapid artificial intelligence is developing, this human-centred focus becomes even more critical. As machines take on routine cognitive tasks, what remains distinctively human–empathy, ethical reasoning, creativity and self-regulation–must be intentionally nurtured in schools. “The science of learning”, Prof Hung notes, “helps educators design learning environments that cultivate these qualities alongside academic understanding.”

From Add-On to Integration in the Classroom 

Despite growing awareness of the importance of well-being, integrating it meaningfully into everyday classroom practice remains challenging. A/P Teo Wei Peng, Deputy Centre Director of SoLEC, observes that many teachers feel caught between competing demands.

“Teachers often have to balance many priorities,” he says. “These include students’ learning and well-being, curriculum coverage, assessment demands and school administrative responsibilities. Amid these competing considerations, well-being practices can sometimes be perceived as additional activities rather than as an integral part of everyday teaching and learning.” Some teachers also feel unprepared to support emotional regulation or mental well-being, unsure of what to do or how to respond to students’ needs.

The science of learning challenges this separation. Instead of treating well-being as a separate programme, it reframes it as integral to effective instruction. Insights about self-regulation, motivation and emotion help teachers design lessons that manage cognitive load, support self-regulation and create emotionally safe, high-engagement classrooms.

This shift is also reshaping professional development. Rather than relying on one-off workshops, teacher learning is becoming more job-embedded, personalized and practice-driven. Coaching, learning communities and science-informed design principles allow teachers to experiment, reflect and refine their practice in real contexts. Over time, schools themselves begin to function as learning organizations.

What excites Wei Peng most is the growing convergence between research and practice. “There is a shared language emerging,” he notes, “one that helps teachers make sense of stress, motivation and social connection in ways that are both evidence-based and deeply human.”

Measuring What Matters in Learning and Well-Being 

For Dr Imelda Caleon, Principal Education Research Scientist at NIE whose main research interests is in the areas of resilience and well-being, the strength of the science of learning lies in its holistic and integrative approach. “By drawing on interdisciplinary perspectives and diverse methodologies, researchers can better understand not just what students learn, but how they experience learning,” she shares.

Traditional measures often capture outcomes after the fact. In contrast, science of learning approaches allow researchers to examine learning processes in real time. By analysing and integrating multimodal data collected using diverse approaches, such as brain imaging, physiological response monitoring and eye tracking, researchers can gain comprehensive insights into students’ engagement, emotional states and social interactions.

For example, studies show that students are more engaged and more likely to remember information when their brains are synchronized with others in the classroom, highlighting the importance of social interaction in learning. Research on gratitude interventions has also revealed how simple practices can activate brain regions associated with long-term well-being.

Crucially, learning and well-being are mutually reinforcing. Drawing on the broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions, Imelda explains that positive emotional experiences can broaden learners’ perspectives, encourage intellectual risk-taking and build psychological resources that support learning and creativity. In her own research, a sense of meaning and purpose, which is a key aspect of well-being, was found to be associated with academic resilience among students who started secondary school with low academic performance.

Well-established pedagogical approaches such as active learning, collaborative learning and peer instruction do not only enhance academic outcomes. Increasingly, they are also shown to support students’ well-being. Imelda notes that when educators understand the mechanisms behind these approaches, they are better equipped to embed them intentionally into practice.

From Research to System-Level Impact 

Beyond classrooms, NIE and SoLEC play a unique role in supporting national priorities in mental well-being and educational excellence. As Imelda notes, this involves three interconnected functions: knowledge generation, knowledge integration and knowledge translation.

At SoLEC, researchers generate local evidence on learning and well-being using emerging research technologies. These findings are then integrated with international research to identify what is distinctive to the Singapore context and what cuts across cultures. Through partnerships with schools and MOE, this knowledge is translated into teacher education, professional learning and school-based innovation.

Such research-practice partnerships are essential for sustaining impact. Rather than prescribing solutions, they create spaces for educators and researchers to learn together, test ideas and adapt insights to real-world constraints. Over time, this builds capacity not just to implement interventions, but to think scientifically about teaching and learning.

Towards Schools That Nurture Growing Minds 

As Prof Liu reminds symposium participants, the science of learning only becomes meaningful when it is enacted in classrooms by empowered educators. As schools navigate AI, digital innovation and evolving societal pressures, staying grounded in human flourishing is more important than ever.

Seeing well-being as the foundation of learning invites a profound shift in how success is defined. It moves education beyond the accumulation of knowledge towards the cultivation of resilient, curious and socially connected individuals.

If the science of learning offers one enduring insight, it is this: when schools nurture minds in all their complexity, learning does not diminish. It deepens, endures and becomes a force for both individual growth and collective good.