Exploring the Brain

As I continue on my course in Instructional Design and Technology, I have begun this week to explore the brain; the brain and learning, information processing theory, and problem-solving methods during the learning process.  It’s been interesting learning how my brain works...exploring what research shows about how exactly my brain processes information.  I was particularly interested in memory and the three processes involved:  encoding information, storing information and retrieving information.  As a classroom teacher and as someone who has a very poor memory myself, I was interested in finding ways to improve the storage into my short term memory (STM) and long term memory (LTM) and have looked for advice and practices that I can use myself and in my classroom with my students.  One of the most effective ways is to make some sort of association and/or connection with the information. Ormrod, Schunk, & Gredler (2009) tell us that “it is important that information be presented in such a way that students can relate the new information to known information (meaningfulness) and that they understand uses for the knowledge” (p. 96).  Check out the sites listed below for some more information on the memory process and advice on how to improve memory.

http://inteldaily.com/2012/01/how-memory-works-infographic/

The website Intelligence Daily is a great website to visit for information on memory.  A simple visual and written explanation is found on http://inteldaily.com/2012/01/how-memory-works-infographic/.  Here you can find how your memory works, foods recommended to help improve memory and great skills to practice using your surroundings on how to improve memory lapses, such as visualising and association and chunking.  Another great read for me on this site was the post ‘Can Coffee Keep Your Mind Sharp?’ It refers to a study posted in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition in August, 2006 that tracked coffee drinkers in Europe over 10 years and “found that the coffee drinkers there had lower rates of age-related cognitive decline than men who didn’t drink coffee”  http://inteldaily.com/2011/10/can-coffee-keep-your-mind-sharp/.  Although it warns of drinking moderately depending on possible side-effects that you may encounter...I personally love the excuse to drink lots of coffee!

http://improveshortermemory.wordpress.com/

To help my poor memory (pardon the pun!) I went exploring to see if there were any practices that I could be doing to improve it. My first thoughts before research were fish oil and puzzles.  I found this blog which had many great ideas all on one list.  It has the expected advice of getting enough sleep, exercising / meditating and certain foods to try.  It also has useful ideas like writing down information down, using mind maps, and keeping work and home environments organised.  Funnily enough, I have recently made an effort to become much more organised and it has helped.  Check it out!