Download The Academy Professional Development Session

Me and My Brain:
How and Why We Learn
Thursday 28 August, 2008
Ordered Sharing
•Did you ever learn
anything that did not
engage any of your
senses? How?
Basic Brain Physiology
• Your brain is the most
complex organ in your
body.
• It is a bunch of nerves
– What is a neuron?
– What is the difference
between an axon and
a dendrite?
– What is plasticity?
Testing our senses…
• What are your reactions to the following
words?
– Candy
– Parents
– Grades
– Sports
– Dances
• Why do we have reactions to these words?
• Inhibiting and Excitatory Neurons
How our senses work…
Being the brain…
• Each of you is going to set about a task! At each
table are cards with the following parts of the brain:
– The Pre-frontal Cortex
– The Amygdale
– Cerebellum
– The Visual Cortex
– The Hippocampus
– The Frontal Lobe
– Broca’s Area
• Split up into tables based on your brain part…
Find out about yourself…
• Each table will become a brain part. So, find
out the following about yourselves:
– What is your function?
– What is your size?
– What is your location?
– What is interesting about you (something else of
interest)?
• You have about 20 minutes…
Brainiac Social
• Now that you’ve learned something about
each of these lovely parts of your brain, go out
and meet someone else.
• In character, as your part of the brain, you
have the next five minutes to get up and meet
other parts of the brain.
• See if you can learn something else about
each of these physiological parts or perhaps
find your brain part’s better half.
Reflection
• How does the physiology of our brain
determine how and why we learn?
• How can we use our knowledge of plasticity,
neurons and various parts of the brain to learn
more effectively?