If you could, you would. You can, but prefer not to know it?
More than any other organ, your brain is up to you. You are what you think, not just what you eat. Here's some food for thought:
Design your Mind
Setting cognitive and behavioral goals raises challenging and worthy questions: What do you want from your brain? Will you know it when you achieve it?
To attain the brain of our choosing, we must understand our selves and current abilities. Introspection and curiosity are helpful if they trigger and sustain the effort to enrich the mind. However, objective information which leads to informed assessment of brain function is often lacking.
Mind your Brain
Honesty. Openness. Self-awareness.
Irrefutable virtues, but in practice most people fall short. Few regularly appraise their brain skills; even so, the ability to accurately judge one's own mental performance is not guaranteed. I believe the first step to minding the brain is shedding hang-ups while offering and soliciting frank feedback from family and close confidants. In the clinical setting, routine cognitive screening and "mental check ups" are not currently practiced, in part due to time constraints and limited utility of traditional paper-and-pencil tests. From a public health perspective, the U.S. Preventative Task Force reviewed Continue Reading »
A beautiful initiative, featured in the New York Times today:
Coming Full Circle:
- "In a typical Montessori classroom, teachers use category-sorting exercises to help young students see patterns and connections. But the participants in this group were mostly in their 80s and on the other side of the cognitive development curve. They are residents at an assisted-living facility for people with dementia called Hearthstone at the Esplanade, which has six other homes in New York State and Massachusetts. Since July the residents have participated in a full-time program of Montessori-based activities designed for people with memory deficiencies."
- "A common misconception about people with dementia, Dr. Camp said, is that they no longer learn. But they do: residents learn to find their dining room table, for example, well after the onset of Alzheimer’s disease. And because they no longer have the higher brain function they had as adults, he reasoned, they are well suited to Montessori."
Full article: Coming Full Circle.
Related posts:
- Alzheimer's Risk and Prevention: the Cognitive Reserve
- Your comments on cognitive training, Posit Science, Alzheimer's Australia, gerontology, games
James Zull is a professor of Biology. He is also Director Emeritus of the University Center for Innovation in Teaching and Education at Case Western Reserve University in Ohio. 
These roles most assuredly coalesced in his 2002 book, The Art of Changing the Brain: Enriching the Practice of Teaching by Exploring the Biology of Learning.
This is a book for both teachers and parents (because parents are also teachers!) Written with the earnestness of first-person experience and reflection, and a lifetime of expertise in biology, Zull makes a well-rounded case for his ideas. He offers those ideas for your perusal, providing much supporting evidence, but he doesn’t try to ram them into your psyche. Rather, he practices what he preaches by engaging you with stories, informing you with fact, and encouraging your thinking by the way he posits his ideas.
I have read a number of books that translate current brain research into practice while providing practical suggestions for teachers to implement. This is the first book I have read that provides a biological, and clearly rational, overview of learning and the brain. Zull provokes you into thinking Continue Reading »
A round-up of interested news during the month:
1) Training Young Brains to Behave (New York Times)
2) Head Games (OpEd in New York Times)
3) Will Gerontology recognize the Brain? (American Society on Aging event)
4) Brain function gets a boost from walking (Los Angeles Times)
5) An idea whose time has (finally) come (McKnight's Long Term Care News)
6) Train your brain (Financial Times Germany)
7) Toman auge ejercicios que adiestran la mente (Milenio, Mexico)
8) Trois nouvelles études IDATE : Serious Games (Publi-News, France)
Links and commentary below. Continue Reading »
A couple of recent studies have reinforced the lifelong potential for brain plasticity (the ability of the brain to rewire itself through experience) and the importance of physical exercise for cognitive vitality. One study focused on 1) adults over 50 with mild cognitive impairment, the other one on 2) stroke survivors.
1) Memory problems: Adults 50-years-old and over with mild cognitive impairment (an advanced form of memory problems, but pre-dementia) were asked to exercise for three 50-minute sessions per week for 24 weeks (a total of 60 hours). Results: there were small, but measurable, cognitive benefits even 18 months after Continue Reading »
Try eating food with one chop stick.
It is possible, for certain types of food. But probably not the best approach.
Let's now talk brain health.
Dr. Larry McCleary is a former acting Chief of Pediatric Neurosurgery at Denver Children's Hospital, and author of the The Brain Trust Program (Perigee Trade, 2007). He agreed to help us answer an important, yet often neglected, question: Given That We Are Our Brains, How do We Nourish Them?
Alvaro: Dr. McCleary, Why did a former neurosurgeon such as yourself develop an interest in brain health public education?
Dr. McCleary: For two reasons ... I am a Boomer and am trying to maximize my own brain health. Also, there is much exciting research documenting how we can be proactive in this regard. This information needs to be disseminated and I would like to help in this process.
And what is the single most important brain-related idea or concept that you would like every person in the planet to fully understand?
The most important take home message about brain health is that we now know that no matter what your brain status or age, there is much you can do to significantly improve brain function and slow brain aging. Based on emerging information, what is especially nice is the fact that unlike many things in life our brain health is largely under own control.
What are the most important elements to nourish our brains as we age?
I approach this question much like an athlete prepares for competition. They utilize a holistic approach. Continue Reading »
Our Market Report has received some recent additional accolades:
"In a widely scattered and unregulated field, this clear, credible document
is a first-class, pioneering compendium that's likely to become industry-standard
for all of us in this field. Well done!"
-- Eric Jensen, Founder of Jensen Learning Corporation.
"This is the first clear, concise and comprehensive overview and analysis I have seen of 
the emerging Brain-Training marketplace. It is a great market research for every investor, entrepreneur, manager, researcher and others who seek an understanding of the subject. Personally, I was waiting such a review for quite a while. The SharpBrains staff, led by Alvaro Fernandez, really did a great job here."
-- Danny Dankner, CEO, Applied Cognitive Engineering (ACE).
"Neuroscience is at a crossroads, and The State of the Brain Fitness Software Market 2008 by SharpBrains, points the way forward. Our understanding of how the brain works is just beginning to yield real fruit in the form of products that truly improve the function of the brain. This reports gives anyone interested in how to understand which products are truly in a position to make a difference in brain function, and which markets will be interested and profitable for such products an invaluable guide. We found the analysis clear, precise, loaded with substantive insight. One would be foolhardy not to use this publication as the best guide to this market."
-- Dr. Arthur Lavin, Associate Clinical Professor of Pediatrics, Case Medical School, and Medical Director of A Working Mind.
"As we begin the task of developing a Brain Fitness Center at our Sunrise Senior Living Community, this Brain Fitness Market Report is proving Continue Reading »
Cognitive training is showing a tremendous potential to expand working memory, a 
capacity once thought limited and untrainable.
If you have enough working memory to both be processing this information and developing your own thoughts, you may be thinking now, a) what exactly is Working Memory?, and b) why do we even care?. Well, Dr. Bill Klemm answers those questions, and more, below. Please enjoy one of the most insightful articles on the subject we have seen in a long while, which we are proud to bring to SharpBrains readers.
- Alvaro
How Well People Think Depends On Working Memory
- By Dr. Bill Klemm
Imagine dialing a phone number by having to look up each digit one at a time in the phone book. Normally, you look up the number and remember all seven digits long enough to get it dialed. Even with one digit at a time, you would have to remember each digit long enough to get it dialed. What if your brain could not even do that! We call this kind of remembering, “working memory,” because that is what the brain works with. Working memory is critical to everyday living.
Continue Reading »
How many of the people behind the blogs you read, have you actually met in person? I hadn't met a single one before yesterday.
Last night Alvaro and I were invited by Bora at A blog around the clock for a blogger get-together at Jupiter in Berkeley 
. Bora who is a part of the Scienceblog umbrella had gathered an interesting group of people, mainly bloggers with diverse backgrounds such as life science, law, anthropology – you name it.
Remembering names is a huge brain exercise for me, since I tend to forget especially names I haven’t heard before. I have tried to pick up some tricks for remembering names from Merlin Mann at 43folders. Let’s see who I can remember from the event:
Continue Reading »
