This is your brain on exercise

Not just energized, but actually brighter. I’m reading John Ratey’s Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain.  Parts of it are technical, but even just the first (less technical) section sheds some astonishing light on the relationship between movement and learning. Here’s my quick summary of the content: exercise makes the brain work [...]

Rest for the memory

I just read a quotation from Lucinda Williams saying that sometimes she keeps her song lyrics with her onstage when she’s performing – even songs she’s been performing for a very long time.  She first says she’s lazy, but then goes on to say that keeping the lyrics on hand means she can concentrate on singing, not [...]

Exercise for the brain…

Solitaire has acquired the reputation for being a popular way to waste time in an office job.  It certainly can be that, but it’s also an opportunity for building mental agility and acuity.  It can also be very meditative, fun, and otherwise great, for some.  For others, it’s terrifically boring. If you happen to know [...]

Reference can help the brain do its best work

The other day I was sitting with an 8 year-old as she wrote out the date.  At one point she turned to look behind her at the analog clock on the wall.  ”I always look at the clock to make sure my 9 is going the right way,” she told me. Kids who know they’re [...]

More than one way to read

There’s more than one way to learn to read.  Actually what I mean is that there’s more than one way to read.  I think we’re pretty clear that there’s more than one way to learn.  But people actually read differently.  Some never get the hang of sounding out, for example.  Sylvia Ashton-Warner built a whole [...]

Absence…

…makes the heart grow fonder, or so they say.  It can also make the plants seem like they’re growing faster, if you leave at the right time of year and the weather cooperates. . … and 11 days later…    Things can happen when/because you’re not micromanaging them.  My elation at the size of the [...]

Finger Memory?

I was trying out a typing program the other day and noticed that I had a lot of trouble typing series of letters that didn’t fit the patterns of English. I could fairly easily type something like daf, which followed an expectable consonant-vowel-consonant pattern, but I had trouble with the likes of fja. I’d consistently [...]

Next time you’re tempted to say “stop doodling and pay attention”…

Yet another suggestion that things are not always as they seem. This reminds me of how many folks I’ve heard say that they can only focus on what someone’s saying if they don’t make eye contact, though we tend to assume it’s the opposite. Take a look at this summary of a study (published earlier this [...]