Blog 1

The main ideas discussed in this chapter were the different functions of the brain, how the brain develops, and how the brain functions during teaching and learning. The brain develops throughout life and goes through critical stages which can be effected by a variety of factors. Pruning of the brain is when we gradually get rid of the unnecessary information that it stored in our brain from birth such as different sounds that are not in our language. There are many factors that effect brain development such as environment, the plasticity of our brains, nutrition, etc. All aspects of life effect the way that our brain develops. As we learn, our brain forms new connections. This can help us hold memories as well as learn new information such as playing a sport or learning an equation. It is important to know how the brain works while teaching because we will better be abe to understand how our students learn. 

One question I had about the reading was how emotion would effect brain development? In the chapter it talked about how emotion would effect learning, which I understand, but how would our emotions effect the way our brain develops?

According to a brain scientists, development is the act of our brain actually making the connections and the synaptic connections. This is when the brain is growing. Learning is what we do with our information and how we make sense of it all. Our connections are strengthened when we learn. The brain itself changes when it develops. 

Repetition is thought of as a good way to remember something according to brain research, but is not thought of as a good method of learning through the IP theory. According to brain research, when we repeat something over and over again we are likely to remember it more easily. Through the IP theory, it says that we do not hold that information in our long term memory so we are not actually learning the information.