Your Brain and How You Learn By Connie Gulick Be patient for all the information to arrive on its own. But if you see this symbol -- -- you will need to.

Your Brain and How You Learn

By Connie Gulick

Be patient for all the information to arrive on its own. But if you see this symbol -- -- you will need to click to move along.

This

is your brain. . .

20th Century Fox

No,

It’s about the size of your two fists put together.

Oops!

this

is your brain!

www.3dscience.com/.../3D_model_brain_web1.jpg

We are learning that knowledge isn’t just that invisible batch of information in your mind, but rather a physical thing.

Let’s go see.

How do we know? With increasingly better

technology, scientists have been able to look at what’s in the brain.

Know what this is?

It’s a neuron --

one of your brain cells.

(Oh, okay, it’s my very bad drawing of a neuron!)

And these

are called dendrites.

As you learn, dendrites grow . . .

like this – only thicker and denser . . .

Have you noticed how much dendrites look like tree branches?

Connie Gulick 2006

Connie Gulick 2006

In fact, the word “dendrite” comes from the Greek word for trees.

Horowitz, Lenore W. Trees that Climb the Sky: Oaks of the

Stanford Linear Accelerator Center. www2.slac.stanford.edu/.../may6/trees-web.jpg

How do we know that learning turns into these branch-like structures?

Using electron microscopes, scientists have studied neurons in the brains of babies and adults.

Here are some photographs of babies’ neurons.

Consistently, the neurons of older, more experienced and knowledgeable people are packed with dendrites, like the dense roots of mature grass turf.

And the neurons of babies have much fewer dendrites.

At birth 3 months

15 months

3 years

Photos from Tag Toys. http://www.tagtoys.com/dendr

ites.htm

Did you notice that there were some dendrites even in a newborn’s brain? How cool is that?Even in utero, a newborn

baby has learned to recognize her mother’s voice and how to swim and kick and suck and much more. Her dendrites have grown even before she is born!

It’s like building muscle mass by lifting weights. Only you build brain mass by exercising your mind and learning more.

UNC Charlotte.  "Athletic Training."  2005.

When scientists provided mice with enriched environments (meaning more opportunity to learn), they discovered that the brains of those mice weighed more than the brains of mice raised in sterile environments.

Weighs more

Weighs less

Warner Bros. Ent.

Before they were able to photograph neurons, scientists had to draw what they saw through the electronmicroscope, dendrites and all. This is a scientist’s drawing of a Purkinje neuron.

Ramon y Cajal, Santiago. 

Classical drawing.

Then they were able to stain neurons.

Here are two apical neurons.

Bluejack.  "Science (#058, Human Freedom)."  Life Beyond the Manufacturer's Specifications Overclocked Podcast. 22 January 2007.  (Not original source.)   libsyn.com/images/overclocked/dendrites.jpg

photos of Purkinje neuronsMcCarthy, J. Brian. “Regulation and

development of protein translation in neuronal processes.” Cellscience Reviews. 25 January 2006. w w.cellscience.com/ reviews7/McCarthy1.jpg

Blau Lab. “Nuclear Reprogramming by Cell Fusion or Nuclear Transfer.” 2003. www.stanford.edu/.../BMDC-GFP-Purkinje.jpg

Another apical neuron from a human brain.

Some apical neurons from a squirrel.

Boycott, Brian and Clark, Jonathan. University College London. 2006. www.ucl.ac.uk/.../images/squirrel_neurons

Photo by Bob Jacobs, Laboratory of Quantitative Neuromorphology Department of Psychology. Colorado College. http://

www.ColoradoCollege.edu/IDProg/Neuroscience/

Stained hippocampal neurons.

Stained neurons from a rat.

Schneider Laboratory, MIT Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences. Located at “9.09J / 7.29J Cellular Neurobiology, Spring 2002.” MIT Open Courseware dspace.mit.edu/.../CourseHome/index.htm

Paves, Heiti.  "Arabidopsis, Neurons, & Tobacco."  National Institute of Chemical Physics and Biophysics.   Estonia.  

www.mediacy.com/.../2002/neurons.jpg

This drawing identifies the parts of a neuron.Each neuron has one axon. It’s how a neuron reaches out to “touch” other neurons.

The yellow arrow shows the flow of electrochemical energy, out through the axon and into another cell’s dendrite, zipping from neuron to neuron and on across the brain.Morphonics LLC “Brain Specimens.” morphonix.com/.../images/neuron_parts.gif

Svoboda Laboratory.  found in "Specific Support Action: SYMBIONIC"  EU Genomic

News.  January 2006.

Notice the axons of other neurons reaching out to this neuron’s dendrites and cell body.

Axons have a special end that, unlike this drawing, can split off to go different directions and “reach” several other neurons at once.

This is a computer-generated picture of neurons with axon terminals connecting to dendrites, cell bodies, and other axons.

as, Atin. “Brain and Chaos: When Two Giants Meet.”

www.cerebromente.org.br/n14/mente/neurons.gif D

This drawing shows the myelin sheath that covers the axon. It serves as insulation from the energy of the electrochemical pulse.

Probably a good thing, or our brain might short out! After all, electrochemical energy is the same kind of energy stored in a car battery.

National Institute on Drug Abuse. Brain Power! The NIDA Junior Scientist Program: Grades 2-3. “Sending and Receiving Messages (Module 3)” www.nida.nih.gov/JSP/MOD3/images/NEURON2.gif

This is detail of the synapse and how the electrical pulse gets carried across by neurotransmitters.

Axons don’t completely touch the other neurons. There’s a tiny gap called a synapse that the electrochemical energy jumps across.

Eaton T. Fores Research Center. 2002.

www.etfrc.com/images/synapse2.gif

The neurons that connect with each other form neuron networks related to the particular information learned. In other words, as we learn, dendrites specific to the information that we are learning grow so that specific neurons can connect at specific synapses to create the

networks.

It takes practice, thinking about and working with the particular information being learned in order to reinforce those networks. (If you don’t use the dendrites, you lose them.) QBM Cell Science Inc.  2005.  Ottawa, Canada. 

qbmcellscience.com

And the more thoroughly you have learned something, the more complex those networks will be.

De Koninck, Paul. “ Dissociated culture of rat hippocampal neurons”. 2007.

www.greenspine.ca/media/neuron_culture_800px.jpg

The same bit of information . . .either can be found in more than one place in the brain . . .

or can be arrived at from different directions.

This type of “redundancy” protects the information from being lost.

Khor, Hwei-Ling.  "Differentiation and properties of embryonal carcinoma cell derived neurons."  Bioelectronics Group Max-Planck-Institute for Polymer Research www.mpip-mainz.mpg.de/.../inc/p19/neurons.jpg

De Koninck, Paul.  "Hippocampal neurons (green) and glial cells (red).“ 2007.  www.greenspine.ca/en/neurons_and_glial_cells.html

Like the branches of trees, dendrites grow from the center of the neuron outward.

Connie Gulick 2006

This means you cannot learn advanced material without knowing and understanding the basic information on that subject. Trying to learn the advanced stuff without knowing the basic stuff, is like trying to draw the branches of a tree by starting with the twigs, then the larger branches, and then the trunk. This information about the brain’s physiology gives us these Major Points About Learning:

Major Points About Learning

1. Your brain was born to learn, loves to learn, and knows how to learn.

2. You learn what you practice.

3. You learn what you practice because when you are practicing your brain is growing new fibers (dendrites) and connecting them (at synapses). This is what learning is.

• Practice is making mistakes, correcting mistakes, learning from them, and trying over, again and again.• Making and learning from mistakes is a natural and necessary part of learning.

4. Learning takes time because you need time to grow and connect dendrites.

5. If you don’t use it, you can lose it. Dendrites and synapses can begin to disappear if you don’t use them (if you don’t practice what you have learned).6. Your emotions affect your brain’s ability to learn, think, and remember.

• Self-doubt, fear, etc., prevent your brain from learning, thinking, and remembering.

• Confidence, interest, etc., help your brain learn, think, and remember.

7. Remember, you are a natural-born learner.

Smilkstein, Rita. We’re Born to Learn. 103.