The Powers Of Mind

BIG QUESTION:
HOW DO WE DEVELOP THE
POWERS OF MIND?

Discuss that understanding the left and right brain functions
may help in improving one’s learning
Explore mind-mapping techniques suited to right brain- or left
brain-dominant thinking styles, and
Make a plan to improve learning using both left and right
brain development

You are driving down the road in your car on a wild, stormy
night, when you pass by a bus stop and you see three people
waiting for the bus:
a. An old lady who looks as if she is about to die
b. An old friend who once saved your life
c. The perfect partner you have dreaming about
Knowing that there can only be one passenger in your car,
whom would you choose?

Acting on an anonymous phone call the police raid a house to
arrest a suspected murderer. They don’t know what he looks
like but they know his name is John and that he is inside the
house. The police bust in on a carpenter, a lorry driver, a
mechanic and a fireman all playing poker. Without hesitation or
communication of any kin, they immediately arrest the fireman.
How do they know they’ve got their man.

A man lives in the penthouse of an apartment building. Every
morning he takes the elevator down to the lobby and leaves the
building. Upon his return, however, he can only travel halfway
up in the lift and has to walk the rest of the way- unless it’s
raining. What is the explanation for this?

A man and his son are in a car crash. The father is killed and the
child is taken in the hospital gravely injured. When he gest
there, the surgeon says, ‘I can’t operate on this boy – for he is
my son!!!!’ How can this possibly be?

CEREBRUM
CEREBELLUM
BRAIN STEM

It connects the spinal cord and the brain. It
controls functions that keep the people alive such
as breathing, heart rate, blood pressure and food
digestion.

It controls voluntary movement. You form the
thought and then an area in the cerebellum
translates your will into action.

The signal jumps from the end of the dendrite
on one cell across the space called a SYNAPSE,
to the dendrite of another cell with the help of
chemicals called NEUROTRANSMITTERS.

It is the largest of the three brain sections, accounts for
about 85 percent of the brain’s weight and has four
lobes.

FRONTAL
LOBE
PARIETAL LOBE
OCCIPITAL LOBE
TEMPORAL LOBE

P A R I E TA L L O B E
F R O N TA L L O B E
O C C I P I TA L L O B E
T E M P O R A L L O B E
It helps people to understand what they see
and feel
It determines personality and emotions
It is for vision
It is for hearing and word recognition abilities

There is a consensus among researchers that
brain cells regenerate throughout life, but that
new growth happens very slowly after a certain
age.
DOUG POSTELS, PEDIATRIC NEUROSURGEON
IN NEW ORLEANS

S Y N A P T O G E N E S I S
Creation of pathways for brain cells to
communicate

In situations where doctors removed parts of the
brains of patients younger than 3 to correct
disorders, the remaining parts of the brain sections
developed to assume the role of the portions
those doctor removed. But when physicians
performed the same surgery on older patients, that
adaptability function did not occur.

“We know from experiments that if you deprived
people of intellectual stimulation and put them in
a dark room, that produces permanent changes in
the brain. That occurs most dramatically before
age 3. After that age, it’s impossible to ethically do
a study.”

“The question scientists can’t answer
now is if the damage is permanent.”
-SUE RUSCHE, CO-AUTHOR OF FALSE MESSENGERS A BOOK ON
HOW ADDICTIVE DRUGS CHANGE THE BRAIN

Inhalants destroy the outer lining of nerve
cells and make them unable to
communicate with one another

In 1993, more than 60 young people died from
sniffing inhalants.
According to National Families in Action, a drug
education Center based in Atlanta.

Marijuana use hinders memory, learning,
judgment and reaction times
Steroid cause aggression and violent
mood swings

Drug destroys neurons that
make serotonin, a chemical
crucial in controlling sleep,
violence, mood swings and
sexual urges.

Which of these apply to you?
I am very organized.
I remember faces more than names.
I think things through before making a decision.
If someone’s mad at me, I can tell even without
the person saying a word.
I work best in a quiet place.
I daydream a lot.
I hate taking risks.
I tend to get emotional.
I make a to-do-list.
I trust my “gut instinct”

There is nothing good or bad about either
preference. Both orientations can be equally
successful in accomplishing a single task;
however, one may be more appropriate over
the other depending on the situation

THE BRAIN’S LEFT AND RIGHT SIDES SEEM TO
WORK TOGETHER BETTER IN MATHEMATICALLY
GIFTED MIDDLE-SCHOOL YOUTH
Mathematically gifted teens did better than
average-ability teens and college students
on tests that required the two halves of the
brain to cooperate.
-April issue of Neuropsychology, published by APA

MATH GIFTEDNESS SEEMS TO FAVOUR
BOYS OVER GIRLS, APPEARING SIX TO
13 TIMES MORE OFTEN.

THE BOYS VIEWED LETTER PATTERNS FLASHED ON THE
LEFT OR RIGHT SIDES OF A COMPUTER SCREEN.
THE LETTER PATTERNS WERE PRESENTED IN THREE
CONDITIONS- ONE-SIDED, TO THE RIGHT HEMISPHERE
(LEFT EYE); ONE SIDED TO THE LEFT HEMISPHERE
(RIGHT EYE); OR BILATERALLY (BOTH EYES)
THERE WERE TWO TYPES OF TASKS- LOCAL AND
GLOBAL
LEFT HEMISPHERE- PROCESSING VISUAL PARTS
RIGHT HEMISPHERE- IS MORE ADEPT IN ANALYZING
VISUAL “WHOLES”

THE MATHEMATICALLY GIFTED BOYS SHOWED NO SUCH
HEMISPHERIC DIFFERENCES.
THE MATH-GIFTED WERE SLOWER ON ONE SIDED
TRIALS, BUT WHEN TASK ASKED BOTH SIDES OF THE
BRAIN TO WORK TOGETHER, THEY WERE FASTER THAN
AVERAGE BOYS.

“It’s not that you have a special math module
somewhere in your brain, but rather that the brain’s
particular function organization- which allows right
hemisphere contributions to be better integrated into
the overall cognitive/behavioral equation –
predisposes it towards the use of high- level imagery
and spatial skills, which in turn happen to be very
useful when it comes to doing math reasoning.”
-Michael O’Boyle, PhD

- A graphical technique that mirrors the
way the brain works
- Invented by Tony Buzan
- Helps make thinking visible and helps
organize ideas and thoughts
- Used for note taking, revision planning,
planning for writing, and problem
solving
- It involves the use of the left and right
brain

Turn the page on its side (landscape). Use plain paper.
Draw the central image using different colors. The central
image should encapsulate the subject of the map.
Add the branches representing the subject’s main topics or
themes using key words or images.

Add detail with more key words and images. Use color.
Print the words clearly.
Use arrows to connect linked ideas.

- Research shows that the brain is more like a muscle. It
changes and gets stronger when you use it.
- Muscles become larger and stronger with exercise and tend
to shrink and weaken when not in use.
- Inside the cortex of the brain are billions of tiny nerve cells,
called neurons
- Nerve cells have branches connecting them to other cells
in a complicated network.
- When you learn new things, these tiny connections in the
brain actually multiply and get stronger.

Brain of animal living
with other animals
and toys
Nerves of animal
living in bare cage

- Scientists started thinking that the human brain could
develop and change when they studied animal brains
- They found out that animals who were exercising their brains
by playing toys and interacting with other animals were
smarter and were better at solving problems and learning
new things
- Their whole brain were 10% heavier than the brains of
animals who lived alone without toys

- Babies brain cells get larger and grow new
connections between them
- These new, stronger connections make the child’s
brain stronger and smarter

- With practice, you can learn to do anything
- The more the person learns, the easier it gets to learn new
things because their brain muscles have gotten stronger
- You just need to build up your reading muscles

EXERCISE AND PRACTICE - by practicing, you make your
brain stronger, you learn skills that lets you use your brain
in a smarter way.

- One of the best basketball players at all
time.
- His average points per game is the
highest in NBA history (3.15)
- Has 11 MVP awards. 5 from the regular
season and 6 for the finals

When he was a sophomore in high
school, he didn’t even make a team. “It was
embarrassing not making the team”, he
says. “They posted the roster (list of players)
and it wasn’t there for a long, long time
without my name on it. I remember being
really mad, too, because there was a guy
who made it that wasn’t as good as me.”

This fueled Jordan’s desire to improve.
“Whenever I was working out and got tired
and figured out I ought to stop, I’d close
my eyes and see the list in the locker room
without my name on it and that usually got
me going again.”

Ruby Sutton – physical education teacher at
Jordan’s high school
“I would normally get to school between 7
and 7:30. Michael would be at school
before I would. Every time I’d come and
open doors, I’d hear the basketball. Fall,
wintertime, summertime. Most of the
mornings I had to run Michael out of the
gym.”

The Powers Of Mind

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