The Nature of Memory

Scientists now understand some aspects of memory. For example, memory is not found in one place but includes a pathway of neurons and connections; multiple systems are involved such as the fact that memory is stored in one place with its corresponding emotion stored in a different part of the brain. There are from 200 to 400 billion neurons in the brain with each having around 10,000 connections. Thus memory is complex and a comprehensive understanding of how it works is lacking. Drugs can be used to block or enhance memory, the fight-or-flight response results in strong memories, and hormones are involved in the engraving of memory into cells. Positron emission tomography scans are used to record the firing of neurons which hold memories and show memory moving as a current across the brain during wake and sleep cycles.

Question 2: How can one help a child to remember?

Bjorkund and Bjorkund (1992) discuss how the memory works in a young child. A child must attend and perceive an

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resulted from findings that may or may not be related. Question 5: Are brain-research findings relevant to educators? Brandt (1999) reports that although there exists a controversy about the usefulness of brain-based research findings, to exclude these findings would be a mistake. Brandt argues that cognitive science and neuroscience are "two sides of the same coin;" each brings relevance to findings from the other. An example of brain-based findings includes that enrichment plays an important role in early education. Studies with rats demonstrated that complex environments resulted in rat brains that were of extra weight and thickness compared to those kept in isolation. This was due to the forming of greater numbers of connections among neurons. It was also found that this response occurred at all ages, which is also true for humans. Some conclude that these findings can be applied to the educational environment, with the position that an enriched situation would result in greater learning. Others downplay the concept of enrichment, pointing out that the complex environment in the rat experiments only resembled that which the rat would experience in their natural habitat, and thus conclusions can not be drawn regarding
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Approximate Word count = 2401
Approximate Pages = 10 (250 words per page)

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