1. This is Your Brain. This Is How It Works.

2. Keep in mind there are two distinct sides with different functions
Parts of the brain:
Keep in mind there are two distinct sides with different functions
Notes
Cerebellum controls your balance, body posture, and muscle functions.
By age 2, it has almost reached its adult size.

3. The Brainstem (Pathway to the Body)
Base of brain
Unconscious work
Autonomic functions
(survival)
The brainstem controls unconscious work such as breathing, heartbeat, and blood pressure. This area of the brain holds the key to life itself.

4. The Cerebellum (Balance)
“little brain”
Large in size
11% of brain’s weight
Center of balance
The cerebellum is the key to balance, maintenance of body posture, and coordination of muscle function. The cerebellum ‘remembers’ such movements learned at a young age such as walking and grabbing.

5. The brain has 4 areas called lobes
Frontal
Parietal
Temporal
Occiptal

6. The Frontal Lobes (Problem Solving)
Largest part
Move your body
Highly developed
Forms your personality
The frontal lobes are responsible for allowing you to think of the past, plan for the future, focus your attention, solve problems, make decisions, and have conversation with others. This region is also responsible for thinking creatively and analytically in a problem-solving mode.

7. The Parietal Lobes (Touching)
Two major divisions
Anterior and posterior
Senses hot and cold, hard and soft, and pain.
Taste and smell
Helps integrate the senses
The brain must always know where each part of the body is located and its relation to it’s surroundings. The anterior part (front) is responsible for receiving incoming sensory stimuli. The posterior part (rear) is continuously analyzing to give a person a sense of spatial awareness.

8. The Temporal Lobes (Hearing)
Process auditory stimuli
Subdivisions
Wernicke’s Area
Broca’s Area
Subdivisions cope with hearing, language, and some aspects to memory. Wernicke’s Area is critical for speech including reading. It allows us to comprehend or interpret speech and to words together correctly so they make sense. Broca’s area is behind the frontal lobes. This area is the center of our speech. It also relates to other language areas such as writing and reading.

9. The Occipital Lobes (Seeing)
Located at lower central back of brain
Processes visual stimuli
This area gives a person the ability to see and observe.

10. Taking sides….two sides that is!
Two sides or hemispheres of the brain: LEFT and RIGHT
We have two cerebral hemispheres connected by the corpus callosum. This is a bundle of nerves that allows each side of the brain to communicate with each other.
Each side of the brain processes things differently.
It is an outdated assumption that “artsy” type people are right-brained.

11. Taking sides…. how the two sides process information that is!
Left Brain
Logical
Sequential
Rational
Analytical
Objective
Looks at parts
Right Brain
Random
Intuitive
Holistic
Synthesizing
Subjective
Looks at wholes

12. Left Hemisphere processes things more in parts and sequentially
recognizes positive emotions
Identified with practicality and rationality
Understands symbols and representations
Processes rapid auditory information faster than the right (crucial for separating the sounds of speech into distinct units for comprehension)
is responsible for language development. It develops slower in boys, that is why males usually develop more language problems than females.

13. Right Hemisphere
Recognizes negative emotions
High level mathematicians, problem solvers, and chess players use
The “non-verbal” side
Responds to touch and music (sensory)
Intuitive
Responsive to color and shape
Emotional and originative

14. Taking sides…. what information the two sides recognize!
Left Brain
Letters
Numbers
Words
Right Brain
Faces
Places
Objects
based on Sousa (1995, p. 88)

15. Taking sides….take the test!
Hemispheric Dominance Inventory Test at
Then learn more at:

16. References
Bandura, A.(1994). Social learning theory. From Theory into practice database. (Kearsley, G.). Retrieved March 25, 2003 from the World Wide Web:
Bloom's Taxonomy: (2003). retrieved December 2, 2003, from
Chicurel, M. (1995) The Inner Life of Neurons, retrieved on-line,
Doolittle, P. (2001). Multimedia Learning: Empirical Results and Practical Applications [Online]. Available [2002, Aug 18].
Gaines, B.R. & Shaw, M. (1995). Collaboration Through Concept Maps. Retrieved November 20, 2002, from:
Sousa, D. R. (1995). How the Brain Learns. Reston, VA: NASSP

17. Any Questions?