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Brain Rules (Updated and Expanded): 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School
Most of us have no idea what's really going on inside our heads. Yet brain scientists have uncovered details every business leader, parent, and teacher should know--like the need for physical activity to get your brain working its best.
How do we learn? What exactly do sleep and stress do to our brains? Why is multi-tasking a myth? Why is it so easy to forget--and so important to repeat new knowledge? Is it true that men and women have different brains?
In Brain Rules, Dr. John Medina, a molecular biologist, shares his lifelong interest in how the brain sciences might influence the way we teach our children and the way we work. In each chapter, he describes a brain rule--what scientists know for sure about how our brains work--and then offers transformative ideas for our daily lives.
Medina's fascinating stories and infectious sense of humor breathe life into brain science. You'll learn why Michael Jordan was no good at baseball. You'll peer over a surgeon's shoulder as he proves that most of us have a Jennifer Aniston neuron. You'll meet a boy who has an amazing memory for music but can't tie his own shoes.
You will discover
Every brain is wired differently
Exercise improves cognition
We are designed to never stop learning and exploring
Memories are volatile
Sleep is powerfully linked with the ability to learn
Vision trumps all of the other senses
Stress changes the way we learn
In the end, you'll understand how your brain really works--and how to get the most out of it.
How do we learn? What exactly do sleep and stress do to our brains? Why is multi-tasking a myth? Why is it so easy to forget--and so important to repeat new knowledge? Is it true that men and women have different brains?
In Brain Rules, Dr. John Medina, a molecular biologist, shares his lifelong interest in how the brain sciences might influence the way we teach our children and the way we work. In each chapter, he describes a brain rule--what scientists know for sure about how our brains work--and then offers transformative ideas for our daily lives.
Medina's fascinating stories and infectious sense of humor breathe life into brain science. You'll learn why Michael Jordan was no good at baseball. You'll peer over a surgeon's shoulder as he proves that most of us have a Jennifer Aniston neuron. You'll meet a boy who has an amazing memory for music but can't tie his own shoes.
You will discover
Every brain is wired differently
Exercise improves cognition
We are designed to never stop learning and exploring
Memories are volatile
Sleep is powerfully linked with the ability to learn
Vision trumps all of the other senses
Stress changes the way we learn
In the end, you'll understand how your brain really works--and how to get the most out of it.
304 pages, Paperback
First published February 26, 2008
4045 people are currently reading
57288 people want to read
About the author
John Medina
57 books559 followersDR. JOHN J. MEDINA, a developmental molecular biologist, has a lifelong fascination with how the mind reacts to and organizes information. He is the author of the New York Times bestseller "Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School" -- a provocative book that takes on the way our schools and work environments are designed. His latest book is a must-read for parents and early-childhood educators: "Brain Rules for Baby: How to Raise a Smart and Happy Child from Zero to Five."
Medina is an affiliate Professor of Bioengineering at the University of Washington School of Medicine. He lives in Seattle, Washington, with his wife and two boys. www.brainrules.net
Medina is an affiliate Professor of Bioengineering at the University of Washington School of Medicine. He lives in Seattle, Washington, with his wife and two boys. www.brainrules.net
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 1,972 reviews
June 21, 2008
I think I would give this book 3.5 stars if I could.
The book discusses "12 principles for surviving and thriving at work, home, and school." The real focus seems feels like how we can use this to improve schools.
The 12 rules are:
EXERCISE | Rule #1: Exercise boosts brain power.
SURVIVAL | Rule #2: The human brain evolved, too.
WIRING | Rule #3: Every brain is wired differently.
ATTENTION | Rule #4: We don't pay attention to boring things.
SHORT-TERM MEMORY | Rule #5: Repeat to remember.
LONG-TERM MEMORY | Rule #6: Remember to repeat.
SLEEP | Rule #7: Sleep well, think well.
STRESS | Rule #8: Stressed brains don't learn the same way as non-stressed
SENSORY INTEGRATION | Rule #9: Stimulate more of the senses.
VISION | Rule #10: Vision trumps all other senses.
GENDER | Rule #11: Male and female brains are different.
EXPLORATION | Rule #12: We are powerful and natural explorers.
The underlying tone really seems focused on improving education and schools. He covers each of the different principles and backs it up with research.
Some sections are better than others. He's not quite as engaging as Dr. Oliver Sacks, but in the overall context of putting things together to form an overall idea of improving education based on how the brain works, it is pretty engaging. He does do a good job of keeping it light and easy to understand. At times this almost gets annoying, but it does make for an easy to read book. A lot of the material I've read elsewhere, but this book does a good job of tying it all together.
There is a DVD included (I haven't had a chance to view it yet) and an accompanying web site. If you just want to get the highlights of the 12 principles, checkout the web site. If you want to get the research behind the 12 principles, get the book. The content of the website actually nicely summarizes the 12 principles.
The book discusses "12 principles for surviving and thriving at work, home, and school." The real focus seems feels like how we can use this to improve schools.
The 12 rules are:
EXERCISE | Rule #1: Exercise boosts brain power.
SURVIVAL | Rule #2: The human brain evolved, too.
WIRING | Rule #3: Every brain is wired differently.
ATTENTION | Rule #4: We don't pay attention to boring things.
SHORT-TERM MEMORY | Rule #5: Repeat to remember.
LONG-TERM MEMORY | Rule #6: Remember to repeat.
SLEEP | Rule #7: Sleep well, think well.
STRESS | Rule #8: Stressed brains don't learn the same way as non-stressed
SENSORY INTEGRATION | Rule #9: Stimulate more of the senses.
VISION | Rule #10: Vision trumps all other senses.
GENDER | Rule #11: Male and female brains are different.
EXPLORATION | Rule #12: We are powerful and natural explorers.
The underlying tone really seems focused on improving education and schools. He covers each of the different principles and backs it up with research.
Some sections are better than others. He's not quite as engaging as Dr. Oliver Sacks, but in the overall context of putting things together to form an overall idea of improving education based on how the brain works, it is pretty engaging. He does do a good job of keeping it light and easy to understand. At times this almost gets annoying, but it does make for an easy to read book. A lot of the material I've read elsewhere, but this book does a good job of tying it all together.
There is a DVD included (I haven't had a chance to view it yet) and an accompanying web site. If you just want to get the highlights of the 12 principles, checkout the web site. If you want to get the research behind the 12 principles, get the book. The content of the website actually nicely summarizes the 12 principles.
February 7, 2017
I kind of loved this book because it give a lot of the "why" - the science - behind a lot of best practices. This is the kind of thing that helps me change my behavior - when I know how it works under the hood.
The book is broken into a series of "brain rules" on different subjects. I'll list main takeaways:
Exercise
We all know it's good for us and it feels good and we should do it. The best quote here was "Physical activity is cognitive candy." - also "A lifetime of exercise results in a sometimes astonishing elevation in cognitive performance, compared with those who are sedentary." The basic science is that blood flow through your brain is good for it and increases brain activity. Tip: exercise before you need your brain to be at its best.
Sleep
First, great to have validation that there really are early birds and night owls. I'm definitely a night owl, despite my kids best efforts. The interesting implications of this for a company are that people are at their best - their most productive - at different times of the day - so building a culture that is flexible and let's people work their hours is key. The science about the history of naps and the fact that the mid-afternoon slump is a real thing was also very interesting. The studies about sleep loss being as cognitively limiting as alcohol were also illuminating. Another study showed sleeping on a problem really does work.
But the most interesting thing about the sleep chapter was the section on dreaming and what it might mean. In particular, dreams may at least in large part be a method of neural network training to enforce learning. "humans appear to replay certain learning experiences at night, during the slow-wave phase."
Stress
Too much stress is bad for you - our systems weren't designed for constant stress. If you have too much adreline in your system constantly it leads to scarred blood vessels and then eventually a stroke. But a little stress is good - our brains will remember things that we are stressed about better (eg avoid predators on the savannah). But too much (chronic) stress can overwhelms the brain and hurts learning and can even make you depressed. Chronic stress is often the culprit in grief, or high anxiety households. The worst kind of stress is the feeling that you have no control over the problem— you are helpless.
Wiring
“What you do and learn in life physically changes what your brain looks like— it literally rewires it.”
Attention
I’ve said for a long time that humans don’t remember facts, we remember facts couched in emotions. We can easily recall all the strong emotional moments of our lives as if they happened yesterday. Now it’s great to have the science behind this: emotions release dopamine, which greatly aids in memory and information processing. This means that people will relate better to products that bring up positive emotions for them. It also means that an emotional hook to lead into an idea or product will always work as it triggers the emotion in the person.
“Emotionally charged events are better remembered—for longer, and with more accuracy—than neutral events.”
Another interesting thing mentioned in this chapter is the 10 minute rule. We only have about 10 minutes of attention on something before we start to tune out. As the book says, “This fact suggests a teaching and business imperative: Find a way to get and hold somebody’s attention for 10 minutes, then do it again.”
To get an idea to stick you have to give people the mental model for it first - “meaning before details”. Specifically, you need to: “Give the general idea first, before diving into details, and you will see a 40 percent improvement in understanding.” And then you also have to simplify and hammer home concepts and let people digest them - force-feeding too many concepts at once won’t sink in.
In terms of paying attention (vs automatic things like riding a bicycle), “Multitasking, when it comes to paying attention, is a myth.” - the brain can only pay attention to one thing at a time.
Memory
There are different types of memory: declarative (I can remember my address and SSN), non declarative (I can remember how to ride a bike), short term, and long term. Short term memory isn’t converted to long term easily: “People usually forget 90 percent of what they learn in a class within 30 days. And the majority of this forgetting occurs within the first few hours after class.”. Keys to doing so are coding in emotion (why word association works), and repetition (“repeat to remember”). Also, thinking about what tree the person will mentally group the information and how to increase entry points or create strong ones.
Interestingly, “Memory worked best, it appeared, if the environmental conditions at retrieval mimicked the environmental conditions at encoding.”. This means if you learn something sad you will remember it better if you get sad again. Fascinating. This makes sense, as our brains must group similar patterns it remembers together. To get practical, you can create science, art, language stations to help people remember better.
We all know this to be true - our memory isn’t perfect. This is because we remember patterns, not facts or single instances. “Our brains give us only an approximate view of reality, because they mix new knowledge with past memories and store them together as one.”
Another tidbit I liked, that fits in the “repeat to remember” bucket: “A great deal of research shows that thinking or talking about an event immediately after it has occurred enhances memory for that event”. Basically the more an idea can be repeated - especially in timed intervals - the more chance it has of being encoded from short term to long term memory.
Sensory Integration
We remember data from each of our senses, and we learn best if we stimulate multiple senses concurrently. You remember better if you see AND hear something, or even if given words and pictures. Smells or sounds or tastes can trigger additional associations or emotions and help us create positive or negative associations to things we see or do. This is why people who haven’t adopted digital reading say things like “I love the smell of a good book”, this is why smelling fresh roasted coffee is a key part of Starbucks playbook. Smells have the power to bring back memories that are associated with them.
Vision
Vision trumps and overrides all other senses. I loved the story about the wine experts who were fooled by white wine with red dye in it because their eyes said it was red wine. Fascinating to read about the science of how the brain takes in the signals from the eyes, combines both signals, and applies pattern matching to fill in details. This means the brain has creative freedom to insert whatever it wants into our vision.
Practical applications: our vision is caught by bold colors, orientations, motion. We remember images better than words because it’s easier to pattern match the image, so use images in presentations.
Music
Music makes us more empathic - we can better recognize the emotions in speech, which helps in social abilities. Making music is 10x better for kids than listening to baby einstein CD’s. Listening to music reduced cortisol and stress.
Gender
Boys and girls have different brain structures. When under stress, men remember the gist of things better, and women remember details and emotions. These quotes describe it well:
“The difference between girls’ and boys’ communication could be described as the addition of a single powerful word. Boys might say, “Do this.” Girls would say, “Let’s do this.”
“When girl best friends communicate with each other, they lean in, maintain eye contact, and do a lot of talking. They use their sophisticated verbal talents to cement their relationships. Boys never do this. They rarely face each other directly, preferring either parallel or oblique angles. They make little eye contact, their gaze always casting about the room. They do not use verbal information to cement their relationships. Instead, commotion seems to be the central currency of a little boy’s social economy. Doing things physically together is the glue that cements their relationships.”
“In our evolutionary history, having a team that could understand both the gist and details of a given stressful situation helped us conquer the world. Why would the world of business be exempted from that advantage? Having an executive team or work group capable of simultaneously understanding both the emotional forests and the trees of a stressful project, such as a merger, might be a marriage made in business heaven. It could even affect the bottom line.”
Exploration
We learn by doing, by exploring the world. We take pleasure in that exploration. Discovery based learning is best. Medical school offers the best on the job learning - other types of education should do better to model it. Learn and be curious.
The book is broken into a series of "brain rules" on different subjects. I'll list main takeaways:
Exercise
We all know it's good for us and it feels good and we should do it. The best quote here was "Physical activity is cognitive candy." - also "A lifetime of exercise results in a sometimes astonishing elevation in cognitive performance, compared with those who are sedentary." The basic science is that blood flow through your brain is good for it and increases brain activity. Tip: exercise before you need your brain to be at its best.
Sleep
First, great to have validation that there really are early birds and night owls. I'm definitely a night owl, despite my kids best efforts. The interesting implications of this for a company are that people are at their best - their most productive - at different times of the day - so building a culture that is flexible and let's people work their hours is key. The science about the history of naps and the fact that the mid-afternoon slump is a real thing was also very interesting. The studies about sleep loss being as cognitively limiting as alcohol were also illuminating. Another study showed sleeping on a problem really does work.
But the most interesting thing about the sleep chapter was the section on dreaming and what it might mean. In particular, dreams may at least in large part be a method of neural network training to enforce learning. "humans appear to replay certain learning experiences at night, during the slow-wave phase."
Stress
Too much stress is bad for you - our systems weren't designed for constant stress. If you have too much adreline in your system constantly it leads to scarred blood vessels and then eventually a stroke. But a little stress is good - our brains will remember things that we are stressed about better (eg avoid predators on the savannah). But too much (chronic) stress can overwhelms the brain and hurts learning and can even make you depressed. Chronic stress is often the culprit in grief, or high anxiety households. The worst kind of stress is the feeling that you have no control over the problem— you are helpless.
Wiring
“What you do and learn in life physically changes what your brain looks like— it literally rewires it.”
Attention
I’ve said for a long time that humans don’t remember facts, we remember facts couched in emotions. We can easily recall all the strong emotional moments of our lives as if they happened yesterday. Now it’s great to have the science behind this: emotions release dopamine, which greatly aids in memory and information processing. This means that people will relate better to products that bring up positive emotions for them. It also means that an emotional hook to lead into an idea or product will always work as it triggers the emotion in the person.
“Emotionally charged events are better remembered—for longer, and with more accuracy—than neutral events.”
Another interesting thing mentioned in this chapter is the 10 minute rule. We only have about 10 minutes of attention on something before we start to tune out. As the book says, “This fact suggests a teaching and business imperative: Find a way to get and hold somebody’s attention for 10 minutes, then do it again.”
To get an idea to stick you have to give people the mental model for it first - “meaning before details”. Specifically, you need to: “Give the general idea first, before diving into details, and you will see a 40 percent improvement in understanding.” And then you also have to simplify and hammer home concepts and let people digest them - force-feeding too many concepts at once won’t sink in.
In terms of paying attention (vs automatic things like riding a bicycle), “Multitasking, when it comes to paying attention, is a myth.” - the brain can only pay attention to one thing at a time.
Memory
There are different types of memory: declarative (I can remember my address and SSN), non declarative (I can remember how to ride a bike), short term, and long term. Short term memory isn’t converted to long term easily: “People usually forget 90 percent of what they learn in a class within 30 days. And the majority of this forgetting occurs within the first few hours after class.”. Keys to doing so are coding in emotion (why word association works), and repetition (“repeat to remember”). Also, thinking about what tree the person will mentally group the information and how to increase entry points or create strong ones.
Interestingly, “Memory worked best, it appeared, if the environmental conditions at retrieval mimicked the environmental conditions at encoding.”. This means if you learn something sad you will remember it better if you get sad again. Fascinating. This makes sense, as our brains must group similar patterns it remembers together. To get practical, you can create science, art, language stations to help people remember better.
We all know this to be true - our memory isn’t perfect. This is because we remember patterns, not facts or single instances. “Our brains give us only an approximate view of reality, because they mix new knowledge with past memories and store them together as one.”
Another tidbit I liked, that fits in the “repeat to remember” bucket: “A great deal of research shows that thinking or talking about an event immediately after it has occurred enhances memory for that event”. Basically the more an idea can be repeated - especially in timed intervals - the more chance it has of being encoded from short term to long term memory.
Sensory Integration
We remember data from each of our senses, and we learn best if we stimulate multiple senses concurrently. You remember better if you see AND hear something, or even if given words and pictures. Smells or sounds or tastes can trigger additional associations or emotions and help us create positive or negative associations to things we see or do. This is why people who haven’t adopted digital reading say things like “I love the smell of a good book”, this is why smelling fresh roasted coffee is a key part of Starbucks playbook. Smells have the power to bring back memories that are associated with them.
Vision
Vision trumps and overrides all other senses. I loved the story about the wine experts who were fooled by white wine with red dye in it because their eyes said it was red wine. Fascinating to read about the science of how the brain takes in the signals from the eyes, combines both signals, and applies pattern matching to fill in details. This means the brain has creative freedom to insert whatever it wants into our vision.
Practical applications: our vision is caught by bold colors, orientations, motion. We remember images better than words because it’s easier to pattern match the image, so use images in presentations.
Music
Music makes us more empathic - we can better recognize the emotions in speech, which helps in social abilities. Making music is 10x better for kids than listening to baby einstein CD’s. Listening to music reduced cortisol and stress.
Gender
Boys and girls have different brain structures. When under stress, men remember the gist of things better, and women remember details and emotions. These quotes describe it well:
“The difference between girls’ and boys’ communication could be described as the addition of a single powerful word. Boys might say, “Do this.” Girls would say, “Let’s do this.”
“When girl best friends communicate with each other, they lean in, maintain eye contact, and do a lot of talking. They use their sophisticated verbal talents to cement their relationships. Boys never do this. They rarely face each other directly, preferring either parallel or oblique angles. They make little eye contact, their gaze always casting about the room. They do not use verbal information to cement their relationships. Instead, commotion seems to be the central currency of a little boy’s social economy. Doing things physically together is the glue that cements their relationships.”
“In our evolutionary history, having a team that could understand both the gist and details of a given stressful situation helped us conquer the world. Why would the world of business be exempted from that advantage? Having an executive team or work group capable of simultaneously understanding both the emotional forests and the trees of a stressful project, such as a merger, might be a marriage made in business heaven. It could even affect the bottom line.”
Exploration
We learn by doing, by exploring the world. We take pleasure in that exploration. Discovery based learning is best. Medical school offers the best on the job learning - other types of education should do better to model it. Learn and be curious.
March 26, 2011
كتاب رائع، يبحث في العديد من أبحاث الدماغ ليخرج بـ 12 قانون، معرفتها تساعدك لكي تزيد كفائة الدماغ في العمل، المنزل، والمدرسة. يأتي بعدة فوائد وأمثلة وأبحاث تحت كل قانون.
القوانين هي (باختصار، الكتاب يفصل فيها طبعاً):
1-الرياضة:
التمارين الرياضية تقوي القدرات العقلية.
-أدمغتنا تحب أن تتحرك أجسامنا
- الرياضة تزيد نسبة تدفق الأوكسيجين للدماغ، ذلك يزيد نشاط المخ
- الرياضة تؤثر على عمل خلايا المخ. فهي تزيد وتسارع تكوينها، تساعدها على البقاء أكثر، وتجعلها أكثر قدرة على مكافحة الضرر والقلق.
2- البقاء:
الدماغ البشري تطور حسب التحديات التي واجهت البشر وتكيف لحل المشكلات التي تواجههم منذ القدم.
3- التميز:
كل دماغ يعمل بطريقة مختلفة.
- لا يوجد أي شخصين لهما نفس تركيب الدماغ، ولا حتى التوائم.
- انظمتنا الدراسية تتجاهل اختلاف أدمغة البشر عندما تحتم مقررات معينة تدرس بنفس الطريقة لكل الأطفال بنفس العمر.
-شركات مثل أمازون تراعي فوارق الاختلاف بين الناس وتفكيرهم بأن تخصص تجربة استخدام خاصة لكل شخص بناءً على مواضيع اهتمامه.
4- التركيز:
لا نركز على الأشياء المملة.
-من السهل علينا التركيز على أشياء مثل المشاعر، الأخطار التي تواجهنا، والجنس.
5- الذاكرة قصيرة المدى:
التكرار يساعد الحفظ.
- الدماغ يستطيع فقط حفظ سبع أجزاء من المعلومات لمدة 30 ثانية. اذا كنت تريد حفظ شيء لأكثر من ذلك، فعليك تكراره واعادة تعريض نفسك للمعلومات.
6- الذاكرة طويلة المدى:
- تكوين ذكريات وتعزيزها في الدماغ يأخذ الكثير، الكثير من الوقت. بعض المعلومات التس نتعلمها في الصف الأول لا يتم ترسيخها في المخ بشكل كامل الا اذا بلغنا الجامعة.
- النسيان يساعدنا على ترتيب أولوياتنا.
- اذا اردت ان تتذكر، أعد المعلومة مراراً وتكراراً، لفترات مختلفة من الوقت.
7- النوم:
نم جيداً، فكر جيداً
- الدماغ لا ينام. بل هو يعمل في كل الأوقات.
-هناك حرب قائمة في الدماغ. كل طرف ينتصر مرة، ويخسر مرة أخرى. نتيجة الربح والخسارة هي دائرة النوم والصحو.
8- القلق:
دماغ قلق لا يتعلم كما يتعلم دماغ غير قلق.
- الدماغ مؤهل للتعامل مع القلق الذي يستمر لأقل من 30 ثانية. لكنه ليس مؤهل للقلق الذي يدوم أكثر من ذلك خصوصاً في الحالات التي نشعر أنه ليس لدينا تحكم فيها.
- يمكن مشاهدة أثر القلق بشكل عملي في تقليص حجم الدماغ.
- القلق يؤثر سلباً على كل وظائف المخ. يؤثر على الذاكرة، على التفكير، على الحركة الجسمانية. القلق لفترات طويلة يؤثر سلباً على جهاز المناعة. تمرض أكثر عندما تكون قلق. القلق يؤذي برنامج نومك وترتيبه. تكون معرض بشكل أكبر للاكتئاب.
- الإستقرار العاطفي للمنزل هو أكبر وأهم سبب ودليل على النجاح الدراسي.
-القلق في المنزل ينعكس على عمل الشخص، لا مهرب من ذلك.
9- تكامل الحواس:
إثارة الحواس المختلفة.
- اذا أردت حفظ شيء، فإن فرصك بحفظه تزيد كلما جعلته يرتبط بحواس اضافية. فأنت أكثر قدرة على تذكر كلمة لو أنك قرأتها وسمعتها. وستكون أكثر قدرة لو أنك قرأتها وسمعتها وشممت رائحة مرتبطة بها.
10- البصر:
البصر يفوق الحواس الأخرى.
- البصر يتم بصورة عجيبة، العين لا تعمل كالكاميرا التي تلتقط الصورة ثم يعرضها لنا الدماغ. بل الدماغ يقوم بالكثير من المعالجة لما تلتقطه العينين ويرينا ما يعتقد أنه أكثر شيء منطقية.
- هناك أماكن مخصصة في الدماغ لمعالجة وتحليل المناطق التي تتحرك في الصور التي تلتقطها العينين، أماكن أخرى لتحليل الألوان، وغير ذلك.
- نصف طاقة الدماغ تذهب عادة لتحليل حاسة البصر.
11- الجنس:
أدمغة الذكور والإناث تختلف عن بعض
- أبحاث دلت على أنه في حالة القلق، فإن الرجال بشكل عام يفضلون التركيز على خلاصة الموضوع، بينما تفضل النساء التركيز على التفاصيل.
12- الاستكشاف:
نحن مستكشفين رائعين بطبيعتنا.
-----
موقع الكتاب يحوي المزيد من المعلومات:
http://www.brainrulesbook.com
القوانين هي (باختصار، الكتاب يفصل فيها طبعاً):
1-الرياضة:
التمارين الرياضية تقوي القدرات العقلية.
-أدمغتنا تحب أن تتحرك أجسامنا
- الرياضة تزيد نسبة تدفق الأوكسيجين للدماغ، ذلك يزيد نشاط المخ
- الرياضة تؤثر على عمل خلايا المخ. فهي تزيد وتسارع تكوينها، تساعدها على البقاء أكثر، وتجعلها أكثر قدرة على مكافحة الضرر والقلق.
2- البقاء:
الدماغ البشري تطور حسب التحديات التي واجهت البشر وتكيف لحل المشكلات التي تواجههم منذ القدم.
3- التميز:
كل دماغ يعمل بطريقة مختلفة.
- لا يوجد أي شخصين لهما نفس تركيب الدماغ، ولا حتى التوائم.
- انظمتنا الدراسية تتجاهل اختلاف أدمغة البشر عندما تحتم مقررات معينة تدرس بنفس الطريقة لكل الأطفال بنفس العمر.
-شركات مثل أمازون تراعي فوارق الاختلاف بين الناس وتفكيرهم بأن تخصص تجربة استخدام خاصة لكل شخص بناءً على مواضيع اهتمامه.
4- التركيز:
لا نركز على الأشياء المملة.
-من السهل علينا التركيز على أشياء مثل المشاعر، الأخطار التي تواجهنا، والجنس.
5- الذاكرة قصيرة المدى:
التكرار يساعد الحفظ.
- الدماغ يستطيع فقط حفظ سبع أجزاء من المعلومات لمدة 30 ثانية. اذا كنت تريد حفظ شيء لأكثر من ذلك، فعليك تكراره واعادة تعريض نفسك للمعلومات.
6- الذاكرة طويلة المدى:
- تكوين ذكريات وتعزيزها في الدماغ يأخذ الكثير، الكثير من الوقت. بعض المعلومات التس نتعلمها في الصف الأول لا يتم ترسيخها في المخ بشكل كامل الا اذا بلغنا الجامعة.
- النسيان يساعدنا على ترتيب أولوياتنا.
- اذا اردت ان تتذكر، أعد المعلومة مراراً وتكراراً، لفترات مختلفة من الوقت.
7- النوم:
نم جيداً، فكر جيداً
- الدماغ لا ينام. بل هو يعمل في كل الأوقات.
-هناك حرب قائمة في الدماغ. كل طرف ينتصر مرة، ويخسر مرة أخرى. نتيجة الربح والخسارة هي دائرة النوم والصحو.
8- القلق:
دماغ قلق لا يتعلم كما يتعلم دماغ غير قلق.
- الدماغ مؤهل للتعامل مع القلق الذي يستمر لأقل من 30 ثانية. لكنه ليس مؤهل للقلق الذي يدوم أكثر من ذلك خصوصاً في الحالات التي نشعر أنه ليس لدينا تحكم فيها.
- يمكن مشاهدة أثر القلق بشكل عملي في تقليص حجم الدماغ.
- القلق يؤثر سلباً على كل وظائف المخ. يؤثر على الذاكرة، على التفكير، على الحركة الجسمانية. القلق لفترات طويلة يؤثر سلباً على جهاز المناعة. تمرض أكثر عندما تكون قلق. القلق يؤذي برنامج نومك وترتيبه. تكون معرض بشكل أكبر للاكتئاب.
- الإستقرار العاطفي للمنزل هو أكبر وأهم سبب ودليل على النجاح الدراسي.
-القلق في المنزل ينعكس على عمل الشخص، لا مهرب من ذلك.
9- تكامل الحواس:
إثارة الحواس المختلفة.
- اذا أردت حفظ شيء، فإن فرصك بحفظه تزيد كلما جعلته يرتبط بحواس اضافية. فأنت أكثر قدرة على تذكر كلمة لو أنك قرأتها وسمعتها. وستكون أكثر قدرة لو أنك قرأتها وسمعتها وشممت رائحة مرتبطة بها.
10- البصر:
البصر يفوق الحواس الأخرى.
- البصر يتم بصورة عجيبة، العين لا تعمل كالكاميرا التي تلتقط الصورة ثم يعرضها لنا الدماغ. بل الدماغ يقوم بالكثير من المعالجة لما تلتقطه العينين ويرينا ما يعتقد أنه أكثر شيء منطقية.
- هناك أماكن مخصصة في الدماغ لمعالجة وتحليل المناطق التي تتحرك في الصور التي تلتقطها العينين، أماكن أخرى لتحليل الألوان، وغير ذلك.
- نصف طاقة الدماغ تذهب عادة لتحليل حاسة البصر.
11- الجنس:
أدمغة الذكور والإناث تختلف عن بعض
- أبحاث دلت على أنه في حالة القلق، فإن الرجال بشكل عام يفضلون التركيز على خلاصة الموضوع، بينما تفضل النساء التركيز على التفاصيل.
12- الاستكشاف:
نحن مستكشفين رائعين بطبيعتنا.
-----
موقع الكتاب يحوي المزيد من المعلومات:
http://www.brainrulesbook.com
March 21, 2009
Brain rules is really well organized. It's a very un-boring synthesis of current neuroscience research into very comprehensible terms. I only give it four stars because the author (openly) says that the educational implications of the findings are not clear.
Some major take-aways, along with my questions and ruminations:
Attention:
Emotional arousal helps the brain learn. Number of minutes a person can pay attention to presentation style information (a lecture) is the same as their age, up to 10. After that, it’s 10. So, you need a hook every 10 minutes. In particular, a hook that resonates emotionally. BUT—has to be connected to what you’re teaching.
Brains like the gist, or general ideas first and learn better this way.
Experts forget that their audience is built up of novices.
Memory
Even long-term memory is malleable. New information makes the old long-term memory as though it were all new information.
Elaborate encoding means we are more likely to remember new information.
Repetition is key. Exactly what intervals are best is unknown.
Sleep is so important:
Really must not do meetings during nap time. Naps are healthy. We have a biological drive for a nap.
Procedural learning improves tremendously when learning and practice are separated by a period of sleep. Example—model a method for solving a math problem that can be simplified. Have student try it. Then, let them sleep on it. The next day, give several problems of that type.
sleeping between modeling and problem set triples the likelihood that a student will discover the simpler way to solve the problem.
During sleep we close out the outside world and brain works wildly to process input from the day.
We imagine the near future much more vividly than the far future. We need to work on this to make people less short sighted.
Learned Helplessness is a term we shouldn’t use. It is not kids who ask for help before they try something themselves. It’s those who have been abused at random so much that they feel they have no control over their environment.
Our stress responses are designed to solve a problem in a few minutes, not long term (ie-the saber tooth tiger either ate you or you got away.) I don’t know if I believe this, what about drought?
One of the greatest predictors of student success in school is the stability of the home life.
Gottman and Shapiro studied marriages and found that when the adults had better coping skills and were more stable, the kids physiologically changed.
Sorry for the note form on this review.
Some major take-aways, along with my questions and ruminations:
Attention:
Emotional arousal helps the brain learn. Number of minutes a person can pay attention to presentation style information (a lecture) is the same as their age, up to 10. After that, it’s 10. So, you need a hook every 10 minutes. In particular, a hook that resonates emotionally. BUT—has to be connected to what you’re teaching.
Brains like the gist, or general ideas first and learn better this way.
Experts forget that their audience is built up of novices.
Memory
Even long-term memory is malleable. New information makes the old long-term memory as though it were all new information.
Elaborate encoding means we are more likely to remember new information.
Repetition is key. Exactly what intervals are best is unknown.
Sleep is so important:
Really must not do meetings during nap time. Naps are healthy. We have a biological drive for a nap.
Procedural learning improves tremendously when learning and practice are separated by a period of sleep. Example—model a method for solving a math problem that can be simplified. Have student try it. Then, let them sleep on it. The next day, give several problems of that type.
sleeping between modeling and problem set triples the likelihood that a student will discover the simpler way to solve the problem.
During sleep we close out the outside world and brain works wildly to process input from the day.
We imagine the near future much more vividly than the far future. We need to work on this to make people less short sighted.
Learned Helplessness is a term we shouldn’t use. It is not kids who ask for help before they try something themselves. It’s those who have been abused at random so much that they feel they have no control over their environment.
Our stress responses are designed to solve a problem in a few minutes, not long term (ie-the saber tooth tiger either ate you or you got away.) I don’t know if I believe this, what about drought?
One of the greatest predictors of student success in school is the stability of the home life.
Gottman and Shapiro studied marriages and found that when the adults had better coping skills and were more stable, the kids physiologically changed.
Sorry for the note form on this review.
August 9, 2008
The content, when you can get to it, is interesting. But I find his writing style incredibly annoying -- full of anecdotes that don't really have a very tight connection to the content of the chapter. Then, midway thru the book, you learn that he finds that 10-minute chunks interspersed with anecdotes helps students pay attention in lecture. I totally accept that for an oral presentation. But in a written text, it's really annoying. I'm used to reading nonfiction that doesn't seem to be talking down to me like I'm 17.
March 29, 2016
Bullet Review:
This was a fun little book that talked about the various "oddities" of your brain and have some ideas for helping to use your brain the way it was built. I have found I really enjoy learning about the brain, as it is a strange and kinda mysterious organ - this book was no disappointment in that regard (although several topics I had read in different books).
Full Review:
(NOTE: I wasn't going to do one...and then Amazon asked me to review, and since I did buy on Kindle, I felt, oh, well, why not? So here's a "full review", as best as I can muster.)
"Brain Rules" is a fun book exploring the intricacies of the brain - what makes it tick, the way we process information and how it all links back to our ancestors surviving on the plains. John Medina has 12 "rules" of the brain, which he explains along with providing perhaps helpful tips to use the brain more fully.
I never really realized how much I liked psychology until I started to read books like this. I didn't realize psychology looked so much into how weird our brain is - which is something that has intrigued me since I watched the Illusions episode of Bill Nye as a young adult/teen. Ever since then, I've sought out books, such as this one, to learn more about our brain and how to better utilize it.
Fortunately, while this book had some overlap with other psychology texts I've read (including the Myth of Baby Mozart), there was enough new and different material that I didn't feel the book was "a waste of time" (or better, just plain repetitive). I think what really makes this book stand out is that it tries to incorporate ways to adapt to how your brain thinks - such as getting more exercise in (treadmill while typing, anyone?) or encouraging children to take music lessons (note: this is different than Baby Mozart, in that children do better when LEARNING to play an instrument, not just listening to Mozart).
Medina has a great writing style; it's incredibly informative but not too heavy-laden with psychology and biology language to make the common person stop in frustration.
I really enjoyed Brain Rules and would recommend to others who love to learn more about how their brain works and how to adapt to its idiosyncrasies. Further, I would not mind reading Medina's other works.
This was a fun little book that talked about the various "oddities" of your brain and have some ideas for helping to use your brain the way it was built. I have found I really enjoy learning about the brain, as it is a strange and kinda mysterious organ - this book was no disappointment in that regard (although several topics I had read in different books).
Full Review:
(NOTE: I wasn't going to do one...and then Amazon asked me to review, and since I did buy on Kindle, I felt, oh, well, why not? So here's a "full review", as best as I can muster.)
"Brain Rules" is a fun book exploring the intricacies of the brain - what makes it tick, the way we process information and how it all links back to our ancestors surviving on the plains. John Medina has 12 "rules" of the brain, which he explains along with providing perhaps helpful tips to use the brain more fully.
I never really realized how much I liked psychology until I started to read books like this. I didn't realize psychology looked so much into how weird our brain is - which is something that has intrigued me since I watched the Illusions episode of Bill Nye as a young adult/teen. Ever since then, I've sought out books, such as this one, to learn more about our brain and how to better utilize it.
Fortunately, while this book had some overlap with other psychology texts I've read (including the Myth of Baby Mozart), there was enough new and different material that I didn't feel the book was "a waste of time" (or better, just plain repetitive). I think what really makes this book stand out is that it tries to incorporate ways to adapt to how your brain thinks - such as getting more exercise in (treadmill while typing, anyone?) or encouraging children to take music lessons (note: this is different than Baby Mozart, in that children do better when LEARNING to play an instrument, not just listening to Mozart).
Medina has a great writing style; it's incredibly informative but not too heavy-laden with psychology and biology language to make the common person stop in frustration.
I really enjoyed Brain Rules and would recommend to others who love to learn more about how their brain works and how to adapt to its idiosyncrasies. Further, I would not mind reading Medina's other works.
February 4, 2009
This is a fabulous book I wish had been written before I started baby-making 30 years ago! It does confirm for me that I did a lot of things right as a parent, but I would have benefited as a mom from knowing things now clearly related by John Medina on when an infant is learning what much more precisely than I knew from observation and experience alone.
the information in this book is priceless for any parent and any person who intends to live life healthily, influence people positively and make a difference in the world. It should be read by anyone in psychology, psychiatry, infant and child development, parenting, and healthy living at any age/stage of life.
the information in this book is priceless for any parent and any person who intends to live life healthily, influence people positively and make a difference in the world. It should be read by anyone in psychology, psychiatry, infant and child development, parenting, and healthy living at any age/stage of life.
July 7, 2013
يحتوي الكتاب على 12 فصلاً يجعلها الكاتب قوانين تحكم العقل. غير أن ما يورده الكتاب لا يمكن جعله تحت مسمى (القوانين) بل هو تجميع لبعض مواضيع الدماغ والعقل كالرياضة والذاكرة والتطور .. . الخ ويحاول الكاتب استنتاج بعض التوصيات بناء عليها في سبيل تحسين وتطوير أساليب التدريس والتي تبدو ذات أولوية لدى الكاتب.
لا يخلو الكتاب من جديد ومفيد لكن الكاتب يفتقد إلى الأسلوب الجيد لإيصال أفكاره.كما أنه بالغ في صياغة الأمثلة والتشبيهات. أفضل الفصول هي الفصول التي ناقش فيها الذاكرة والترابطات الدماغية .
وافتقدت الفصول للترتيب الداخلي الجيد ولعله نسي أن ترتيب المعلومات يساعد على سهولة استيعابها .
الحقيقة أني لا أنصح بهذا الكتاب ...
لا يخلو الكتاب من جديد ومفيد لكن الكاتب يفتقد إلى الأسلوب الجيد لإيصال أفكاره.كما أنه بالغ في صياغة الأمثلة والتشبيهات. أفضل الفصول هي الفصول التي ناقش فيها الذاكرة والترابطات الدماغية .
وافتقدت الفصول للترتيب الداخلي الجيد ولعله نسي أن ترتيب المعلومات يساعد على سهولة استيعابها .
الحقيقة أني لا أنصح بهذا الكتاب ...
January 19, 2008
We participated in a research study led by this author last year, so I was curious to read this book. John Medina was an engaging and thought-provoking speaker, and this is an engaging and thought-provoking. It took a while to read because I had to stop and think after each section. It was relevant to teaching in many ways, but also to life in general.
September 27, 2020
3.5/5 (Bản tiếng Việt) Quyển sách rất thú vị cơ mà chất lượng dịch kém quá. (06/2020)
English Version 4.25/5
Hơn 3 tháng sau khi đọc xong quyển sách tiếng Việt, cuối cùng mình cũng đã hoàn thành bản gốc tiếng Anh. Cảm ơn tác giả đã đưa mình vào thế giới kỳ diệu của khoa học não bộ, sau đây là một vài điều thú vị mình muốn ghi chú lại
1. Tập thể dục hoặc đơn giản là chạy hay đi bộ có thể kích thích tăng cường các chức năng của não tương tự như quá trình tiến hóa hàng nghìn năm của con người từ leo trèo sang đi thẳng bằng hai chân và di chuyển qua những thảo nguyên để dến những vùng đất xa xôi khắp thế giới.
2. Cần phân biệt khả năng "làm" nhiều việc khác với khả năng "tập trung" chú ý vào nhiều việc cùng một lúc của bộ não.
3. Khi mình tưởng tượng thật nhiều chi tiết, hình dung thật nhiều ý nghĩa và hoàn cảnh xung quanh một điều gì đó, mình có thể ghi nhớ nó đậm sâu và lâu hơn.
4. Bộ não cũng giống như các tế bào cơ bắp, càng năng vận động, nó càng trở nên cứng cáp và khỏe mạnh.
5. Một cách luyện não là hãy tập kể lại hoặc trình bày lại những câu chuyện mình vừa chứng kiến, những quyển sách mình vừa đọc, những bài học mình vừa học nó sẽ giúp mình nhớ lâu hơn.
6. Quá trình học tập và tiếp nhận thông tin sẽ hiểu quả hơn nếu nhiều giác quan được cùng lúc kích thích.
Đọc quyển sách này giúp mình ôn lại các kiến thức về giải phẩu, sinh lý, sinh hóa của bộ não, một phần các kiến thức này mình đã học trong môn sinh lý học người. Rất nhiều những nghiên cứu khoa học được tác giả trình bảy khá dễ hiểu. Tựu trung, cách mà các nhà khoa học tìm ra nguyên lý hoạt động của một bộ phận nào đó là khi bộ phận đó bị tổn thương, hoặc họ trực tiếp dùng các "thần dược" khiến chúng ngưng hoạt động trong một thời gian.
Với nổ lực đưa khoa học đến với độc giả đại chúng, John mô tả những bộ phận những chi tiết sinh học như tế bào thần kinh, cấu trúc bộ não, những hiện tượng sinh lý như hô hấp, dòng chảy của quá trình nhận thức rất sống động, đưa người đọc đến thế giới của những đoạn phim hành động khoa học giả tưởng. Cách John mô tả về các nhà khoa học, các đồng nghiệp của anh cũng rất thú vị: "đó là một người đàn ông râu dài như ông già Noel...." Thực chất, John đã đang áp dụng các thủ thuật kích thích trí nhớ ngắn hạn của mình trong từng trang viết.
Giọng văn của tác giả rất hài hước, John là một người đàn ông của gia đình, rất nhiều ví dụ gợi nhớ về tuổi thơ với mẹ, các hoạt động với con. Các đọc giả đang tìm kiếm người yêu, chuẩn bị lập gia đình hoặc làm cha mẹ có thể thích thú với các chương viết về sự khác biệt của bộ não đàn ông và đàn bà, hoặc chương viết về bản năng thích khám phá của con người từ lúc còn là những đứa bé sơ sinh.
Điểm trừ: nhiều mẫu chuyện cười và các dẫn chứng đậm tính văn hóa của người Mỹ như "play fetch"(trò chơi rượt bắt -đem vật về với các chú cún), Miracle Gro là một nhãn hiệu một sản phẩm phân bón cho cây... Các bản dịch, nếu dịch không khéo người đọc khó có thể hiểu được. Cần phải có chú thích để đọc giả có thể hiểu được ý đồ của tác giả. Ngoài ra, một vài mục trình bày mình nghĩ nên có thêm biểu đồ minh họa sẽ giúp người đọc dễ hình dung hơn, vd khi viết về quá trình S và C trong việc điều hòa quá trình ngủ và buồn ngủ.
Chung quy, mình nghĩ đây là một quyển sách hay, đáng đọc. Với một bản dịch tốt, quyển sách có th��� đem lại nhiều kiến thức bổ ích cho nhiều đọc giả quan tâm đến khoa học não bộ, nghiên cứu khoa học (sinh học, sinh lý học, tâm lý học hành vi...), các giáo viên, các bậc cha mẹ...
(09/2020)
English Version 4.25/5
Hơn 3 tháng sau khi đọc xong quyển sách tiếng Việt, cuối cùng mình cũng đã hoàn thành bản gốc tiếng Anh. Cảm ơn tác giả đã đưa mình vào thế giới kỳ diệu của khoa học não bộ, sau đây là một vài điều thú vị mình muốn ghi chú lại
1. Tập thể dục hoặc đơn giản là chạy hay đi bộ có thể kích thích tăng cường các chức năng của não tương tự như quá trình tiến hóa hàng nghìn năm của con người từ leo trèo sang đi thẳng bằng hai chân và di chuyển qua những thảo nguyên để dến những vùng đất xa xôi khắp thế giới.
2. Cần phân biệt khả năng "làm" nhiều việc khác với khả năng "tập trung" chú ý vào nhiều việc cùng một lúc của bộ não.
3. Khi mình tưởng tượng thật nhiều chi tiết, hình dung thật nhiều ý nghĩa và hoàn cảnh xung quanh một điều gì đó, mình có thể ghi nhớ nó đậm sâu và lâu hơn.
4. Bộ não cũng giống như các tế bào cơ bắp, càng năng vận động, nó càng trở nên cứng cáp và khỏe mạnh.
5. Một cách luyện não là hãy tập kể lại hoặc trình bày lại những câu chuyện mình vừa chứng kiến, những quyển sách mình vừa đọc, những bài học mình vừa học nó sẽ giúp mình nhớ lâu hơn.
6. Quá trình học tập và tiếp nhận thông tin sẽ hiểu quả hơn nếu nhiều giác quan được cùng lúc kích thích.
Đọc quyển sách này giúp mình ôn lại các kiến thức về giải phẩu, sinh lý, sinh hóa của bộ não, một phần các kiến thức này mình đã học trong môn sinh lý học người. Rất nhiều những nghiên cứu khoa học được tác giả trình bảy khá dễ hiểu. Tựu trung, cách mà các nhà khoa học tìm ra nguyên lý hoạt động của một bộ phận nào đó là khi bộ phận đó bị tổn thương, hoặc họ trực tiếp dùng các "thần dược" khiến chúng ngưng hoạt động trong một thời gian.
Với nổ lực đưa khoa học đến với độc giả đại chúng, John mô tả những bộ phận những chi tiết sinh học như tế bào thần kinh, cấu trúc bộ não, những hiện tượng sinh lý như hô hấp, dòng chảy của quá trình nhận thức rất sống động, đưa người đọc đến thế giới của những đoạn phim hành động khoa học giả tưởng. Cách John mô tả về các nhà khoa học, các đồng nghiệp của anh cũng rất thú vị: "đó là một người đàn ông râu dài như ông già Noel...." Thực chất, John đã đang áp dụng các thủ thuật kích thích trí nhớ ngắn hạn của mình trong từng trang viết.
Giọng văn của tác giả rất hài hước, John là một người đàn ông của gia đình, rất nhiều ví dụ gợi nhớ về tuổi thơ với mẹ, các hoạt động với con. Các đọc giả đang tìm kiếm người yêu, chuẩn bị lập gia đình hoặc làm cha mẹ có thể thích thú với các chương viết về sự khác biệt của bộ não đàn ông và đàn bà, hoặc chương viết về bản năng thích khám phá của con người từ lúc còn là những đứa bé sơ sinh.
Điểm trừ: nhiều mẫu chuyện cười và các dẫn chứng đậm tính văn hóa của người Mỹ như "play fetch"(trò chơi rượt bắt -đem vật về với các chú cún), Miracle Gro là một nhãn hiệu một sản phẩm phân bón cho cây... Các bản dịch, nếu dịch không khéo người đọc khó có thể hiểu được. Cần phải có chú thích để đọc giả có thể hiểu được ý đồ của tác giả. Ngoài ra, một vài mục trình bày mình nghĩ nên có thêm biểu đồ minh họa sẽ giúp người đọc dễ hình dung hơn, vd khi viết về quá trình S và C trong việc điều hòa quá trình ngủ và buồn ngủ.
Chung quy, mình nghĩ đây là một quyển sách hay, đáng đọc. Với một bản dịch tốt, quyển sách có th��� đem lại nhiều kiến thức bổ ích cho nhiều đọc giả quan tâm đến khoa học não bộ, nghiên cứu khoa học (sinh học, sinh lý học, tâm lý học hành vi...), các giáo viên, các bậc cha mẹ...
(09/2020)
September 13, 2013
The author, a lecturer, researcher, and molecular biologist, lists twelve major principles that help explain how the brain works: though processes are improved by physical exercise, we pay attention to evolutionarily important things like sex and danger, we need sleep to cogitate properly, repetition is crucial to long-term memory, we learn more through a variety of sensory inputs, gender influences how our brain process certain interactions, and so on. In most of the chapters, he goes on to advocate for the integration of these findings into education, thus revolutionizing the traditional classroom.
This book is widely praised for its clear, lucid prose, but I didn’t come away all that impressed. I felt that Medina took up too much space describing various sections of the brain to no real purpose. Does it really help our understanding of how the brain works to visualize axons and brain sections and cells and neurons as, variously, stomped eggs, a scorpion with an egg on its back, or uprooted trees jammed together horizontally? There’s no relation between its physical structure and how it works, so what’s the point? (In the same vein, I was bemused by his habit of describing nearly every scientist he refers to. I simply don’t care whether a man looks youthful or his head is shaped like an egg; indeed, such dwelling on looks turns me off an author.) I also thought that Medina (using tricks based on principles of attention) relied too much on cutesy and misleading attention-grabbers like “we’ll learn that we each have a Jennifer Aniston neuron” (no, we don’t) or “we’ll learn the difference between bicycles and Social Security numbers” (overly playful and not at all accurate). I find deliberately misleading teasers like that to be insulting rather than enticing. Finally and most importantly, most of these principles are extremely basic. (Is it really cutting-edge news that repetition is important when learning, or that we need sleep, or that some people crumple under stress while others rise to the challenge, or that people need to feel safe in order to learn?) Despite that, Medina several times in the book proposes sweeping, pie-in-the-sky “solutions” to education problems based on this research, such as restructuring the school day into short lessons, the same content repeated three times, and thus stretching the school year into the summer to make room for all the information; or offering an early work- or schoolday as well as a later one to accommodate different sleep cycles; or mandating child care and parent classes to everyone. Some of these aren’t bad ideas; it’s just that they aren’t going to happen any time soon. Some reasonable, easily-implemented changes that could provide some benefit would have been better. It is an interesting, if basic, primer on the brain, and it is told lucidly; I just didn’t feel there was much point to it, let alone help for “surviving and thriving,” as the subtitle boasts.
This book is widely praised for its clear, lucid prose, but I didn’t come away all that impressed. I felt that Medina took up too much space describing various sections of the brain to no real purpose. Does it really help our understanding of how the brain works to visualize axons and brain sections and cells and neurons as, variously, stomped eggs, a scorpion with an egg on its back, or uprooted trees jammed together horizontally? There’s no relation between its physical structure and how it works, so what’s the point? (In the same vein, I was bemused by his habit of describing nearly every scientist he refers to. I simply don’t care whether a man looks youthful or his head is shaped like an egg; indeed, such dwelling on looks turns me off an author.) I also thought that Medina (using tricks based on principles of attention) relied too much on cutesy and misleading attention-grabbers like “we’ll learn that we each have a Jennifer Aniston neuron” (no, we don’t) or “we’ll learn the difference between bicycles and Social Security numbers” (overly playful and not at all accurate). I find deliberately misleading teasers like that to be insulting rather than enticing. Finally and most importantly, most of these principles are extremely basic. (Is it really cutting-edge news that repetition is important when learning, or that we need sleep, or that some people crumple under stress while others rise to the challenge, or that people need to feel safe in order to learn?) Despite that, Medina several times in the book proposes sweeping, pie-in-the-sky “solutions” to education problems based on this research, such as restructuring the school day into short lessons, the same content repeated three times, and thus stretching the school year into the summer to make room for all the information; or offering an early work- or schoolday as well as a later one to accommodate different sleep cycles; or mandating child care and parent classes to everyone. Some of these aren’t bad ideas; it’s just that they aren’t going to happen any time soon. Some reasonable, easily-implemented changes that could provide some benefit would have been better. It is an interesting, if basic, primer on the brain, and it is told lucidly; I just didn’t feel there was much point to it, let alone help for “surviving and thriving,” as the subtitle boasts.
August 9, 2011
Finally finished “Brain Rules” by John Medina. Fascinating how simple habits can boost our brain power. Seemingly passive and low impact activities like exercise and sleeping enhance our thinking ability (we’ve all heard this before, but the author provides compelling explanations as to why this is the case).
There’s also an interesting discussion on multitasking (apparently it’s true you can do two things at once, just not as well as if you weren’t trying to multitask).
A well written and engaging book. I recommend it to everyone from artists to business owners since it reveals some little known facts on how to amplify your productivity and sense of well-being.
There’s also an interesting discussion on multitasking (apparently it’s true you can do two things at once, just not as well as if you weren’t trying to multitask).
A well written and engaging book. I recommend it to everyone from artists to business owners since it reveals some little known facts on how to amplify your productivity and sense of well-being.
May 26, 2021
Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School by John Medina looks quite promising but I found it a little underwhelming. The book gives some information about various aspects of brain along with real life examples and some personal anecdotes of the author. However, he does not delve deep into brain research, even some well-known brain research. The 12 brain rules are related to: survival, exercise, sleep, stress, brain-wiring, attention spans, memory, sensory stimulation, sight, gender, and curiosity. Some of the so called rules don’t look very useful. The oversimplification of the workings of the brain did not really work for me and the book does not provide any new insights. Another annoying factor was that the book did not provide any notes or bibliography to refer to, the author asks us to check the notes on his website. See you around.
March 10, 2013
إن كنت تبحث عن كتاب بسيط وجميل ويتحدث عن كيفية عمل الدماغ
فهذا هو الكتاب الأمثل لذلك
بالنسبة لي فقد استمتعت للنسخة الصوتية منه
وأسلوب المؤلف وصوته يشدان الإنتباه بشكل جميل جدا
فهذا هو الكتاب الأمثل لذلك
بالنسبة لي فقد استمتعت للنسخة الصوتية منه
وأسلوب المؤلف وصوته يشدان الإنتباه بشكل جميل جدا
March 19, 2011
As always, I need to declare my preference for fiction. That said, let me recommend this book. Author and molecular biologist, John Medina, does a great job capturing the reader with brain research, of all things. Clearly a subject that could lull the layperson into a comatose state, Medina follows his own advice in this text. Chapters are not overly long; each reading objective is clearly stated, and he reviews the salient items at the end of each chapter, with three or four bulleted items. To help you understand and remember complex ideas, he shares anecdotes and narratives from his own life, as well as unusual stories from scientific research. One such story illustrated working memory (or storage and retrieval--I can't remember which): A man could remember ridiculously long lists of words after reading them only once, and then recall them with one hundred percent accuracy over twenty years later! These anecdotal interludes, plus the straightforward, simple writing will keep any reader engaged. Additionally, readers will develop a deeper understanding of what the brain 'likes' in terms of maintaining attention, as well as recalling information. A little humor helps to lighten the cerebral load. Highly recommended to teachers, high school age students, and parents.
August 13, 2012
3.5
John Medina explains 12 principles that involve the brain or thoughts that can help you in life. The copy I checked out from the library contained a dvd that gave an overview of the book that explained all of Medina's main points.
This book is worth reading and its ideas are worth incorporating into your life.
Watch this video to see if you might be interested in reading this book:
Brain Rules
From the book:
“If you wanted to create an education environment that was directly opposed to what the brain was good at doing, you probably would design something like a classroom. If you wanted to create a business environment that was directly opposed to what the brain was good at doing, you probably would design something like a cubicle. And if you wanted to change things, you might have to tear down both and start over.”
John Medina explains 12 principles that involve the brain or thoughts that can help you in life. The copy I checked out from the library contained a dvd that gave an overview of the book that explained all of Medina's main points.
This book is worth reading and its ideas are worth incorporating into your life.
Watch this video to see if you might be interested in reading this book:
Brain Rules
From the book:
“If you wanted to create an education environment that was directly opposed to what the brain was good at doing, you probably would design something like a classroom. If you wanted to create a business environment that was directly opposed to what the brain was good at doing, you probably would design something like a cubicle. And if you wanted to change things, you might have to tear down both and start over.”
May 25, 2010
My sister and I both work with kids and have our own little book club where we read works that are related to learning, the brain, and child development. While she liked 'Brain Rules,' she critiqued for being 'pop.' I get that, but I really liked the book.
We read it after seeing Medina give an enthusiastic and inspiring presentation at the Learning and the Brain Conference several months ago in San Francisco. He's definitely a salesman type with his own shtick, but for me, it works.
I was reading an excellent, but all-encompassing book by Fernette and Brock Eide, 'The Mislabeled Child,' at the same time (still on that one) as 'Brain Rules,' and enjoyed having something a bit less weighty that still made me rethink how kids learn.
One of the key points Medina made at that conference was a possible way we can screen for good teachers--the concept of Theory of Mind. Medina essentially turned around current examination of that concept, the ability to think about what others are thinking about.
Lots of fascinating work is being done with children trying to discover how much an awareness that others have thoughts as well as oneself is innate, rather than learned. Early identification of a Theory of Mind deficit might help children with communicative disorders like those on the autism spectrum.
Instead of just looking at children's Theory of Mind, Medina proposes that we look at teachers' ability to understand what others are thinking. He noted that learning is constructed and breakdowns occur when there are 'gaps' caused by faulty understanding of underlying concepts.
Teachers cannot assume kids get what they are teaching, and move forward in linear fashion. They must listen to what the kids say, and be able to interpret, evaluate and return to their students' understanding. And they have to do that not with a few students but with an entire classroom. That's an astounding ability.
When we think about great teachers, we intuitively recognize that ability. Usually the teachers we remember and admire brought not only an enthusiasm for their subject to the classroom, but empathy. Good teachers respect what their students say, reinforce what is correct about their understanding, and direct them in positive ways to rethink faulty assumptions.
Perhaps, Medina says, 'an advanced skill set in Theory of Mind predicts a good teacher.' If that is true, 'existing Theory of Mind tests could be used like Myers-Briggs personality tests to reveal good teachers from bad, or to help people considering careers as teachers.'
With that idea, Medina certainly engaged me at the conference, and once again in Rule #3 of his book, 'Every brain is wired differently.' The book is framed as twelve of these 'rules.' Each one of them really got me reviewing and modifying my own understanding of the brain.
For example, with his rule ('Rule #5: Repeat to remember') and discussion on short-term memory, Medina makes a discerning distinction between declarative and nondeclarative memories. While we consciously retrieve the former as we recall information such as the names of the presidents, we do not do so when we remember how to ride a bike. I've really been thinking a lot about this motor-skill type of memory and its connection to the reading process, which we want to be automatic and subconscious.
As someone who teaches that process, I'm still working on assimilating Medina's thoughts on the 'inefficiency of text.' However proficient you are as a reader, he notes, you still must 'stop and ponder individual textual features.' While it's clear to me that reading is not 'natural' for humans, I am not sure I can completely accept that 'pictures are a more efficient mechanism of information than text.' If that's so, why did Medina bother writing his book?
That's an issue I'll have to keep reconsidering, which can't be a bad thing. Whether or not we should follow the 'USA Today' principle ('less text, more pictures'), as Medina suggests, I have no doubt that a multisensory approach to all learning is beneficial.
Medina prompts us to think about memory and sensory experience in another surprising way, by noting that elaboration is a good thing. 'More pieces of intellectual baggage to inventory should make learning more difficult,' he writes. However, 'extra cognitive processing...helps the learner to integrate...new material with prior information.'
I loved the way Medina encapsulates this concept: 'We know that information is remembered best when it is elaborate, meaningful, and contextual.' My reading of 'Brain Rules' was certainly enhanced by going to Medina's website and watching the short slide shows and videos that supplemented his text (material also available on a CD that accompanies the book).
It was also enhanced by more reading, that artificial information-gathering process. In a bit of synchronicity, I read the Eides' observation in 'The Mislabeled Child': 'Because children with poor language output can't effectively elaborate information, they'll have far greater difficulty with many kinds of language-based learning.'
Another nice connection I made gets back to the idea of children's innate capacity for learning. Medina points out that babies seem to come equipped with the scientific method: 'Hypothesis testing...is the way babies gather information. They use a series of increasingly self-corrected ideas to figure out how the world works.'
Paul Bloom, a scientist at Yale has just completed a wonderful study of babies' 'rich understanding of objects and people' (see his New York Times article: 'The Moral Life of Babies' at http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/09/mag...). He comments, 'Babies might start off smart, because it enables them to get smarter.'
Despite criticisms that could be made of Medina's easy-to-read format as superficial, this book really got me thinking and rethinking about learning and teaching, memory, sleeping (which Medina says is an active learning time we need, rather that merely a restorative period), and so much more. It's a useful introduction to recent brain research for beginners, as well as great elaboration on that subject for those with more knowledge.
Highly recommended.
We read it after seeing Medina give an enthusiastic and inspiring presentation at the Learning and the Brain Conference several months ago in San Francisco. He's definitely a salesman type with his own shtick, but for me, it works.
I was reading an excellent, but all-encompassing book by Fernette and Brock Eide, 'The Mislabeled Child,' at the same time (still on that one) as 'Brain Rules,' and enjoyed having something a bit less weighty that still made me rethink how kids learn.
One of the key points Medina made at that conference was a possible way we can screen for good teachers--the concept of Theory of Mind. Medina essentially turned around current examination of that concept, the ability to think about what others are thinking about.
Lots of fascinating work is being done with children trying to discover how much an awareness that others have thoughts as well as oneself is innate, rather than learned. Early identification of a Theory of Mind deficit might help children with communicative disorders like those on the autism spectrum.
Instead of just looking at children's Theory of Mind, Medina proposes that we look at teachers' ability to understand what others are thinking. He noted that learning is constructed and breakdowns occur when there are 'gaps' caused by faulty understanding of underlying concepts.
Teachers cannot assume kids get what they are teaching, and move forward in linear fashion. They must listen to what the kids say, and be able to interpret, evaluate and return to their students' understanding. And they have to do that not with a few students but with an entire classroom. That's an astounding ability.
When we think about great teachers, we intuitively recognize that ability. Usually the teachers we remember and admire brought not only an enthusiasm for their subject to the classroom, but empathy. Good teachers respect what their students say, reinforce what is correct about their understanding, and direct them in positive ways to rethink faulty assumptions.
Perhaps, Medina says, 'an advanced skill set in Theory of Mind predicts a good teacher.' If that is true, 'existing Theory of Mind tests could be used like Myers-Briggs personality tests to reveal good teachers from bad, or to help people considering careers as teachers.'
With that idea, Medina certainly engaged me at the conference, and once again in Rule #3 of his book, 'Every brain is wired differently.' The book is framed as twelve of these 'rules.' Each one of them really got me reviewing and modifying my own understanding of the brain.
For example, with his rule ('Rule #5: Repeat to remember') and discussion on short-term memory, Medina makes a discerning distinction between declarative and nondeclarative memories. While we consciously retrieve the former as we recall information such as the names of the presidents, we do not do so when we remember how to ride a bike. I've really been thinking a lot about this motor-skill type of memory and its connection to the reading process, which we want to be automatic and subconscious.
As someone who teaches that process, I'm still working on assimilating Medina's thoughts on the 'inefficiency of text.' However proficient you are as a reader, he notes, you still must 'stop and ponder individual textual features.' While it's clear to me that reading is not 'natural' for humans, I am not sure I can completely accept that 'pictures are a more efficient mechanism of information than text.' If that's so, why did Medina bother writing his book?
That's an issue I'll have to keep reconsidering, which can't be a bad thing. Whether or not we should follow the 'USA Today' principle ('less text, more pictures'), as Medina suggests, I have no doubt that a multisensory approach to all learning is beneficial.
Medina prompts us to think about memory and sensory experience in another surprising way, by noting that elaboration is a good thing. 'More pieces of intellectual baggage to inventory should make learning more difficult,' he writes. However, 'extra cognitive processing...helps the learner to integrate...new material with prior information.'
I loved the way Medina encapsulates this concept: 'We know that information is remembered best when it is elaborate, meaningful, and contextual.' My reading of 'Brain Rules' was certainly enhanced by going to Medina's website and watching the short slide shows and videos that supplemented his text (material also available on a CD that accompanies the book).
It was also enhanced by more reading, that artificial information-gathering process. In a bit of synchronicity, I read the Eides' observation in 'The Mislabeled Child': 'Because children with poor language output can't effectively elaborate information, they'll have far greater difficulty with many kinds of language-based learning.'
Another nice connection I made gets back to the idea of children's innate capacity for learning. Medina points out that babies seem to come equipped with the scientific method: 'Hypothesis testing...is the way babies gather information. They use a series of increasingly self-corrected ideas to figure out how the world works.'
Paul Bloom, a scientist at Yale has just completed a wonderful study of babies' 'rich understanding of objects and people' (see his New York Times article: 'The Moral Life of Babies' at http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/09/mag...). He comments, 'Babies might start off smart, because it enables them to get smarter.'
Despite criticisms that could be made of Medina's easy-to-read format as superficial, this book really got me thinking and rethinking about learning and teaching, memory, sleeping (which Medina says is an active learning time we need, rather that merely a restorative period), and so much more. It's a useful introduction to recent brain research for beginners, as well as great elaboration on that subject for those with more knowledge.
Highly recommended.
August 25, 2017
“Dopo i primi dieci minuti di una lezione o di una presentazione, il cervello stacca la spina. È dunque importante sapere che ogni dieci minuti bisogna lanciare all’uditorio un ‘amo’, per esempio un aneddoto, che susciti emozioni come il riso, l'incredulità o la paura”.
Questo è solo un esempio delle tante cose interessanti citate in questo libro che tratta del cervello e del suo funzionamento.
Si sanno ancora poche cose del cervello, ma negli ultimi anni sono state fatte molte scoperte interessanti, tra le quali il fatto che i neuroni possono continuare a formarsi anche in età avanzata se adeguatamente stimolati. Il segreto è tenere il cervello in allenamento: leggere, essere curiosi e pensare aiuta a rinforzare le connessioni neuronali.
Un altro aspetto importante per il cervello è l’esercizio fisico. Medina consiglia di fare attività fisica almeno due o tre volte la settimana, per trenta minuti alla volta. Secondo gli studi fatti le persone che praticano attività fisica abbassano il rischio di demenza senile e di contrarre l’Alzheimer.
Il sonno è un altro ingrediente importante per il cervello, tanto che non solo è necessario dormire abbastanza durante la notte, ma sarebbe utile anche un riposino pomeridiano per migliorare le nostre prestazioni cerebrali.
Importante anche sapere che i ricordi sono legati alle emozioni e che quindi rimangono impressi nella nostra mente tanto più sono legati a fattori emozionali di un dato avvenimento. A distanza di molti anni si può ricordare perfettamente una giornata, o un episodio, in cui siamo stati coinvolti nei nostri affetti più cari.
Interessante il discorso del multitasking, cui tutti noi siamo costretti durante le nostre giornate.
“Il nostro sistema cognitivo non è per nulla adatto a questo. Se riceviamo una e-mail mentre stiamo scrivendo una relazione, la corteccia prefrontale anteriore deve disimpegnarsi delle ‘regole di scrittura della relazione’ che aveva attivato all'inizio del lavoro e lanciare al cervello un messaggio di attivazione delle ‘regole per leggere l'e-mail e rispondere’, compito che richiede alcuni decimi di secondo e che non può sovrapporsi all'altro, ma va eseguito in maniera sequenziale. Questo succede a ogni interruzione: alla fine impieghiamo il 50% in più del tempo per portare a termine un compito, con il 50% in più di errori”.
Non facciamoci quindi interrompere dalle e-mail, dal telefono e dal cellulare, se possibile.
Un bel libro interessante, scritto bene, divulgativo. Anche se a volte, applicando la regola della ripetizione per migliorare l’apprendimento, diventa un pochino noioso…
Questo è solo un esempio delle tante cose interessanti citate in questo libro che tratta del cervello e del suo funzionamento.
Si sanno ancora poche cose del cervello, ma negli ultimi anni sono state fatte molte scoperte interessanti, tra le quali il fatto che i neuroni possono continuare a formarsi anche in età avanzata se adeguatamente stimolati. Il segreto è tenere il cervello in allenamento: leggere, essere curiosi e pensare aiuta a rinforzare le connessioni neuronali.
Un altro aspetto importante per il cervello è l’esercizio fisico. Medina consiglia di fare attività fisica almeno due o tre volte la settimana, per trenta minuti alla volta. Secondo gli studi fatti le persone che praticano attività fisica abbassano il rischio di demenza senile e di contrarre l’Alzheimer.
Il sonno è un altro ingrediente importante per il cervello, tanto che non solo è necessario dormire abbastanza durante la notte, ma sarebbe utile anche un riposino pomeridiano per migliorare le nostre prestazioni cerebrali.
Importante anche sapere che i ricordi sono legati alle emozioni e che quindi rimangono impressi nella nostra mente tanto più sono legati a fattori emozionali di un dato avvenimento. A distanza di molti anni si può ricordare perfettamente una giornata, o un episodio, in cui siamo stati coinvolti nei nostri affetti più cari.
Interessante il discorso del multitasking, cui tutti noi siamo costretti durante le nostre giornate.
“Il nostro sistema cognitivo non è per nulla adatto a questo. Se riceviamo una e-mail mentre stiamo scrivendo una relazione, la corteccia prefrontale anteriore deve disimpegnarsi delle ‘regole di scrittura della relazione’ che aveva attivato all'inizio del lavoro e lanciare al cervello un messaggio di attivazione delle ‘regole per leggere l'e-mail e rispondere’, compito che richiede alcuni decimi di secondo e che non può sovrapporsi all'altro, ma va eseguito in maniera sequenziale. Questo succede a ogni interruzione: alla fine impieghiamo il 50% in più del tempo per portare a termine un compito, con il 50% in più di errori”.
Non facciamoci quindi interrompere dalle e-mail, dal telefono e dal cellulare, se possibile.
Un bel libro interessante, scritto bene, divulgativo. Anche se a volte, applicando la regola della ripetizione per migliorare l’apprendimento, diventa un pochino noioso…
August 31, 2008
A very straightforward read on the latest advance in the understanding of how the brain works. A lot of the chapters draw from some of the accessible trade books on cognitive development. Stories from Deborah Tannen, Oliver Sachs, Howard Gardner, Steven Jay Gould, etc. add stories and examples to Medina's main structure of the book. The book is organized around 12 principles that Medina feels are necessary to a healthy brain (due to what Medina sees as evolutionary factors).
The first principle is that physical exercise helps keep our brains active as well. Our ancestors were active and our brains adapted to that environment and still rely on our mobility.
The second principle is that our brains evolved to survive our environment and we have thousands of years of outdoor living to overcome to deal with the past hundred years of technology.
The third principle is that each of our brains are uniquely wired. It's impossible to develop a standard model of the brain because each one is vastly different.
The 4th is that we can only pay attention for about 10 minutes before our attention drifts. Medina focuses on how teachers and presenters need to keep their audience focused through short learning modules.
The 5th is that we can improve our short-term memory by cycling through memories several times in a limited time period.
The mid-principle explores how our long-term memories work to retain knowledge.
The 7th principle examines how we need sleep to allow our brain to think.
The 8th principle is that stress is really bad for our thinking.
Number 9 (appropriately), is about how we make sense of the world around us using our senses in conjunction with one another, except for
Vision, which overrules all other senses. This is principle 10 which says we literally see to believe.
Principle 11 is all about gender: men's brains process things in a general sense, while women's brains seem to have better control of details.
The last principle is that we explore the world around us. Exploration is how we as a species evolved and how our brain develops from infancy to adulthood.
The book has a website at brainrules.net which has a breakdown of the book as well as exercises and resources for each of the rules.
The first principle is that physical exercise helps keep our brains active as well. Our ancestors were active and our brains adapted to that environment and still rely on our mobility.
The second principle is that our brains evolved to survive our environment and we have thousands of years of outdoor living to overcome to deal with the past hundred years of technology.
The third principle is that each of our brains are uniquely wired. It's impossible to develop a standard model of the brain because each one is vastly different.
The 4th is that we can only pay attention for about 10 minutes before our attention drifts. Medina focuses on how teachers and presenters need to keep their audience focused through short learning modules.
The 5th is that we can improve our short-term memory by cycling through memories several times in a limited time period.
The mid-principle explores how our long-term memories work to retain knowledge.
The 7th principle examines how we need sleep to allow our brain to think.
The 8th principle is that stress is really bad for our thinking.
Number 9 (appropriately), is about how we make sense of the world around us using our senses in conjunction with one another, except for
Vision, which overrules all other senses. This is principle 10 which says we literally see to believe.
Principle 11 is all about gender: men's brains process things in a general sense, while women's brains seem to have better control of details.
The last principle is that we explore the world around us. Exploration is how we as a species evolved and how our brain develops from infancy to adulthood.
The book has a website at brainrules.net which has a breakdown of the book as well as exercises and resources for each of the rules.
March 11, 2008
A solid attempt at making a practical (useful) book on how the brain works, aimed at everyday people. He focuses on memory and efficiency, and writes in an engaging style. As a long-time researcher in the field he has the science cred, and he explains it well. There's a website (brainrules.net I think) that goes with the book, and when the book is released for real (I got a galley) it'll come with a DVD.
My only complaint is that he's insufficiently scientific in the book. I wanted more hard numbers and facts about the trials of his techniques and fewer stories about people. His technique is very much to begin with an anecdote that makes the section real, but I tired of them by midway through the book. And it often seems that the critical parts of his suggestions remain untested and unproven in science.
But its flaws don't prevent it from being worth reading. I'm trying to get my boy to focus using the techniques I read here, and I'm hoping I see some small improvements after only two days. Of course, that's just anecdotal ...
My only complaint is that he's insufficiently scientific in the book. I wanted more hard numbers and facts about the trials of his techniques and fewer stories about people. His technique is very much to begin with an anecdote that makes the section real, but I tired of them by midway through the book. And it often seems that the critical parts of his suggestions remain untested and unproven in science.
But its flaws don't prevent it from being worth reading. I'm trying to get my boy to focus using the techniques I read here, and I'm hoping I see some small improvements after only two days. Of course, that's just anecdotal ...
July 7, 2010
I read this for a cognitive learning group at work, kind of a self-help meets neuroscience attempt. Some of it was interesting, some of it was stuff most people 'know' but the scientific explanations solidified it, and some seemed a little bit of a stretch.
July 19, 2014
Книга скорее НЕ понравилась :( На первый взгляд это даже странно: солидный (в научном смысле) автор; изложение "тонких материй" (о работе нашего мозга и нашей психики)довольно лёгкое и занимательное; кроме научных фактов и теоретических выкладок вроде бы присутствуют и практические советы, но... :((
Начну с "минусов":
Во-первых, мне непонятен адресат книги. В названии значится "вам и вашим детям", но стиль книги очень неровный. Местами автор ударяется в "объяснение на пальцах", с шуточками и примитивными аналогиями - и это похоже на разъяснения для детей-школьников. Но местами наукообразные рассуждения автора довольно "тяжёлые" (даже для меня, а я считаю себя читателем, искушенным в теме). Что интересно, в "идеях" автор пишет рекомендации для педагогов - т.е. как можно/нужно использовать его рекомендации в процессе обучения.
Вот я и ломаю голову - для кого книга? Для школьников, для учителей, для студентов?
Во-вторых, книга на 99% - это научно-популярное изложение основ общей психологии. Складывается совершенно четкое ощущение, что автор просто взял и в свободной форме пересказал обычный вузовский учебник по общей психологии для 1 курса.
Что это означает? В книге ОЧЕНЬ много вторичных фактов, которые кочуют из одной книги по психологии в другую уже много лет. Например, в 9 главе описывается русский мнемонист Шерешевский, уникальные способности которого проявились еще до октябрьской революции; а лучше всего о Шерешевском написал А.Р.Лурия в своей "Маленькой книжке о большой памяти". Хоть автор и позиционируется как "современный учёный", лично для меня бОльшая часть информации в книге была давно знакомой, читать было скучно :(
В-третьих, книга НЕ практична. В конце каждой главы есть раздельчик "идеи", где автор предлагает как бы практические рекомендации. Но вот вам пример: 3 глава книги посвящена тому, как мы обучаемся. В конце главы автор предлагает аж целых две "идеи", причём обе имеют отношение не к читателю лично, а к школьной системе обучения.
"Идеи", кстати, такие: 1) лучше обучаться в группах/классах меньшего размера; 2) лучше использовать индивидуализированные программы и методы обучения. Оригинальность данных идей ну просто зашкаливает(((( Поверьте, в других главах автор предлагает "идеи" такого же уровня :(
Теперь "плюсы":
1) Если вы не знаете о психологии вообще НИЧЕГО, и ваш возраст 16+, то книгу можно и почитать. Хотя, на мой взгляд, для научно-популярной книги она написана несколько тяжеловато (или это неуклюжесть перевода).
Название "правила мозга", на мой взгляд, несколько вводит читателей в заблуждение :) В книге нет каких-то особенный правил! Это просто рассказ об отдельных психических функциях/процессах, причём структура изложения в точности совпадает с разделами учебника "Общая психология":
"Правило №1" - эволюция мозга; возрастные изменения нервной системы
№2 - нейрофизиологические основы психики + кратко анатомическое строение мозга
№3 - нейронная активность, зоны морзга
№4 - психология восприятия
№5 - кратковременная память
№6 - долговременная память
...и т.д.
2) В книге действительно много занимательных фактов; качество изложенной информации высокое :) Это я к тому, что в качестве очень добротного науч-попа книга неплоха.
Резюме: средненько... Людям с психологическим (или хорошим гуманитарным образованием) будет скучно. Если же познания в общей психологии у вас отсутствуют вовсе, то книгу можно и почитать.
PS Для сравнения я бы рекомендовал книги Дэниела Амена "Измени мозг - изменится и жизнь" и Дэвида Рока "Мозг. Инструкция по применению". По охватываемым темам - они примерно про то же самое, но практичность и "современность" данных книг на порядок выше, чем у книги Медины.
PPS Я понимаю, что всё потихонечку морально устаревает... Но вот популярного изложения основ общей ��сихологии лучше чем в книге К.Платонова "Занимательная психология" (первое издание - ещё в 60-х) мне видеть не доводилось.
Начну с "минусов":
Во-первых, мне непонятен адресат книги. В названии значится "вам и вашим детям", но стиль книги очень неровный. Местами автор ударяется в "объяснение на пальцах", с шуточками и примитивными аналогиями - и это похоже на разъяснения для детей-школьников. Но местами наукообразные рассуждения автора довольно "тяжёлые" (даже для меня, а я считаю себя читателем, искушенным в теме). Что интересно, в "идеях" автор пишет рекомендации для педагогов - т.е. как можно/нужно использовать его рекомендации в процессе обучения.
Вот я и ломаю голову - для кого книга? Для школьников, для учителей, для студентов?
Во-вторых, книга на 99% - это научно-популярное изложение основ общей психологии. Складывается совершенно четкое ощущение, что автор просто взял и в свободной форме пересказал обычный вузовский учебник по общей психологии для 1 курса.
Что это означает? В книге ОЧЕНЬ много вторичных фактов, которые кочуют из одной книги по психологии в другую уже много лет. Например, в 9 главе описывается русский мнемонист Шерешевский, уникальные способности которого проявились еще до октябрьской революции; а лучше всего о Шерешевском написал А.Р.Лурия в своей "Маленькой книжке о большой памяти". Хоть автор и позиционируется как "современный учёный", лично для меня бОльшая часть информации в книге была давно знакомой, читать было скучно :(
В-третьих, книга НЕ практична. В конце каждой главы есть раздельчик "идеи", где автор предлагает как бы практические рекомендации. Но вот вам пример: 3 глава книги посвящена тому, как мы обучаемся. В конце главы автор предлагает аж целых две "идеи", причём обе имеют отношение не к читателю лично, а к школьной системе обучения.
"Идеи", кстати, такие: 1) лучше обучаться в группах/классах меньшего размера; 2) лучше использовать индивидуализированные программы и методы обучения. Оригинальность данных идей ну просто зашкаливает(((( Поверьте, в других главах автор предлагает "идеи" такого же уровня :(
Теперь "плюсы":
1) Если вы не знаете о психологии вообще НИЧЕГО, и ваш возраст 16+, то книгу можно и почитать. Хотя, на мой взгляд, для научно-популярной книги она написана несколько тяжеловато (или это неуклюжесть перевода).
Название "правила мозга", на мой взгляд, несколько вводит читателей в заблуждение :) В книге нет каких-то особенный правил! Это просто рассказ об отдельных психических функциях/процессах, причём структура изложения в точности совпадает с разделами учебника "Общая психология":
"Правило №1" - эволюция мозга; возрастные изменения нервной системы
№2 - нейрофизиологические основы психики + кратко анатомическое строение мозга
№3 - нейронная активность, зоны морзга
№4 - психология восприятия
№5 - кратковременная память
№6 - долговременная память
...и т.д.
2) В книге действительно много занимательных фактов; качество изложенной информации высокое :) Это я к тому, что в качестве очень добротного науч-попа книга неплоха.
Резюме: средненько... Людям с психологическим (или хорошим гуманитарным образованием) будет скучно. Если же познания в общей психологии у вас отсутствуют вовсе, то книгу можно и почитать.
PS Для сравнения я бы рекомендовал книги Дэниела Амена "Измени мозг - изменится и жизнь" и Дэвида Рока "Мозг. Инструкция по применению". По охватываемым темам - они примерно про то же самое, но практичность и "современность" данных книг на порядок выше, чем у книги Медины.
PPS Я понимаю, что всё потихонечку морально устаревает... Но вот популярного изложения основ общей ��сихологии лучше чем в книге К.Платонова "Занимательная психология" (первое издание - ещё в 60-х) мне видеть не доводилось.
October 11, 2024
كتاب "قواعد الدماغ" للدكتور جون ميدينا هو دليل عملي مبني على أحدث الأبحاث العلمية حول كيفية عمل الدماغ. يقدم الكتاب 12 مبدأً أساسياً يمكن تطبيقها في حياتنا اليومية لتحسين الأداء في العمل، والتعلم، والعلاقات الشخصية.
ما هي أهم المبادئ التي يقدمها الكتاب؟
الدماغ كائن اجتماعي: نحن كائنات اجتماعية بطبيعتنا، والتفاعل الاجتماعي يلعب دوراً حاسماً في نمو الدماغ وتطوره.
الدماغ يحب القصص: نحن نتذكر المعلومات بشكل أفضل عندما يتم تقديمها في شكل قصص أو حكايات.
الدماغ يعمل بشكل أفضل عندما يكون نشطاً: الحركة البدنية تحسن وظائف الدماغ وتزيد من الإبداع.
الدماغ يكره تعدد المهام: التركيز على مهمة واحدة في كل مرة يؤدي إلى نتائج أفضل.
الدماغ بحاجة إلى النوم: النوم ضروري لترسيخ الذكريات وتنظيم العواطف.
الدماغ ي��علم من خلال التجربة: التعلم النشط والعملي أكثر فعالية من الحفظ والتلقين
الدماغ يحب المكافآت: المكافآت، سواء كانت مادية أو معنوية، تحفز الدماغ على التعلم والعمل بجد.
الدماغ يختلف من شخص لآخر: لكل شخص نمط تعلم وتفكير مختلف، لذا يجب تكييف أساليب التعلم لتناسب كل فرد.
الدماغ يتأثر بالبيئة: البيئة المحيطة تؤثر بشكل كبير على وظائف الدماغ، لذا يجب تهيئة بيئة محفزة للتعلم والإبداع.
الدماغ يغير شكله باستمرار: الدماغ مرن وقابل للتغيير، ويمكننا تحسين وظائفه من خلال التعلم والتدريب.
الدماغ يحتاج إلى فترات راحة: أخذ فترات راحة قصيرة خلال العمل أو الدراسة يحسن الأداء.
الدماغ يحب التنوع: التنوع في الأنشطة والمهارات يحافظ على صحة الدماغ ويمنع الملل.
"قواعد الدماغ" هو كتاب قيم لكل من يرغب في فهم نفسه بشكل أفضل وتحسين حياته.
ما هي أهم المبادئ التي يقدمها الكتاب؟
الدماغ كائن اجتماعي: نحن كائنات اجتماعية بطبيعتنا، والتفاعل الاجتماعي يلعب دوراً حاسماً في نمو الدماغ وتطوره.
الدماغ يحب القصص: نحن نتذكر المعلومات بشكل أفضل عندما يتم تقديمها في شكل قصص أو حكايات.
الدماغ يعمل بشكل أفضل عندما يكون نشطاً: الحركة البدنية تحسن وظائف الدماغ وتزيد من الإبداع.
الدماغ يكره تعدد المهام: التركيز على مهمة واحدة في كل مرة يؤدي إلى نتائج أفضل.
الدماغ بحاجة إلى النوم: النوم ضروري لترسيخ الذكريات وتنظيم العواطف.
الدماغ ي��علم من خلال التجربة: التعلم النشط والعملي أكثر فعالية من الحفظ والتلقين
الدماغ يحب المكافآت: المكافآت، سواء كانت مادية أو معنوية، تحفز الدماغ على التعلم والعمل بجد.
الدماغ يختلف من شخص لآخر: لكل شخص نمط تعلم وتفكير مختلف، لذا يجب تكييف أساليب التعلم لتناسب كل فرد.
الدماغ يتأثر بالبيئة: البيئة المحيطة تؤثر بشكل كبير على وظائف الدماغ، لذا يجب تهيئة بيئة محفزة للتعلم والإبداع.
الدماغ يغير شكله باستمرار: الدماغ مرن وقابل للتغيير، ويمكننا تحسين وظائفه من خلال التعلم والتدريب.
الدماغ يحتاج إلى فترات راحة: أخذ فترات راحة قصيرة خلال العمل أو الدراسة يحسن الأداء.
الدماغ يحب التنوع: التنوع في الأنشطة والمهارات يحافظ على صحة الدماغ ويمنع الملل.
"قواعد الدماغ" هو كتاب قيم لكل من يرغب في فهم نفسه بشكل أفضل وتحسين حياته.
June 5, 2016
This subject matter is fast-becoming my favorite for non-fiction books. All this new neuroscience that has jumped up in the last twenty years has been overall pretty uplifting. The malleability of the brain, its connection with the body, and its amazing powers of regeneration and lifelong ability to change are overall pretty good news for a world that has kind of let itself slide into a damaging passivity and learned helplessness.
This book isn't a business or education book, it's a pop science book, in the best way. The only thing to do with work and school is his suggestions at the end of chapters about how he would implement something or other in offices or schools. Honestly he's kind of a fascist when it comes to his ideal schools, but so what, great intentions.
One cool thing I noticed was that in one part he talks about the attention span of the average mind, and how minds need a hook every ten minutes or so in order to stay interested in something, and that's EXACTLY how he writes every section of his book. I guess it worked, because I read this whole thing in bed through a really miserable sickness while my friends were partying their asses off. Oh well. I HAD A PARTY OF THE INTELLECT, BITCHES! *sob*
This book isn't a business or education book, it's a pop science book, in the best way. The only thing to do with work and school is his suggestions at the end of chapters about how he would implement something or other in offices or schools. Honestly he's kind of a fascist when it comes to his ideal schools, but so what, great intentions.
One cool thing I noticed was that in one part he talks about the attention span of the average mind, and how minds need a hook every ten minutes or so in order to stay interested in something, and that's EXACTLY how he writes every section of his book. I guess it worked, because I read this whole thing in bed through a really miserable sickness while my friends were partying their asses off. Oh well. I HAD A PARTY OF THE INTELLECT, BITCHES! *sob*
December 18, 2024
Personally, the most interesting fact I learned from this book was that the term “macadam” for road surfaces comes from the fact that a Scottish engineer named “McAdams” first introduced tar and pebble water-impervious road surfaces in order to help ease transport delays in Scotland.
Other points included: adequate sleep is good for the brain and learning, repetition is good for memory, and attention spans for college students are short, so lectures need to be interesting, and lecture topics should change every 10 minutes. Also, the brain remembers facts better when auditory and visual inputs are combined. Visual stimuli are stronger than the others, but music soothes the soul.
A chatty writing style that was easy to skim, leavened with short anecdotes, and lots of repetition.
Other points included: adequate sleep is good for the brain and learning, repetition is good for memory, and attention spans for college students are short, so lectures need to be interesting, and lecture topics should change every 10 minutes. Also, the brain remembers facts better when auditory and visual inputs are combined. Visual stimuli are stronger than the others, but music soothes the soul.
A chatty writing style that was easy to skim, leavened with short anecdotes, and lots of repetition.
January 19, 2021
I really liked the book since it explains quite easily how the brain works to people with no prior medical knowledge.
It kind of reminded of my high school biology classes but with examples and ideas of how and why we are who we are and who we can be by following the natural evolution and need of our brains.
In my opinion, not only people reading the book can use it to their advantage but school systems and work places can reinvent their models to achieve better results, stimulating learning curves and more satisfactory overall experience.
It kind of reminded of my high school biology classes but with examples and ideas of how and why we are who we are and who we can be by following the natural evolution and need of our brains.
In my opinion, not only people reading the book can use it to their advantage but school systems and work places can reinvent their models to achieve better results, stimulating learning curves and more satisfactory overall experience.
October 18, 2016
Una entretenida e interesante guía a la neurociencia, con muchas aplicaciones prácticas. Si bien al conocedor es posible que le aporte menos (los capítulos de memoria me recordaban a 2° de la carrera), hay multitud de buenas ideas, expuestas con rigor científico y de modo claro y ameno. Muy recomendable.
Read
October 2, 2019Lots of interesting insights and information about how the brain works.
December 27, 2022
(The English review is placed beneath Russian one)
Перечитывая книгу, поймал себя на мысли, что это не только одна из лучших книг по психологии, которую я бы рекомендовал к прочтению на самых первых этапах знакомства с предметом «психология», но которая также не потеряла – лично для меня – свою ценность спустя многие десятки книг по соответствующей теме, которые были мной прочитаны. Т.е. после этой книги я прочёл очень много других книг как на тему самопомощи и нейропсихологии, так и на тему психологии в целом. Часто так бывает, что после такого огромного количества книг, повторно читаемая книга уже не кажется такой новой, увлекательной и интересной, какой она была в первый раз. Но в данном случаи, всё обстоит как раз по иному. Книга потрясла меня в первый раз (настолько сильно, что я полностью поменял свой стиль жизни, перейдя на здоровый образ жизни, начав с ежедневных фитнес-упражнений) и пусть во второй раз она уже не потрясла, но определённо я перечитывал книгу с большим неослабевающим интересом.
Вот что мне определённо нравится у Медины, так это не приевшийся текст. Да, многие темы давно известны и повторяются во многих книга (я имею в виду, главным образом, важность сна и физических упражнений). Но вот примеры автор предлагает намного более свежие и разнообразные, чем авторы других книг. Возможно, ещё и стиль как таковой автора сказывается. Так вот тема про работу мозга, а точнее за что отвечает определённая часть мозга (как в первый раз, так и во второй, мне безумно понравилась история про женщину, которая не могла видеть движущиеся объекты) у автора получилась просто великолепно. Вообще, все примеры, которые использует автор, настолько интересные и, как я сказал, не затёртые, что читать становится само удовольствие.
Так же я бы отметил, что книгу я бы определил и как книгу по самопомощи (важность сна, физических упражнений, опасность непрерывного стресса) и как по нейропсихологии (возможно, кому-то покажется, что там, где автор подробно пишет про работу мозга, слишком много специальных терминов и что в целом не очень понятно, но вот каждый согласится с тем, что примеры, иллюстрирующие сказанное, понятные и интересные) и как по психологии в целом. Да, любителям психоанализа тут ловить определённо нечего, но, тем не менее, даже им я бы посоветовал прочесть книгу. В конце концов, у автора отсутствует это неприятная привычка, которая так свойственна эволюционным психологам – психологам с сильным уклоном в биологию – ставить своё направлении выше всех остальных ответвлений психологии. Так вот, у автора такой стиль написания полностью отсутствует.
И последнее что хотелось отметить. Да, книга скорее развлекательная, т.к. автор взял несколько тем, но не весь предмет (нейропсихология или даже психология) целиком. Да, получилось у него великолепно. Тем не менее (это не является минусом), это определённо не учебник. Это не книга типа социальной психологии Майерса. Это просто очень увлекательное - объясняющее может быть и не всё, но многое - описание функционирования мозга, того как работает он, почему он важен весь целиком и как мы можем поддерживать его в здоровом состоянии (не менее 7 часов сна, фитнес, отсутствие длительного стресса).
Я настоятельно рекомендую начать знакомство с миром психологии именно с этой книги. Ну, или если вы не собираетесь знакомиться с предметом «психология», то просто прочтите эту книга как книгу по самопомощи, которую я также поставил на самую верхнюю строчку списка «Лучшие книги по self-help».
Rereading the book, I caught myself thinking that this is not only one of the best books on psychology, which I would recommend to read in the very first stages of acquaintance with the subject of psychology, but which also has not lost its value after many dozens of books on the same topic that were read by me. That is after this book I have read many other books, both on self-help and Neuropsychology, and on psychology in general. It often happens that after such a huge number of books, rereading the book no longer seem so new, exciting and interesting, as it was the first time. But in this case, everything is different. The book shocked me for the first time (so much so that I completely changed my lifestyle to a healthy one, starting with daily fitness exercises) and even if it didn't shock me for the second time, I definitely reread the book with a lot of interest.
What I definitely like about this book is that it's not boring text. Yes, many topics have long been known and repeated in many books (I mean the importance of sleep and exercise). But the examples that the author offers are much more fresh and varied than the examples offered by other authors of books. The topic of brain function, or rather, what a certain part of the brain is responsible for (as well as the first time I read this book, and the second time I liked the story about a woman who couldn't see moving objects) was described by the author just fine. In general, all the examples that the author uses are so interesting and, as I said, not worn out, that reading becomes enjoyable.
I would also note that the book I would define both as a book on self-help (the importance of sleep, physical exercise, the danger of continuous stress) and as a book on Neuropsychology (perhaps, someone would think that where the author writes in detail about the work of the brain, there are too many special terms and that in general it is not very clear, but everyone would agree that the examples to illustrate what has been said are understandable and interesting) and as a psychology in general. Yes, there is nothing here for fans of psychoanalysis, but, nevertheless, even for them I would recommend to read the book. After all, the author does not have this unpleasant habit, which is so characteristic of evolutionary psychologists - psychologists with a strong inclination to biology - to put their direction above all other branches of psychology. So, the author has no such style of writing completely absent.
And the last thing I wanted to note. Yes, the book is rather entertaining, because the author took several topics, but not the whole subject (Neuropsychology or even psychology). Yes, it turned out great. However (this is not a minus), it is definitely not a textbook. It's not a book of Myers' social psychology type. It is just a very fascinating description of how the brain functions, how it works, why it is important in its entirety and how we can keep it healthy (at least 7 hours of sleep, fitness, no long-term stress).
I strongly recommend to start acquaintance with the world of psychology with this book. Well, or if you are not going to get acquainted with the subject of psychology, then just read this book as a self-help book, which I also put on the top of the list "Best books on self-help".
Перечитывая книгу, поймал себя на мысли, что это не только одна из лучших книг по психологии, которую я бы рекомендовал к прочтению на самых первых этапах знакомства с предметом «психология», но которая также не потеряла – лично для меня – свою ценность спустя многие десятки книг по соответствующей теме, которые были мной прочитаны. Т.е. после этой книги я прочёл очень много других книг как на тему самопомощи и нейропсихологии, так и на тему психологии в целом. Часто так бывает, что после такого огромного количества книг, повторно читаемая книга уже не кажется такой новой, увлекательной и интересной, какой она была в первый раз. Но в данном случаи, всё обстоит как раз по иному. Книга потрясла меня в первый раз (настолько сильно, что я полностью поменял свой стиль жизни, перейдя на здоровый образ жизни, начав с ежедневных фитнес-упражнений) и пусть во второй раз она уже не потрясла, но определённо я перечитывал книгу с большим неослабевающим интересом.
Вот что мне определённо нравится у Медины, так это не приевшийся текст. Да, многие темы давно известны и повторяются во многих книга (я имею в виду, главным образом, важность сна и физических упражнений). Но вот примеры автор предлагает намного более свежие и разнообразные, чем авторы других книг. Возможно, ещё и стиль как таковой автора сказывается. Так вот тема про работу мозга, а точнее за что отвечает определённая часть мозга (как в первый раз, так и во второй, мне безумно понравилась история про женщину, которая не могла видеть движущиеся объекты) у автора получилась просто великолепно. Вообще, все примеры, которые использует автор, настолько интересные и, как я сказал, не затёртые, что читать становится само удовольствие.
Так же я бы отметил, что книгу я бы определил и как книгу по самопомощи (важность сна, физических упражнений, опасность непрерывного стресса) и как по нейропсихологии (возможно, кому-то покажется, что там, где автор подробно пишет про работу мозга, слишком много специальных терминов и что в целом не очень понятно, но вот каждый согласится с тем, что примеры, иллюстрирующие сказанное, понятные и интересные) и как по психологии в целом. Да, любителям психоанализа тут ловить определённо нечего, но, тем не менее, даже им я бы посоветовал прочесть книгу. В конце концов, у автора отсутствует это неприятная привычка, которая так свойственна эволюционным психологам – психологам с сильным уклоном в биологию – ставить своё направлении выше всех остальных ответвлений психологии. Так вот, у автора такой стиль написания полностью отсутствует.
И последнее что хотелось отметить. Да, книга скорее развлекательная, т.к. автор взял несколько тем, но не весь предмет (нейропсихология или даже психология) целиком. Да, получилось у него великолепно. Тем не менее (это не является минусом), это определённо не учебник. Это не книга типа социальной психологии Майерса. Это просто очень увлекательное - объясняющее может быть и не всё, но многое - описание функционирования мозга, того как работает он, почему он важен весь целиком и как мы можем поддерживать его в здоровом состоянии (не менее 7 часов сна, фитнес, отсутствие длительного стресса).
Я настоятельно рекомендую начать знакомство с миром психологии именно с этой книги. Ну, или если вы не собираетесь знакомиться с предметом «психология», то просто прочтите эту книга как книгу по самопомощи, которую я также поставил на самую верхнюю строчку списка «Лучшие книги по self-help».
Rereading the book, I caught myself thinking that this is not only one of the best books on psychology, which I would recommend to read in the very first stages of acquaintance with the subject of psychology, but which also has not lost its value after many dozens of books on the same topic that were read by me. That is after this book I have read many other books, both on self-help and Neuropsychology, and on psychology in general. It often happens that after such a huge number of books, rereading the book no longer seem so new, exciting and interesting, as it was the first time. But in this case, everything is different. The book shocked me for the first time (so much so that I completely changed my lifestyle to a healthy one, starting with daily fitness exercises) and even if it didn't shock me for the second time, I definitely reread the book with a lot of interest.
What I definitely like about this book is that it's not boring text. Yes, many topics have long been known and repeated in many books (I mean the importance of sleep and exercise). But the examples that the author offers are much more fresh and varied than the examples offered by other authors of books. The topic of brain function, or rather, what a certain part of the brain is responsible for (as well as the first time I read this book, and the second time I liked the story about a woman who couldn't see moving objects) was described by the author just fine. In general, all the examples that the author uses are so interesting and, as I said, not worn out, that reading becomes enjoyable.
I would also note that the book I would define both as a book on self-help (the importance of sleep, physical exercise, the danger of continuous stress) and as a book on Neuropsychology (perhaps, someone would think that where the author writes in detail about the work of the brain, there are too many special terms and that in general it is not very clear, but everyone would agree that the examples to illustrate what has been said are understandable and interesting) and as a psychology in general. Yes, there is nothing here for fans of psychoanalysis, but, nevertheless, even for them I would recommend to read the book. After all, the author does not have this unpleasant habit, which is so characteristic of evolutionary psychologists - psychologists with a strong inclination to biology - to put their direction above all other branches of psychology. So, the author has no such style of writing completely absent.
And the last thing I wanted to note. Yes, the book is rather entertaining, because the author took several topics, but not the whole subject (Neuropsychology or even psychology). Yes, it turned out great. However (this is not a minus), it is definitely not a textbook. It's not a book of Myers' social psychology type. It is just a very fascinating description of how the brain functions, how it works, why it is important in its entirety and how we can keep it healthy (at least 7 hours of sleep, fitness, no long-term stress).
I strongly recommend to start acquaintance with the world of psychology with this book. Well, or if you are not going to get acquainted with the subject of psychology, then just read this book as a self-help book, which I also put on the top of the list "Best books on self-help".
April 24, 2017
The book lays out the core aspects of cognitive science in layman terms and is a fluid and entertaining read. The author keeps it clear from time to time what is established and what is experimental or state of the art in terms of our understanding of cognition. The chapters are very well organized, each focusing on a particular aspect of personal development and life choices. I learned a lot although I already had good understanding of chapters around memory but John's style of writing leads a sticky factor.
A must read book for all growth mindset folks regardless of one's prior understanding and knowledge of the subject. Highly recommend it to all. I am now looking forward to read his next book 'Brain Rules for Babies'
A must read book for all growth mindset folks regardless of one's prior understanding and knowledge of the subject. Highly recommend it to all. I am now looking forward to read his next book 'Brain Rules for Babies'
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