Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School by John Medina

My review

rating: 3 of 5 stars 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. Buy it from Amazon.com View all my reviews.

Labels: psychology, science