London Taxi Drivers and Brain Wiring

A reader shared this article link and video about London taxi drivers. In their test, which takes years to prepare for, they must memorize every street and address in London. This rewires their brains. More details can be found at these links.

Scientific American Article
Link for Video from National Geographic
Second Video Link
Article in Nat Geo about the subject
Article in Wired


posted by Chuck Schallhorn

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Brain Games Episode Guides-One Document

Brain Games is our new favorite series in my classroom. My TAs watched all the episodes and did their best to identify the seasons, episode titles, and concepts mentioned. I am certain there are errors or omissions, but neither student has had AP Psych.

I finally had the chance to put the seasons together into one document. Click here for the Word document.

Season One
1.1 Pay Attention
1.2 Watch This!
1.3 Remember This!

Season Two
2.1 Focus Pocus
2.2 It's About Time
2.3 Motion Commotion
2.4 Don't Be Afraid
2.5 Power of Persuasion
2.6 What You Don't Know
2.7 Battle of the Sexes
2.8 Seeing is Believing
2.9 You Decide
2.10 Use It or Lose It
2.11 Illusion Confusion
2.12 Liar Liar!

Season Three
3.1 Battle of the Ages
3.2 In Living Color
3.3 Laws of Attraction
3.4 Trust Me
3.5 Stress Test
3.6 What's Going on?
3.7 In Living Color
3.8 Mind Your Body
3.9 Follow the Leader
Bonus: Brain Games DIY

Season 4
4.1 Compassion
4.2 Addiction
4.3 Language
4.4 Risk
4.5 Battle of the Sexes 2
4.6 Superstitions
4.7 Food
4.8 Anger
4.9 Patterns
4.10 Intuition
Bonus: Digital Extras

If you want to purchase the DVDs, you can find them here:











You can buy Season 5 on video on demand now with Amazon Video or order the DVDs later when they are released.

posted by Chuck Schallhorn

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Brain Games--National Geographic Series

I could have sworn I had posted about this before, but perhaps I had just created a false memory based upon mental repetition of the intent to do so.

If you have not seen these shows, they are fantastic.  The first season begins with hour-long episodes. Seasons two, three, and four have half hour episodes, but each one runs 22 minutes.  The segments are as varied as psychology itself, but ultimately, you will have one of the best resources you can imagine.

Demonstrations I used to create for class or had on old VHS video are now all in high resolution and prepared professionally by editors and graphic artists.  I must say, I am a huge fan of this show. Below are links for you to order them from Amazon.com.  I have seasons 1-3 and have preordered season 4 since I have watched them on tv.  Simply great tv and great psych.  For me, seasons two and three were excellent, but one got me hooked.  Check them out.  You will not regret it.  This is great for both regular and AP Psych.









posted by Chuck Schallhorn

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National Geographics Brain Page

Believe it or not, the National Geographic has part of their website devoted to the human body. I (Kent) will leave the sections on the digestive system, heart, skin and lungs to our colleagues in biology and concentrate on the section devoted to the brain. Go to http://science.nationalgeographic.com/science/health-and-human-body/human-body/brain-article.html for more information.

In addition, make sure to check out a short, but fantastic slide show at http://science.nationalgeographic.com/science/photos/brain/?source=A-to-Z as well as an article on sleep deprivation in rats at http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/04/110427-sleep-deprived-brains-nature-science-health-rat-asleep-awake/

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