10/3/14

Quick write: 

How do you think your teenage Prefrontal Cortex affects for you decision making? 

10/2/14

Quick Write: Formulate a question you still have about the teen brain. After you've written your question, classify it (DOK level 1, 2, 3, or 4) and explain why you classified it that way. Emphasis on Quick. You have only five minutes from the official start of class.

What would happen if we used a larger percentage of our brain?

I would classify my question as a DOK level 3 question. My question is an open-ended question that can lead to a discussion, and can not be answered with a "yes" or "no".

10/1/14

Step 2: Teenagers are known as risk-takers. But why? Turns out it’s an evolutionary part of our brain development. Read about the science of teenage risk-taking in this article from Science News for Kids. As you read, take notes so that you can summarize the article on your blog. Hint: Pay attention to the subheads in the article!

After reading the article 

The teenage life is complex. Scientist are looking at teenage brains to see how and why they make the decisions they make. Teenagers choices' are all about exploring and pushing limits. Every species has an adolescence stage, this stage is necessary in order to reach adult hood. In order to examine the human brain, researchers use an MRI machine to test the theory between teenage and adult hood brains. Researchers use these young test subjects by putting them into an MRI machine and having them play various video games. While the teenagers play the researchers are tracking their brain activity. The researchers discovered that in teenagers there is a tug of war going on between the reward center, the ventral striatum, and the master planner, the prefrontal cortex. The reward center shows increased activity in everyone when there is a risky decision to be made or the offer of a reward. However, in teenagers this brain region is shouting even louder between the ages of 13-17. The prefrontal cortex's ability to boss the brain increases with age. Researchers believe that the teenage brain is constructed to experiment and take risks so that teens will grow away from their parents, create their own worlds and become more independent. There are two processes going on in the teen brain. One process involves the fibers connecting nerve cells. The other process is the strengthening of the synapses the docks between the nerve cells. Babies have an abundance of connections, but during the teenage years, many of these connections are pruned (eliminated) to make the brain process more efficient. This is why it's easier for young people to learn languages, but it also explains why sometimes it's hard for them to make logical decisions.

After reading the article "The Teenage Brain", I've realized the difference between a win, and a lost while taking a risk. One risk I took was earlier this month down in Soho. I was walking towards American Apparel for an open-call interview and since I was about 15min early, I decided to get something to drink to not only calm my nerves, but to quench my thirst. Haha. So I went into a friendly looking cafe and ordered some tea. The lady in the back of the counter told me "we only have black tea, would you like some lemon in it?" So I was like ".. sure" because I like tea, its soothing to my soul, but after drinking about half the cup my stomach started to hurt and I got nauseous. Wonderful! So this was the lost I experienced. I took a chance, and bought some black tea, I didn't want to spend $4 on the tea but I did, and the end result was me becoming nauseous, having to piss a river, and learning that I should not trust every cafe I go in to. 

After experiencing a lost, I must talk about a time I experienced a win. A win I experienced was last night, I left my boyfriends house and was in a rush to get home. The bus was taking forever and I was not at my usual bus stop. I usually go to the stop where I can either take the Bx1 or the Bx2 but I decided to take a risk, and went to the bus stop where I could only take the Bx1. After waiting for about 10min the bus finally came and it's about a 35min bus ride if I take it straight home. I was feeling lazy and the bus was going express, so I was stuck contemplating whether I should stay on or get off. I got off, I ran towards the train station and about 3 minutes later the train came. Not only did I make a smart move to get home quickly, save myself 20 minutes, but I also learned that getting off the bus isn't such a bad idea sometimes, and I need to stop being lazy. 

9/19/14

Quick Write: Check out the rubric for blogs under "Pages" on the right. Evaluate your first posting using the rubric. Explain why you gave yourself that score.

I would give all my post a 4 because I put in a lot of effort, details, information and my vocabulary/punctuation is 9/10 times correct and on point. 



On the test I chose question 10. Question 10 was  the quote "I can! I can! I can! (If I put my mind to it.)" and I strongly agree with this quote. The reason why I strongly agree with the quote was because if I decide I'm going to something, I'm going to do it and be completely untouchable and unstoppable. I feel that whenever I put my mind towards something and I know in my heart and my mind I can achieve it, I'm going to do it. As an example this year I've decided to become an Honor Roll student and raise my garbage GPA into an award-winning GPA which is usually an 85 and above. By raising my GPA and becoming an Honor Roll student, my accomplishments are going to get me into a good college and get me enough financial aid and scholarship money to lift these tuition prices off my shoulders.  So this is why I agree with the quote and feel like anyone who puts their mind into something can do it as long as they're dedicated and consistent. 

9/17/14

Do Now:

• What is the relationship between our brains and our minds?

This is the question I am going to attempt to answer on a different day and will keep you guys updated. 

9/15/14

Hello people visiting my blog, my name is Sophia Rose and this is my first post for September 2014. This is my senior year in Crotona Academy High School and my second semester being in Ms.Beckers class. I plan to be an excellent student this year, achieve high 90s in this class, and during this course I hope to learn more about the human brain and the way it works. A question is have for this course on the brain is, "What parts of the brain contribute to decision making and being distracted?".

5/29/14

Quick Write: Check out the flow chart on Amy Ortiz's blog. Identify simply the cue for one of your bad habits using the flow chart. Write about it. Quickly. (Make this a habit.)

The cue for my bad habit occurs when I'm in my "I don't care" estate. 

Step 3: Write about a habit you want to change and why. Be sure to identify the three parts of this habit (cue, reward, routine) when you describe it.

My habit: Being insensitive 
why: It's not nice
cue: when I don't feel like being bothered 
reward: solitude 
routine: announcing " I DO NOT CARE " and repeating until my point gets across.