Improving mental speed -
Whatever the case, learners have been shown to absorb more information in the first 10 minutes of a lesson than they can in a whole hour. So, by keeping learning fresh, snappy and short students are far more likely to take in that much needed subject matter.
I have written a blog post that has 10 different exercises that can be used to speed up mental processing. Click here to read quick and easy activities that can be used during one on one time with students or even in a small group.
You can read about more tips here. A quick activity that you can use to warm up daily is to use a symbol speed activity. Student must go through a group of symbols and search for the target symbol.
Symbol Search involves processing speed and improves visual scanning. There is also an activity in the packet that has students marking symbols as quickly as possible which also helps tie processing speed to fine motor output. Visual discrimination and processing speed are important for littles before they even start being taught how to read and write.
Here is an activity that I think is useful for young learners. They will cut out the symbols and find their match and glue it down as quickly as possible. After being proficient with the symbols they move on to letters. With the advancement of technology, there are lots of classrooms with interactive whiteboards, iPads, etc and these can both help students have more fun with learning and the teacher can make learning suit the needs of individuals.
These can be simple things such as tiredness during sessions at the end of the day or sluggishness after eating lunch. Whatever the case try to pinpoint these factors and avoid introducing difficult new information during these times.
Health competition can involve any type of game in which you compete with yourself, someone, or even a computer to complete a task as quickly as possible. The point is to try to do it faster! Remember the point with these activities is to beat the time! Students need to be taught to be aware of their thinking and also be given the tools to help them improve it.
I hope this blog post helped you to understand the importance of mental processing speed and how to improve it with your students. subscribe to our newsletter. Toggle Navigation Home Book Study Blog Freebies TpT Shop Online Community About. Creativity Hub. Resources and Ideas for Educators Guiding Curiosity, Igniting Imagination!
Menu Home Book Study Blog Freebies TpT Shop Online Community About. Previous Next. View Larger Image. Aerobic Exercise Doing short bursts of exercise before learning something difficult helps to wake the brain up. Change the method of learning If it seems that a student is having a tough time learning from a worksheet, book, etc.
Short repetitive bursts Learning can be an arduous task for some pupils. Mental Processing Exercises I have written a blog post that has 10 different exercises that can be used to speed up mental processing.
Symbol Speed A quick activity that you can use to warm up daily is to use a symbol speed activity. Interactive learning With the advancement of technology, there are lots of classrooms with interactive whiteboards, iPads, etc and these can both help students have more fun with learning and the teacher can make learning suit the needs of individuals.
Healthy Competition Health competition can involve any type of game in which you compete with yourself, someone, or even a computer to complete a task as quickly as possible. Some ideas you can do with your class are: Quickly unscramble a word or sentence.
Solve a maze. Say the alphabet backwards. Kerchner , assistant professor of neurology and neurological sciences at the Stanford University School of Medicine, responds:. To a brain scientist, processing speed means just that: the rate at which a human can take in a bit of new information, reach some judgment on it and then formulate a response.
Studies suggest that the speed of information processing changes with age along an inverted U-shaped curve, such that our thinking speeds up from childhood to adolescence, maintains a period of relative stability leading up to middle age, and finally, in late middle age and onward, declines slowly but steadily.
If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today. That processing speed slows with age is intuitive to most people.
Many elderly individuals have noticed that it takes them longer to solve problems or make decisions than it did when they were young. Yet the reasons for this age-related deceleration in information processing are not completely understood and may vary from person to person.
Some compelling evidence suggests that such a decline reflects wear and tear of the white matter in the brain, which is made up of all the wires, or axons, that connect one part of the brain to another.
Slowed information transfer along axons may impede processing speed. But what causes this axonal communication to slow down in the first place? In some people, diabetes, smoking, high blood pressure or other so-called vascular risk factors can wear away at the blood vessels feeding the brain's white matter, starving axons of much needed oxygen and glucose.
Some people may have a genetic predisposition to age-related white matter decay, a poorly understood but actively studied hypothesis.
Last Updated: January 31, Fact Checked. This article was medically reviewed by Imprving Lewis, MD, Improvibg, MBA, FACPM, FACN Improvinv by wikiHow staff writer, Aly Rusciano. Michael D. Lewis, MD, MPH, MBA, FACPM, FACN, is an expert on nutritional interventions for brain health, particularly the prevention and rehabilitation of brain injury. In upon retiring as a Colonel after 31 years in the U.
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