Sunday, June 17, 2012

Parts of the Brain (What Does What)

What are the most important parts of the brain? Which parts of the brain are used for speaking, understanding and remembering? Can you label the lobes yourself? Use the song and these pictures to help you learn:

http://vimeo.com/26067401

Here are the lyrics (words). The most important parts are in red.

This is a song about parts of the brain 
I'm singing it to memorize the names 

The ideas here may be simplistic 
but matching meaning and rhyme is a tough logistic

The Cerebral Cortex has four main lobes 
With names from the nearby skull bones

Frontal does the thinking
Occipital deals with vision 
Parietal senses objects and 
Temporal listens

Inside these lobes there's specialties like 
Broca's Area, which produces speech. 

Wernicke's Area handles language comprehension
and the Motor Cortex is for moving with intention.

The Sensory Cortex handles perception
of touch, pain, temperature and proprioception.

There's two outer brain parts that are distinct
They may seem separate, but everything's linked

The Cerebellum does balance & coordination
and has our memorized-movement archive

The Brainstem sets heartbeat & respiration
and other things that we need to survive

The brain's inner parts are unique
Cut the Corpus Callosum to take a peek

The Thalamus handles signal routing 
and the Amygdala's emotions can have you shouting.

The Hippocampus does our long-term memory saving
and the Hypothalamus makes our sex and food cravings.

The Anterior Cingulate Cortex learns from mistakes
and in controlling movement, the Basal Ganglia is the brakes.

The brain parts list is much longer, indeed 
But for my class assignment this is all I need

Author's comments:


There's so much here packed into 3 minutes, that I recommend repeated viewings/listenings for anyone wanting to use this song as a memory/learning aid. The song is actually pretty catchy if you listen enough, although there's no exact repetition like most pop songs.


Questions to think about:

What do we call the two halves of the brain? Which parts of the brain are most important for language? The brain is plastic. What does that mean? What happened to Sarah Scott? Who helped Sarah Scott to recover? What happened to Jill Bolte Taylor? Why was Dr. Taylor so excited about it?