Video: "The Secret Life of the Brain"

In class #2 we watched the PBS video entitled "The Secret Life of the Brain". What an amazing video!! In the video we were introduced to a couple of kids: Katie and Michael. Katie had relentless firestorms in her brain and as a result, had her left hemisphere removed. Michael also had the left part of the brain removed after having countless daily seizures. What really struck me were the number of seizures that Michael would have in a day. Prior to surgery, on a good day, he would have 50, 60 even 70 seizures a day; but, on a bad day, that would increase to 300-400!!! Post-surgery, Michael was cured of his seizures although half of his body was paralyzed. He had to relearn how to walk and talk however, he is now within normal limits for his age in the area of spoken speech. It was discovered that there was more plasticity in the brain than originally thought.

These two students remind me of a former student in our school. She too used to have numerous seizures. Two summers ago, she had brain surgery in BC. For the first three months of the school year, we noticed a remarkable improvement in her. Her seizures had all but disappeared. Unfortunately, this did not remain the case. Each week she seemed to increase in the number of daily seizures and in their length. After they would stop, she would have to go and lie down for a 1/2 and most days would end up going home. She was scheduled for another brain surgery late this past summer and we will anxiously await the results. It is so crucial that she be able to experience the things that her classmates are experiencing as she had missed out on so much of her childhood. Now in grade 10, it would be nice for her to have those same opportunities.

The video also described how complex reading is in the brain. Different parts of the brain are used based on your age and what you are reading (ie, if you are reading Chinese characters). In all, there are 17 regions of the brain involved in reading!!

It was also interesting to learn that dyslexic children remodel their own brain. They may even use their right hemispheres to read.

So why was it important to watch this video? Here are 2 main points:
1. Experience can change the connections in the brain and Assistive Technology can do that.
2. When we make that AT match, we need to remember the sequence of what is going on and the tasks involved in the reading process and to find out where the difficulty is taking place.