Many people think of the brain as a mystery. They don’t know much about intelligence and how it works. When they do think about what intelligence is, many people believe that a person is born either smart, average, or dumb — and stays that way for life.
But new research shows that the brain is more like a muscle — it changes and gets stronger when you use it. And scientists have shown just how the brain grows and gets stronger when you learn.
Everyone knows that when you lift weights, your muscles get bigger, and you get stronger. A person who can’t lift 20 pounds when they start exercising can get strong enough to lift 100 pounds after working out for a long time. That’s because the muscles become larger and stronger with exercise. And when you stop exercising, the muscles shrink, and you get weaker. That’s why people say, “Use it or lose it!
But most people don’t know that when they practice and learn new things, parts of their brain change and get larger a lot like muscles do when they exercise.
Inside the brain’s cortex are billions of tiny nerve cells, called neurons. The nerve cells have branches connecting them to other cells in a complicated network. Communication between these brain cells allows us to think and solve problems.
When you learn new things, these tiny brain connections actually multiply and get stronger. The more you challenge your mind to learn, the more your brain cells grow. Then, things that you once found very hard or even impossible to do — like speaking a foreign language or doing algebra — seem to become easy. The result is a stronger, smarter brain.
Can Brain Grow Stronger?
Scientists started thinking that the human brain could develop and change when they studied animals’ brains. They found out that animals who lived in a challenging environment, with other animals and toys to play with, were different from animals who lived alone in bare cages.
While the animals who lived alone just ate and slept all the time, the ones who lived with different toys and other animals were always active. They spent a lot of time figuring out how to use the toys and how to get along with the other animals.
Another thing that got scientists thinking about the brain growing and changing was babies. Everyone knows that babies are born without talking or understanding language. But somehow, almost all babies learn to speak their parents’ language in the first few years of life. How do they do this?
From the first day they are born, babies hear people around them talk — all day, every day, to the baby and each other. They have to try to make sense of these strange sounds and figure out what they mean. In a way, babies are exercising their brains by listening hard.
Later, when they need to tell their parents what they want, they start practicing talking themselves. At first, they make goo-goo sounds. Then, words start coming, And by the time they are three years old, most can say whole sentences almost perfectly.
Once children learn a language, they don’t forget it. The child’s brain has changed — it has actually gotten smarter.
No one thinks babies are stupid because they can’t talk. They just haven’t learned how to yet. But some people will call a person dumb if they can’t solve math problems, spell a word right, or read fast — even though all these things are learned with practice.
At first, no one can read or solve equations. But with practice, they can learn to do it. And the more a person learns, the easier it gets to learn new things because their brain “muscles” has gotten stronger!
Like a weightlifter or a basketball player, you have to exercise and practice to be a brain athlete. By practicing, you make your brain stronger. You also learn skills that let you use your brain in a smarter way-just like a basketball player learns new moves.
(Source: The National Association of Independent Schools
