For the assignment we were to review an article from EBSCO MasterFILE Premier on one topic of our choosing. I chose to study Nutrition and Learning since I've been exposed to the concept through Dr. Amen's TED Talk, and by The Winner's Brain.
The Assignment:
Using the Information Literacy module, choose a topic from this lesson that interests you, such as wiring, dendrites, how emotions influence learning, nutrition and learning, REM sleep or how early experiences impact later learning. Conduct a search in the EBSCO MasterFILE Premier database and locate your chosen topic in a journal or magazine article. Create a mind map using Mind Meister that indicates the five most important things you learned about your chosen topic and how they relate to each other. In addition to your mind map, create a Word document (100- 250 words) describing why these are important to you, and include the complete citation information for your chosen article in APA format.
You can view a PDF of my Mind Meister map of Nutrition and Learning here.
Essay:
In
her article titled “Nutrition and Learning,” Joan Murray, RD, analyzes a number
of the nutritional factors that biologically influence the brain and a
student’s overall brain chemistry. Dr. Amen, a qualified expert in brain health
from his work as an American psychiatrist and a brain disorder specialist, has
addressed the importance of diet in his TED Talks, particularly emphasizing
that everything you eat actually changes the physical chemistry of your brain.
Similarly, authors Mark J. Fenske, Jeffery Brown, and Liz Neporent in their
book The Winner’s Brain dedicate a
whole chapter to why nutrition has an important influence on brain-based
learning. If these two references provide mere asides to an overall narrative
of neuroscience, what else can we learn about the effects of nutrition on
learning?
In
her article, Murray has quite a bit to say about nutrition and learning. The
five most fascinating factors are: amino acids, glucose, vitamin deficiencies,
breakfast, and recall factors. Glucose is an important factor that ends up
affecting every other biological facet of brain health, especially hormones and
amino acids. Whether scientists study children, college students, or the
elderly (all patients in Murray’s study), recall factors are affected by
vitamin deficiencies, whether someone has a high-protein breakfast, and what
the glucose levels were in either the control or the placebo experiment. Overall,
students should always have breakfast so that they perform better, stay more
focused, and are able to input more quality information. Murray agrees with
other resources and goes even further: with good protein and glucose during
times of information input, the information recall last longer and has a higher
quality.
Works Cited
Murray,
J. (1998). Nutrition & learning. Foodservice Director, 11(9),
108.
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