New-Year-Resolutions

Here’s a toast to a Healthy, Happy & Meaningful New Year!

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“Think­ing about you” — clas­sic Mafal­da by Joaquín Sal­vador Lava­do Tejón, known as Quino, who left us in 2020 to explore future endeavors

And, if you’re look­ing for New Year Res­o­lu­tions, here you can find some inspi­ra­tion and ideas… 

1. To har­ness neu­ro­plas­tic­i­ty, start with enthusiasm

2. How learn­ing changes your brain

3. What you should know about neu­ro­plas­tic­i­ty and dance

4. Three ways to pro­tect your men­tal health dur­ing –and after– COVID-19

5. Can you grow your hip­pocam­pus? Yes. Here’s how, and why it matters

6. Five rea­sons the future of brain enhance­ment is dig­i­tal, per­va­sive and (hope­ful­ly) bright

7. What are cog­ni­tive abil­i­ties and how to boost them?

8. Six tips to build resilience and pre­vent brain-dam­ag­ing stress

9. Solv­ing the Brain Fit­ness Puz­zle Is the Key to Self-Empow­ered Aging

10. Read, Play, Train: 3 New Year Res­o­lu­tions and 36 Ideas for a Hap­pi­er & Health­i­er 2021

Read, Play, Train: 3 Resolutions and 36 Gift Ideas for a Happier & Healthier 2021

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Dear read­er,

We’d like to share some­thing spe­cial. As we start to cel­e­brate the hol­i­days and wel­come a much need­ed new year, we asked our team and trust­ed advi­sors to com­pile a list of gift (and self-gift) ideas to help us stay sane and healthy in the months ahead, pri­or­i­tiz­ing three habits which have been shown to pro­mote brain health, resilience and pos­i­tive neuroplasticity:

Read: Here’s a selec­tion of 12 fas­ci­nat­ing books to add healthy nov­el­ty, vari­ety and chal­lenge to our read­ing lives — and there­fore to our brains and minds

Play: Here are 12 cre­ative and (most­ly) col­lab­o­ra­tive board games. A peace­ful upgrade from the clas­sic Monop­oly and Risk … we know you know what we mean 🙂

Train: A selec­tion of the equip­ment we have relied on the most to stay fit, resilient and pur­pose­ful this year

For each and every sug­ges­tion, at least one col­league has tried it and tru­ly loved it; and we have ver­i­fied they have many and very pos­i­tive reviews. We are link­ing to their respec­tive pages in Ama­zon web store so that you can com­plete your research there, read­ing the details and user reviews, and because, as an Ama­zon Asso­ciate, we earn a small fee from qual­i­fy­ing purchases.

Hap­py & Healthy Hol­i­days; Hap­py & Healthy New Year!

Alvaro Fer­nan­dez and the Sharp­Brains Team

Checklist to Evaluate Brain Training and Brain Health Claims

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SharpBrains ChecklistTo assist those look­ing for ideas, prod­ucts and ser­vices in the brain training/ health area, either as hol­i­day gifts or New Year Res­o­lu­tions, let us share this resource: Sharp­Brains’ Check­list to eval­u­ate Brain Train­ing and Brain Health claims, includ­ing Ten Ques­tions to Choose the Right Brain Fit­ness Pro­gram— and a brief expla­na­tion of why each ques­tion is important.

10 Brain Tips To Teach and Learn — Ideas for New Year Resolutions

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My inter­est in the brain stems from want­i­ng to bet­ter under­stand both how to make school more palat­able for stu­dents, and pro­fes­sion­al devel­op­ment more mean­ing­ful for fac­ul­ty. To that end, I began my Neu­rons Fir­ing blog in April, 2007, have been doing a lot of read­ing, and been attend­ing work­shops and con­fer­ences, includ­ing Learn­ing & the Brain.

If you agree that our brains are designed for learn­ing, then as edu­ca­tors it is incum­bent upon us to be look­ing for ways to max­i­mize the learn­ing process for each of our stu­dents, as well as for our­selves. Some of what fol­lows is sim­ply com­mon sense, but I’ve learned that all of it has a sci­en­tif­ic basis in our brains. [Read more…] about 10 Brain Tips To Teach and Learn — Ideas for New Year Resolutions

The Ten Habits of Highly Effective Brains — Time for Brain Fitness Resolutions?

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Giv­en many of us are start­ing to pre­pare New Year Res­o­lu­tions, let’s revis­it one of Sharp­Brains’ most pop­u­lar-ever arti­cles that can help us all refine our Brain Fit­ness Res­o­lu­tions…

The Ten Habits of High­ly Effec­tive Brains

  1. Learn what is the “It” in “Use It or Lose It”. A basic under­stand­ing will serve you well to appre­ci­ate your brain’s beau­ty as a liv­ing and con­stant­ly-devel­op­ing dense for­est with bil­lions of neu­rons and synapses.
  2. Take care of your nutri­tion. Did you know that [Read more…] about The Ten Habits of High­ly Effec­tive Brains — Time for Brain Fit­ness Resolutions?