0:00:12.751,0:00:14.403
I want to share a little secret,

0:00:14.403,0:00:18.403
which I hope will not be a secret [br]by the end of the talk.

0:00:18.403,0:00:24.180
I am truly, madly, deeply passionate [br]about the human brain.

0:00:24.180,0:00:29.092
Science has taught us [br]that our brain shapes us,

0:00:29.092,0:00:32.997
that it makes us uniquely who we are.

0:00:32.997,0:00:40.161
And if we think about our brain,[br]it has 200 billion neurons.

0:00:40.161,0:00:44.945
Think about the world's population: [br]that's a mere 7 billion.

0:00:44.945,0:00:51.664
And we have hundreds of trillions [br]of connections in our brain.

0:00:51.664,0:00:56.049
If we imagine all the stars [br]in the Milky Way Galaxy,

0:00:56.049,0:01:02.339
there are more connections in our brain, [br]than all of those stars combined.

0:01:02.339,0:01:06.383
So, this incredibly complex organ [br]that we carry with us

0:01:06.383,0:01:09.979
everywhere we go, [br]it does shape who we are.

0:01:09.979,0:01:12.556
It is a filter, [br]it filters our perceptions

0:01:12.556,0:01:17.854
and our understanding of ourselves, [br]of others, of our world,

0:01:17.854,0:01:21.151
and of our place in that world.

0:01:21.151,0:01:23.371
And, what is incredibly amazing

0:01:23.371,0:01:27.104
is no two brains are exactly alike.

0:01:27.104,0:01:29.525
If you look at the person next to you,

0:01:29.525,0:01:32.523
and you note [br]all the physical differences between you:

0:01:32.523,0:01:37.000
the shape of your nose, [br]the color of your eyes, your height,

0:01:37.000,0:01:40.429
there are more differences [br]between your two brains

0:01:40.429,0:01:45.238
than all of those physical differences [br]in combination.

0:01:45.238,0:01:50.232
So, our brain does make us uniquely us.

0:01:50.232,0:01:55.031
And I am here today [br]to share with you my story,

0:01:55.031,0:01:57.574
and it's a story of how I came to learn

0:01:57.574,0:01:59.928
that not only does our brain shape us,

0:01:59.928,0:02:04.495
but that we can actually shape our brain.

0:02:04.495,0:02:07.841
My story began in Grade 1,

0:02:07.841,0:02:11.845
and in Grade 1 I was identified [br]as having a mental block.

0:02:11.845,0:02:14.374
I was told I had a defect.

0:02:14.374,0:02:19.067
And I was told I would never learn [br]like other children.

0:02:19.067,0:02:23.395
And really, the message at that time [br]was loud and clear.

0:02:23.395,0:02:28.649
I was told I needed to learn to live [br]with those limitations.

0:02:28.649,0:02:34.691
And this was 1957, and it was the time [br]of the unchangeable brain.

0:02:34.691,0:02:40.556
And childhood was [br]a profound struggle for me.

0:02:40.556,0:02:44.449
I couldn't tell time. [br]I couldn't understand the relationship

0:02:44.449,0:02:48.564
between an hour hand [br]and a minute hand on a clock.

0:02:48.564,0:02:54.355
I couldn't understand language. [br]Most of what I read, or heard,

0:02:54.355,0:02:58.247
was really as intelligible [br]as the 'Jabberwocky'.

0:02:58.247,0:03:00.620
I could understand concrete things.

0:03:00.620,0:03:03.321
If somebody said to me, [br]"The man is wearing a black coat",

0:03:03.321,0:03:07.295
I could paint the picture in my head, [br]and I could understand that.

0:03:07.295,0:03:13.899
But what I couldn't do was understand [br]concepts, or ideas, or relationships.

0:03:13.899,0:03:17.256
So, lots of things were confusing.

0:03:17.256,0:03:22.722
I pondered, how could my aunt also [br]be my mother's sister?

0:03:22.722,0:03:27.809
And what did that fraction, [br]1/4, really mean?

0:03:28.973,0:03:32.255
Any kind of abstract concept [br]was hard for me.

0:03:32.255,0:03:35.663
Irony and jokes: that was impossible.

0:03:35.663,0:03:39.594
So, I learned to laugh [br]when other people did.

0:03:39.987,0:03:44.276
Cause and effect: [br]it did not exist in my world.

0:03:44.683,0:03:49.287
There were no reasons [br]behind why things happened.

0:03:49.287,0:03:55.822
My world was a series of disconnected [br]bits and pieces of unrelated fragments.

0:03:55.822,0:03:59.895
And eventually, [br]my fragmented view of the world

0:03:59.895,0:04:05.450
ended up causing [br]a very fragmented sense of myself.

0:04:05.850,0:04:09.069
And that wasn't all: [br]this whole left side of my body

0:04:09.069,0:04:13.140
was like an alien being, [br]unconnected to the rest of me.

0:04:13.140,0:04:16.955
I would bang and bump into things [br]on the left side of my body.

0:04:16.955,0:04:20.821
If I picked up anything in this left hand,[br]I would drop it.

0:04:20.821,0:04:24.678
If I put this left hand on the hot burner,[br]I would feel pain,

0:04:24.678,0:04:27.749
but I had no idea [br]where it was coming from.

0:04:27.749,0:04:31.287
I was truly a danger to myself.

0:04:31.287,0:04:36.274
My mother, she was convinced [br]I would be dead by the age of 5.

0:04:36.274,0:04:40.093
And then, if that wasn't enough, [br]I had a spatial problem.

0:04:40.093,0:04:42.567
I couldn't imagine [br]three-dimensional space.

0:04:42.567,0:04:45.151
I couldn't create maps in my head.

0:04:45.151,0:04:49.444
I would constantly get lost,[br]even in my friend's house.

0:04:49.444,0:04:52.147
Crossing the street instilled terror.

0:04:52.147,0:04:55.710
I could not judge [br]how far away was that car.

0:04:55.710,0:04:58.537
Geometry was a nightmare.

0:04:58.537,0:05:01.212
I felt incredible shame.

0:05:01.212,0:05:05.395
I felt there was something horribly, [br]horribly wrong with me.

0:05:05.395,0:05:08.944
And in my child's mind, [br]when I'd heard that diagnosis,

0:05:08.944,0:05:12.488
of having a mental block, [br]I actually thought

0:05:12.488,0:05:16.762
I had a wooden cube in my head [br]that made learning difficult.

0:05:16.762,0:05:21.191
And I didn't have a piece of wood [br]in my head, but I wasn't far wrong.

0:05:21.191,0:05:24.343
I had blockages, as I was later to learn,

0:05:24.343,0:05:27.833
in very critical parts of my brain.

0:05:28.867,0:05:33.049
And I tried all the traditional approaches, [br]they were all about compensation,

0:05:33.049,0:05:36.024
and about working around the problem,

0:05:36.024,0:05:38.360
finding a strength to support a weakness.

0:05:38.360,0:05:44.120
They were not about trying to address [br]the source of the problem,

0:05:44.120,0:05:50.604
and they took heroic effort, [br]and led to rather limited results for me.

0:05:51.732,0:05:55.498
Then, Grade 8.

0:05:55.498,0:05:57.802
I hit the wall.

0:05:57.802,0:06:01.212
I could not imagine [br]how I could go on to high school,

0:06:01.212,0:06:05.204
and handle more complex curriculum.

0:06:05.204,0:06:09.465
The only option I could see [br]was ending my life.

0:06:09.465,0:06:14.516
So, I decided to end the pain.

0:06:14.516,0:06:19.374
And the next morning, when I woke up [br]after my failed suicide attempt,

0:06:19.374,0:06:24.326
I berated myself for not even being able[br]to get that right.

0:06:24.326,0:06:26.775
So, I soldiered on.

0:06:26.775,0:06:33.294
And part of what kept me going was [br]an attitude that I learned from my father.

0:06:33.294,0:06:37.769
He was an inventor, and he was passionate [br]about the creative process.

0:06:37.769,0:06:43.357
He taught me that if there's a problem,[br]and there's no solution,

0:06:43.357,0:06:46.294
you go out and create a solution.

0:06:46.294,0:06:49.710
And the other thing he taught me was

0:06:49.710,0:06:54.368
that before you can solve a problem, [br]you have to identify its nature.

0:06:54.368,0:06:58.765
So I continued my hunt. [br]I went on to study psychology,

0:06:58.765,0:07:02.106
to try to understand [br]what was wrong with me,

0:07:02.106,0:07:05.532
what was the source of my problem.

0:07:05.532,0:07:14.104
And then, in the summer of 1977, [br]something life-altering happened.

0:07:14.104,0:07:17.596
I met a mind like my own,

0:07:18.227,0:07:23.652
A Russian soldier, Lev Zasetsky, [br]the only difference being

0:07:23.652,0:07:26.889
his mind was shaped by a bullet,

0:07:26.889,0:07:30.870
and mine had been that way since birth.

0:07:30.870,0:07:35.663
I met Zasestky on the pages of a book,[br]'The Man With a Shattered World',

0:07:35.663,0:07:40.087
wrtitten by the brilliant Russian[br]neuropsychologist, Alexander Luria.

0:07:40.087,0:07:43.112
As I read Zasetsky's story,

0:07:43.112,0:07:47.241
he couldn't tell time, [br]he described living in a dense fog.

0:07:47.241,0:07:50.510
All he got was fragments, bits and pieces.

0:07:50.510,0:07:54.153
This man was living my life.

0:07:54.153,0:07:58.110
So now, at the age of 25, in 1977,

0:07:58.110,0:08:01.941
I knew the source of my problem.

0:08:01.941,0:08:07.399
It was a part of my brain, in the left [br]hemisphere, that wasn't working.

0:08:07.399,0:08:10.246
And then I came across the work [br]of Mark Rosenzweig,

0:08:10.246,0:08:12.633
and he showed me a solution.

0:08:12.633,0:08:14.485
Rosenzweig was working with rats,

0:08:14.485,0:08:18.667
and he found that rats in an enriched [br]and stimulating environment

0:08:18.667,0:08:20.396
were better learners. [br]

0:08:20.396,0:08:22.565
And then he went [br]and looked at their brains:

0:08:22.565,0:08:28.416
their brains had changed physiologically [br]to support that learning.

0:08:29.247,0:08:31.947
And this was neuroplasticity in action.

0:08:31.947,0:08:36.151
Neuroplasticity, simply put, [br]the brain's ability to change

0:08:36.151,0:08:40.684
physiologically and functionally, [br]as the result of stimulation.

0:08:40.684,0:08:43.663
So now I knew what I had to do.

0:08:43.663,0:08:48.367
I had to find a way to work, [br]to exercise my brain,

0:08:48.367,0:08:50.971
to strengthen those weak parts.

0:08:50.971,0:08:55.906
And this was the beginning of [br]my transformation and of my life's work.

0:08:55.906,0:09:01.369
And I had to believe that humans must have[br]at least as much neuroplasticity,

0:09:01.369,0:09:04.369
and hopefully more, than rats.

0:09:04.369,0:09:07.933
So, I went on to create my first exercise.

0:09:07.933,0:09:12.158
And I used clocks, because clocks [br]are form of relationship,

0:09:12.158,0:09:14.288
and I had never been able to tell time.

0:09:14.288,0:09:16.164
So I started with the two-handed clock,

0:09:16.164,0:09:19.253
to force my brain [br]to process relationships,

0:09:19.253,0:09:22.231
and then I added a third hand, [br]and then a fourth hand,

0:09:22.231,0:09:26.525
because I wanted to make my brain [br]to work harder, and harder, and harder,

0:09:26.525,0:09:30.539
to pull together concepts [br]and understand their connection.

0:09:30.539,0:09:32.930
And about three to four months in,

0:09:32.930,0:09:37.662
I knew something significant had changed.

0:09:37.662,0:09:42.564
I'd always wanted to read philosophy, [br]and had never been able to understand it.

0:09:42.564,0:09:46.782
And I just happened to have access [br]to a philosophy library.

0:09:46.782,0:09:49.913
So I went in, [br]and I pulled a book off the shelf,

0:09:49.913,0:09:51.997
and I opened it to a page at random,

0:09:51.997,0:09:56.710
and I read that page, [br]and I understood it as I was reading it.

0:09:56.710,0:10:00.327
This had never happened in my entire life.

0:10:00.327,0:10:03.717
And then I thought, maybe it's a fluke, [br]maybe that was just an easy book.

0:10:03.717,0:10:08.152
So I pulled another book off the shelf, [br]opened it, read it, and understood it.

0:10:08.152,0:10:12.481
And by the time I was finished, I was [br]surrounded by a pile of a hundred books,

0:10:12.481,0:10:17.448
and I had been able to read [br]and understand each page.

0:10:17.448,0:10:20.722
So I knew that something had changed.

0:10:20.722,0:10:25.356
(Applause)

0:10:25.356,0:10:27.932
Thank you. My experiment had worked.

0:10:27.932,0:10:30.442
The human brain was capable of change.

0:10:30.442,0:10:32.165
And then I decided to create an exercise

0:10:32.165,0:10:34.835
for that alien part of my body,

0:10:34.835,0:10:38.496
and for that I knew I had to work [br]on an area in the right hemisphere,

0:10:38.496,0:10:41.754
the somatosensory cortex [br]that registers sensation.

0:10:41.754,0:10:46.798
I created an exercise for that [br]and I am no longer a danger to myself.

0:10:46.798,0:10:49.713
And then I decided, that spatial problem,

0:10:49.713,0:10:52.017
because I was really tired [br]of getting lost,

0:10:52.017,0:10:54.770
and so I created [br]another exercise for that,

0:10:54.770,0:10:59.127
and I don't get lost, I can actually [br]read maps -- I don't like GPS's,

0:10:59.127,0:11:02.879
because I like to read maps now, [br]because I can. (Laughter)

0:11:02.879,0:11:06.907
So, I knew now, the brain could change.

0:11:06.907,0:11:11.361
I was living proof [br]of human neuroplasticity.

0:11:11.711,0:11:16.602
And what really breaks my heart

0:11:16.602,0:11:19.933
is that I still meet people today,

0:11:19.933,0:11:25.245
children, individuals, that are struggling[br]with learning problems,

0:11:25.245,0:11:30.145
and they're still being told [br]what I was told in 1957,

0:11:30.145,0:11:33.720
that they need to learn to live [br]with their limitations,

0:11:33.720,0:11:36.610
they don't dare to dream.

0:11:36.610,0:11:40.310
And what I learned since 1977,

0:11:40.310,0:11:44.010
when I met Zasetsky and Luria, [br]and Rosenzweig,

0:11:44.010,0:11:47.291
is that, yes, our brain does shape us,

0:11:47.291,0:11:53.007
it impacts how we can engage, [br]and participate, and be in the world,

0:11:53.007,0:11:55.340
and every single one of us

0:11:55.340,0:11:59.617
has our own unique profile [br]of cognitive strengths and weaknesses.

0:11:59.617,0:12:05.238
And if there's a limitation, [br]we don't necessarily have to live with it.

0:12:05.238,0:12:08.480
We now know about neuroplasticity,

0:12:08.480,0:12:13.854
and we can harness [br]the brain's changeable characteristics,

0:12:13.854,0:12:20.119
to create programs to actually strengthen [br]and stimulate and change our brain.

0:12:20.119,0:12:26.545
And in 1966, Rosenzweig [br]threw down the gauntlet.

0:12:26.545,0:12:31.252
He said, his challenge was: [br]"Let's take what he'd learned with rats,

0:12:31.252,0:12:33.709
and apply it to human learning."

0:12:33.709,0:12:38.558
And we need to embrace that challenge,

0:12:38.558,0:12:42.124
we need to also challenge [br]current practices

0:12:42.124,0:12:47.730
that are still operating out of [br]that paradigm of the unchangeable brain.

0:12:47.730,0:12:52.332
We need to work together to take [br]what we know now about neuroplasticity,

0:12:52.332,0:12:56.288
and develop programs [br]that actually shape our brains,

0:12:56.288,0:12:59.859
to change the future of learning.

0:12:59.859,0:13:03.521
My vision is of a world that we create,

0:13:03.521,0:13:06.583
in which no child has to live

0:13:06.583,0:13:11.846
with the ongoing struggle and pain [br]of a learning disability.

0:13:11.846,0:13:18.555
My vision is that cognitive exercises [br]become just a normal part of curriculum.

0:13:18.555,0:13:25.381
My vision is that school becomes a place [br]that we go to strengthen our brain,

0:13:25.381,0:13:28.810
to become really efficient [br]and effective learners,

0:13:28.810,0:13:32.259
engaged in a learning process,

0:13:32.259,0:13:36.580
where not only, as learners, [br]can we dare to dream,

0:13:36.580,0:13:39.519
but we can realize our dream.

0:13:39.519,0:13:44.951
And to me, this is the perfect marriage [br]between neuroscience and education.

0:13:44.951,0:13:46.643
Thank you.

0:13:46.643,0:13:52.546
(Applause)