The Neural Network

As the smell of vanilla fills the air, you are taken back to your childhood days when your grandmother baked you chocolate chip cookies after school. Maybe she was wearing a bun that day, with a stray patch of flour decorating her hair, or maybe she was wearing her favorite velvet pants that she claimed were fashionable. Whatever it is, the smell of vanilla has kick-started your recall of a memory. But why do smells have such a hold over our past? Emerging research has shown that this can be credited to the direct links between olfaction (your sense of smell), which uses the olfactory bulb, and the amygdala and hippocampus, which work together to store and recall emotional memories. Your other senses, like vision, don't pass directly through these structures, so it might be that this is why olfaction can evoke such strong sensations and bring back such strong memories and emotions. For more info, check out this article from Psychology Today: https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/brain-babble/201501/smells-ring-bells-how-smell-triggers-memories-and-emotions

For a long while, doodling has been discouraged by teachers. It's not unusual to have seen elementary schools tapping sharply on your desk to stop you from doodling as they discussed the Civil War. Often interpreted as "proof" that one is disengaged, doodling has actually been shown recently to aid in concentration. Check out this article from Harvard that discusses why those scribbles might actually be helping you! https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/the-thinking-benefits-of-doodling-2016121510844 Do you agree that doodling can be beneficial, or is it just an escape from a class that you find boring?

To remember numbers, I find the Mnemonic Major System to particularly helpful. Take the following number you need to memorize: 3.14159 Now we use our chart below (the only thing we need to commit to memory) and replace each number with a letter. 0 - s,z 1 - t,d 2 - n 3 - m 4 - r 5 - l 6 - sh, ch, j. 7 - k,g. 8 - f 9 - b, p So we have: m.trdlp Vowels mean nothing in this system, so we are free to use them to fill in the blanks and make a memorable story out of objects. Imagination is the limit! MoTh RoaD LiP A moth journeyed down a road to a land of lips to eat pie. This bizarre visual strangely sticks, and when we think "pi?", We can actually remember a much longer sting of numbers than before.