Let's Talk About It -- Week 9

Dr. Peter emailed me tuesday morning to say there was still data to regroup, so wednesday I headed back to ASU. We created a new annotated file for the genes and chromosomal regions we had narrowed down, meaning another spreadsheet full of information about each region. Where it was located and what a mutation was projected to affect.

Creating this file displayed all our data - which, because of our small sample size, was more of a hypothesis than a conclusion - in an easy to read manner.

But because of the upcoming play back at school, my availability was limited. Instead, I focused on analyzing the two books I had read to supplement my research. First, Working Memory and Learning, a practical Guide for Teachers by Susan Gathercole and Tracy Packiam acted more as a textbook. The authors included graphs of child test scores versus memory abilities to showcase not only the obvious existence of working memory impairment, but also the affect of such impairment on the education of elementary aged kids. Their observations proved sometimes kids who do poorly in school need help with their memory and not necessarily anything else. For example, students may forget what they're writing about and start a paragraph on the themes in To Kill a Mockingbird but conclude with a detailed description of their weekend. This problem doesn't only affect english problems, but math and science as well. Students with poor working memory skills can't hold numbers in their heads, forgetting the grams of carbon they have just calculated for their chemistry problem before they can convert this number to moles. 

The solution to this problem, which seemingly repetitive for typically developing children, is teaching students to write down every part of their instructions and each step of their work. This may force teachers to allow extra time for students with memory impairment, but such patience will help the affected children succeed. 

The second book, How to Learn Any Language Fast and Never Forget It, by Gabriel Wyner took on a far less clinical tone. Wyner, an opera singer, recounts the humorous stories of his quest to learn five languages fluently (and he hasn't stopped there!) but also gives serious tips for picking up vocabulary and grammar. 

Learning a second language isn't the main focus of my project, but the pursuit combines memorizing tactics and the nature of language. Wyner's advice focuses on how to quickly transfer information from the working memory to the long term memory and therefore proves interesting next to the research I've already completed. 

As all of our projects slowly wrap up, I'm looking forward to analyzing all my findings together. Only with the results from each lab and each book can I draw meaningful conclusions about the relationship between speech and working memory.