After this lengthy and interesting experiment, Destin discovered several things that he in turn shares with his viewers. For starters, the experiment confirmed to him through his son that indeed children’s brains are more malleable; that though he had “knowledge” of how to ride a bike, it did not necessarily mean he had “understanding” of all the mechanisms; and finally that people always interpret “the world with a bias, whether you think you are or not” (Smarter Every Day, 2015). His analysis was well thought out and enlightening, for it displays that our abilities to learn and approach a situation are partially fixed, and influenced by our past experiences. As Destin puts it, “Once you have a rigid way of thinking in your head, sometimes you cannot change that, even if you want to “(Smarter Every Day, 2015). This of course begs the question, does this only apply to mechanical functions of your brain, or perhaps ideological and intuitive aspects as well? Though I cannot answer that question I can elaborate on the power of Destin’s work with Smarter Every Day.
What this video directly did for me was, it got me thinking how bias is my perspective, how does my brain function, and how adaptable is my brain in function and thoughts. Yet what this video did indirectly for me, was display that there is so much fun, intriguing, and informative information, and instruction on the Web for me. This is one of many educational videos provided by Smarter Every Day, so why not utilize such resources. This video lets me know as a teacher that I can look to such Youtube pages, and pull from them to perhaps teach my students through some instructional videos to give them the same direct benefit I received from them. Assuming your classroom has access to the internet and such websites, you can utilize these resources too. Smarter Every Day has many videos that can similarly give insight to things as this video did to our brain functionality, thus teachers should look to these different modes of instruction every once in a while as it fits to your subject or purpose of instruction.
References:
Smarter Every Day. (2015, April 2). The Backwards Brain Bicycle – Smarter Every Day 133 [Video File]. Retrieved from https://youtu.be/MFzDaBzBlL0