This week on the brain; neuroscience, nutrition & first impressions.

Every week we share some science for your brain's health and performance - this week is all about learning how to remember, beetroots & what we love.

Remember to practice to remember...

Picture an actor learning their lines - they're stanging up and talking, right? Actually practising them in order to learn better. So why do we always think we can learn by reading alone? (Guilty. Right here.)

Time to put your learning into action.

Whether you’re studying for something or have a back sweat-inducing presentation to nail - this one’s for you.

Make some noise

Active recall is probably a term you’ve heard bandied around, but what actually is it?

The idea is to do your presentation, or speak about the topic you’re studying out loud - even if you don’t think you know enough to do it right.

Each time you delve into your memory vault to retrieve information (even if you make mistakes), you update it with better understanding, so you learn more thoroughly.

Reading the information encodes the information, and trying to remember it makes the information easier to retrieve.

Says who?

This clever study by Karpicke & Blunt researched four types of learning;

1) study text once

2) study text four consecutive times

3) study text, then generate a concept map

4) study text, practise retrieval, study text again, practise retrieval again.

Who performed the best? You guessed it, number four.

Ready to give it a bash? Try these 5 active recall strategies.

FOR THE NERDY: Being a retriever is golden

[Source: Science Mag]

Beetroot, quinoa and feta salad

This week’s seasonal beetroot recipe is ideal for making double portions to take for lunch. Courtesy of dietitian and personal trainer, Kerri Major - it’s light on effort, but heavy on flavour - just the way we like it.

"Beetroot has a high content of nitrate, a useful compound which acts as a vasodilator, opening blood vessels and allowing more blood and oxygen to be delivered to the working muscles and the brain."

-Kerri

Why is it good for my brain?

Beets bring it with antioxidants up the wazoo, and help to increase blood flow to the brain. Asparagus is high in B vitamins, particularly folate - which tends to your brain’s white matter (the signalling part), and according to this study, can reverse the signs of aging. And iron-rich quinoa helps get oxygen to your brain and is important in neurotransmitter synthesis, regulation of body temperature, enzyme activity and metabolism. Not too shabby for one salad, hey?

Final Thoughts