Adolescent Brain Development

Reflecting on the lecture about the development of the adolescents' brains was very interesting. I thought that the power point and information presented were very effective for the directed audience which were supposed to be parents. However, we were the most represented group at the lecture which I think the presenter tried her best to accomodate, but there were certainly times that I felt that her presentation methods were not the best way to effectively communicate her main points. Also, the presentation was geared towards middle school and high school students which explains her behavior and how Luther College students were probably not as receptive to her as younger students. I thought that even though she did hold my attention, alot of the time I kept thinking "Is she serious?" I think it is important to know your audience when presenting, and I know she didn't expect that many college students but it made me realize how crucial it is when I will be teaching to understand how to relate to my students in a way that they can be engaged but also the lectures can be informative and the students can get a lot out of it.

The material that she presented was really interesting to me. Lately I have been thinking about how I would like to teach middle school and I think that by studying the different stages of brain development will help me alot in terms of understanding the developement stages that they are at. I really liked learning about the information, but I thought it was a really repetitive since I have taken psychology courses in the past. Nevertheless, it was good information to review and think about how I can connect it to my future carrer as a teacher. I enjoy learning about the different brain stages and she presented the information in a way that was easy to understand. For example, I thought it was interesting how she related the brain of young teenager to the brain of a toddler. Once she connected the different behavioral characteristics to each other, I could see the correlation and it was a way in which I never thought about the two different developmental stages. I also thought that what she presented on drugs and concussions was also very interesting. I think that it is important to recognzie that what kids do in their lives at this age greatly affects their future, but I know that most adolescents aren't terribly concerned with this. I think that this presentation was very informative and even though it was geared towards parents, as a student in the teacher education program, I think that this information is very relevant to the age group I want to work with and it makes me want to learn more about adolsencents and how to teach this group in ways that would help them connect to the material and lessons presented in class.