The brain is an amazing body organ that controls all body functions. It also plays a significant role in the interpretation of the outside world. As such, the brain effectively embodies the essence of both the mind and soul. The brain governs, among others, creativity, emotion, intelligence, and memory. The brain comprises of three parts; cerebrum, cerebellum, and brainstem. It receives information from all the five senses: smell, sight, touch, taste, and hearing. The brain is responsible for assembling the messages in a manner that has meaning for individuals, as well as the information. Furthermore, the brain controls thoughts, speech, movement, movement of limbs, as well as the functions of the many organs in the body. Thus, the brain is a vital body organ that facilitates cognition and learning and it is responsible for the coordination of people’s learning experiences.
The Role of Brain in Learning to Ride a Bike
There are several brain structures involved in learning to ride a bike. Cerebrum, cerebellum, and brain stem contribute significantly in the process of learning how to ride a bike.
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Figure 1: Brain Structures involved in learning to Ride a Bike
The Cerebrum
The cerebrum is basically the largest part of the brain. It makes up approximately 85 percent of the total weight of a human brain. It is the thinking part of the brain and it plays a critical role in controlling the voluntary muscles (Nobel et al., 2014). Voluntary muscles refer to those muscles that move when one wants them to move. Therefore, the cerebrum is involved in the process of pedaling a bike. A person learning to ride a bike uses the cerebrum to control the speed of pedaling. As such, the cerebrum regulates the speed with which one is riding a bike. The cerebrum also is also critical in making decisions regarding the route to take. Without the cerebrum, one cannot ride to the right destination, as it provides the compass for movement.
A person’s memory also lives in the cerebrum. Thus, the memorized muscle movements are stored in the cerebrum for further reference. This ensures that an individual can recall the bike riding skills previously learned. Without the cerebrum, one will have to re-learn bike riding every other time. It is also important to realize that the cerebrum helps in reasoning. As such, one can make decisions such as riding slowly in order to ensure safety of oneself, as well as other rod users.
The cerebrum is composed of two halves, with each on either side of the head. It is believed that the right half of the cerebrum helps people to think about abstract things such a colors, music, and shapes, while the other half is generally more analytical. Basically, the right side of the cerebrum controls the left side of the body, with the left side of it controlling the right side of the body. Thus, the cerebrum plays a role in learning how to ride a bike.
The Cerebellum
The cerebellum is another important brain structure that is involved in learning how to ride a bike. It is located at the back of the brain, just below the cerebrum. It is relatively smaller compared to the cerebrum and it is a very important part of the brain. The cerebellum is responsible for controlling balance, movement, as well as the coordination of muscle movements.
As such, the cerebellum helps one to maintain balance while riding a bike. An individual’s sense of balance is centered in the inner ear. Thus, signals from the inner ear usually travel to the brain where they are then interpreted. The vestibular system ensures that the ear is connected to all the body functions that involve balancing such as riding a bike. The vestibular system helps in maintaining balance and position, particularly when riding. It is also important to realize that the cerebellum is responsible for coordinating muscle movements. For instance, the diencephalon controls the nerve impulses that tell the body to twist, bend, or pedal while riding.
Brain Stem
Brain stem is another significant component of the brain. It sits below the cerebrum and in front of the cerebellum. The brain stem connects the rest of the brain to the spinal cord. The spinal cord runs from the neck and back. The brain stem is responsible for all the functions that the body requires to stay alive such as digesting food, circulation blood, and breathing air. As such, the brain stem controls all the involuntary. The brain stem tells the heart to pump more blood when the one is biking in order to increase oxygen supply, particularly to the muscles. The brain stem also sends signals to the muscles and tissues of the lung, prompting them to increase the rate of inhalation and exhalation in order to meet the increasing need for oxygen.
The Role of Brain in Learning a New Language
There are well identified areas in the human brain that deal in language processing. In order to learn a new language, the brain has to create and understand such a language. The Warnicke’s area and the Broca’s area are some of the well identified brain structures primarily responsible for language learning. The Wernicke’s area and Broca’s area are located in the dominant brain hemisphere, making language processing a lateralized and localized function. However, the non-dominant hemisphere serves to process the prosody of spoken language.
Figure 2: Brain Structures involved in learning a Language
The Wernicke’s Area
The Wernicke’s area is a brain structure located in the dominant hemisphere, specifically at the posterior section of the superior temporal gyrus (Li et al., 2014). The structure has several branches extending into the parietal lobe. The Wernicke’s are lies between the visual cortex and the auditory cortex. The dominant hemisphere is generally responsible for language comprehension. However, recent studies have also suggested that the non-dominant hemisphere is involved in the comprehension of ambiguous words.
The Wernicke’s area was discovered by Carl Warnicke in 1874 and it plays a significant role in the process of learning a new language. The main function of the Wernicke’s are is the comprehension of any language. Additionally, it provides the ability to communicate coherent ideas, both spoken and written.
Broca’s Area
This particular structure of the brain is created by the pars opercularis and the pars triangularis of the inferior frontal gyrus. Together with the Wernicke’s area, they are located in the dominant hemisphere of the brain. The Broca’s area is primarily involved in speech production. It is located near the motor cortex. As such, the neurons from the Broca’s area serve to send signals to the tongue, larynx, and mouth motor areas. Such motor areas then send the signals to the respective muscles, resulting in the production of sounds. Furthermore, it has been established that the Broca’s area plays a critical role in the coordination of language processing information for the production of speech.
Arcuate Fasciculus
The arcuate fasciculus is the brain region between the Broca’s are and the Wernicke’s area. The arcuate fasciculus serves to connect the Broca’s area and the Wernicke’s area through bundles of nerve fibers. This particular brain structure serves as a transit center between the Wernicke’s area and the Broca’s area and it is primarily deals with speech and communication. Therefore, the structure transports communication signals between the two important brain structures. The signals responsible for speech production are taken from the Wernicke’s area to the Broca’s area through the arcuate fasciculus. It is important to realize that speech production activation begins in the peri-Rolandic cortices. The peri-Rolandic cortices are responsible for coordinating motor functions responsible for speech production.
Aphasias
Aphasias refer to acquired language disorders associated with brain activity. There are several aphasias that can result from brain injury or stroke. The various aphasias include expressive aphasia, receptive aphasia, and conduction aphasia. Expressive aphasia is generally considered a non-fluent aphasia. This particular language disorder occurs when damage occurs to the Broca’s area. People suffering from an expressive aphasia experience difficulties reproducing speech, although the cognitive functions may remain intact. Receptive aphasia is a language disorder resulting from Warnicke’s area damage. People with receptive aphasia produce words that lack coherence because they find it hard to understand what others are trying to communicate. Finally, conduction aphasia is language disorder characterized by poor speech repetition. It happens as a result of damage to the arcuate fasciculus.
Role of the Brain in Learning to Dance
Almost all of human behavior involves motor function. The cerebellum, primary motor cortex, and brain stem are involved in the process of learning to dance. The cerebellum is responsible for maintaining body balance (Chang, 2014). This is because it controls balance, movement, as well as the coordination of muscle movements, particularly in the case of dancing.
The primary motor cortex plays a critical role when one is dancing. When an individual is learning the new motor skills involved in dancing, the primary motor cortex, the primary sensory cortex, thalamus, and the caudate nucleus. The primary motor cortex and the primary sensory cortex serve to monitor how the body muscles move. On the other hand, the thalamus and the caudate nucleus serve to coordinate and smooth out movements involved during the performance of the complex sequenced dance movements.
Figure: The cortical domains of the motor system
Figure: The motor homunculus in primary motor cortex
When a person has effectively learned how to dance, the cerebellum takes over. As such, when a person is trying to perform a well-learned dance move, he or she will have to reach to the cerebellum in order to retrieve the memory of how to execute the complex, sequenced dance moves. However, thinking while dancing can affect the appropriate execution of the learned dance moves. This indicates that the brain play a critical role in the process of executing learned and memorized dance movements.
Conclusion
The brain influences all the cognitive and learning processes that humans engage in. Various brain structures are actively involved in various cognitive learning processes such as learning to ride a bike, learning a new language, and learning to dance. The cerebrum, cerebellum, and the brain stem play a great role in the three identified learning experiences. The cerebrum, cerebellum and the brain stem work together to facilitate the process of learning to ride a bike. The cerebellum plays a critical role in maintaining balance, while cerebrum coordinates voluntary muscle movements. Some of the specific brain structures include Wernicke’s area, Broca’s area, and the arcuate fasciculus, which are involved in language learning. The primary motor cortex, primary sensory cortex, thalamus, and the caudate nucleus play specific roles in the process of learning to dance. They help to coordinate the various activities involved in dancing.
References
Chang, Y. (2014). Reorganization and plastic changes of the human brain associated with skill learning and expertise. Frontiers in human neuroscience , 8 , 35.
Li, P., Legault, J., & Litcofsky, K. A. (2014). Neuroplasticity as a function of second language learning: anatomical changes in the human brain. Cortex , 58 , 301-324.
Nebel, M. B., Joel, S. E., Muschelli, J., Barber, A. D., Caffo, B. S., Pekar, J. J., & Mostofsky, S. H. (2014). Disruption of functional organization within the primary motor cortex in children with autism. Human brain mapping , 35 (2), 567-580.
