WIMICT 9/25 and 9/28

You missed a lot today. First, I returned the chapter seven test from last class, so make sure to get that from me.

You should have already begun the next reading assignment from Chapter 8: Memory. We began with short introduction to memory. If you are in 1,5,7, or 4th periods, you might remember someone coming into the classroom during the test last class and "stealing" the donation jar with $20 from my desk. If you don't remember, you're not alone. We tried as a class to piece together the facts and details of the scene, but most people weren't very accurate.

The takeaway-- we tend to agree that our memory isn't very good when it serves us, for example, when you fail to meet a responsibility or keep a promise; when you can't recall the facts you need to do well on a test. But, other times we have much more faith in memory than we should, like when you witness something and believe that since you "saw it with your own eyes" you can recall significant details of what you witnessed.

Next, we played a little competitive game in teams to find out who could execute the best memory strategy to recall words from a list of 100.

Finally, we began some class notes on memory. The powerpoint and class handout can be found on the "memory page" of my website. Make sure you know the three processes of Memory: Encoding, Storage, and Retrieval. In class, we discussed the three stages of memory: Sensory Memory-->Short-Term (working) Memory--> and Long Term Memory.

We learned that EVERYTHING pretty much enters Sensory memory which lasts less than a second. Most of that information is discarded, and only with ATTENTION, can information pass to Short Term Memory. How good is your attention? Well, on Friday, I changed shirts about five times during both 5th and 7th periods between a Navy and Orange V-Saber UVa shirt and a Navy and White AHS shirt. Only 4 and 2 people respectively noticed that I had changed my clothes multiple times during class. On Tuesday, I changed between a solid blue and a solid orange polo shirt and even with that drastic change only a little over half of the class noticed I had changed my shirt multiple times during the period.

So, that's where memory starts. Processing information from Sensory to Short term memory through Attention and encoding.