Learn about the key habits and protective measures under your control to promote healthy aging and maintain good cognitive health throughout life. Key presentation points will include brain foods and nutrition, brain and body benefits of physical exercise and restorative sleep, appropriate stress management and social stimulation as well as avoidance of toxins. Become aware of neuroplasticity - our brain’s amazing ability to adapt, change and create new pathways in response to experiences, new information, or damage.

By changing the way you use your brain every day, you can literally rewire it — and improve your brain function in the process. We’re not just talking about playing Wordle or crossword puzzles! Seek out new, unusual or exciting experiences. Working through challenges and strong emotions, and even just interacting with others, can make our brains healthier. Consider it nature’s way to improve your brain health.

Our brain's constant supply of fuel comes from the foods we eat. Emerging research from the fields of neuroscience and nutrition shows that by changing what you eat, you can improve your mental and emotional well-being. You can stabilize your moods. You can improve your focus. You can even make your brain grow. Join us to learn how food affects the brain’s structure and function.

Teaching kids about neuroplasticity helps them understand their own abilities and the changes that happen with learning something new. Teaching about a Growth mindset helps kids embrace mistakes, and be prepared to face obstacles and challenges in their daily life. The brain is like a physical muscle that gets stronger the more you use it. A fun interactive class to help kids understand the amazing “pattern-seeking brain.” When the neurons in your brain are activated in a particular pattern, it’s faster and easier for their brain to follow that same pattern in the future.

This presentation is focused on what to know when working with someone with a Traumatic Brain Injury. Including working with mood changes, different personalities, and how to keep participants engaged in activities. The presentation focuses on what Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) is and its impact on repetitive brain trauma, including symptomatic concussions and asymptomatic subconcussive hits to the head. Trauma to the brain impacts degeneration associated with memory loss, confusion, impaired judgment, impulse control problems, aggression, depression, and, eventually, progressive dementia.

Learn about neuroplasticity - our brain’s amazing ability to adapt, change and create new pathways in response to new information or damage. Neuroplasticity refers to the brain's ability to continue to grow, change and evolve in response to life experiences. It helps form both our good and bad habits and is the basis for all new learning, training and rehabilitation. Neuroplasticity is an active and dynamic process that occurs over our lifetime. Let’s take charge of our brains to help keep them sharp and to prevent cognitive decline!

Join us on the insights and findings on the ways music may affect our brains. Music offers an illustrative example. The ability to produce and respond to music is conventionally ascribed to the right side of the brain, but processing such musical elements as pitch, tempo, and melody engages a number of areas, including some in the left hemisphere (which appears to subserve perception of rhythm). It has even been suggested that skilled musicians use their left brain more in responding to music than do the musically naïve, and that parts of the left brain may play a key role in appreciating the emotional dimension of music.

The Importance of Sleep on Brain Health-Sleep is an important part of your daily routine—in fact, you spend about one-third of your life doing it! Quality sleep – and getting enough of it at the right times -- is as essential to survival as food and water. Without sleep, you can’t form or maintain the pathways in your brain that let you learn, create new memories, concentrate and respond quickly. Sleep also plays a key housekeeping role that removes toxins in your brain that build up while you are awake. This presentation will highlight the importance of restorative sleep and how to set up a sleep routine to gain maximum sleep benefits - at all ages!

By changing the way you use your brain every day, you can literally rewire it — and improve your brain function in the process. We’re not just talking about playing Wordle or crossword puzzles! Seek out new, unusual, or exciting experiences. Why dance? Dance is an outlet for creativity, imagination, expression, and connection. Dance improves balance, mobility, cognition, and quality of life. Educational session about our brain’s amazing ability to adapt, change and create new pathways, accompanied by movement. Our time together will present opportunities for dance flow and music, which can be done seated or standing. All levels of mobility are welcome to attend.

Technology use can actually cause structural changes in the brain. Pings, alerts, rings, and notifications can shift our focus in a way that can lead to long-lasting difficulties with paying attention. Difficulties paying attention can lead to poorer performance on academic, personal, and professional tasks.