Peter Doolittle: How your "working memory" makes sense of the world

1:23 - 4 components of working memory 1. Stores immediate experiences and a little bit of knowledge. 2. Reaches back into our long term memories and processes it in line with current goals. 3. Working memory capacity leverages. 4. Great for communication and building narratives around conversations. 6:45 - Strategies: 1. We need to repeat/Practice it. 2. Think elaborately and repeatedly. 3. Rather than connecting new to known, we have to connect everything we known to the new and build connections till it becomes meaningful. 4. Use images/ think in images 5 Organization - Structure things we're doing in ways that it makes sense. 6 Support - Use external supports like charts, tables, etc. until it becomes second nature. 9:06 - Take home message We learn what we process. If we're not processing, we aren't learning.

I literally have had the five words in his video ingrained into my mind for like 3 years now and I don’t know whyy.

I remembered those words all the way to the end and I didn't even need them. Now I can't forget them. I do love the idea of driving down a long highway with a forest on one side and Saturn on the other. Listening to music from the radio that uses electrodes while looking in the rear vision mirror and watching my past fade away into the background.

One of the most helpful TED talks I've seen in long time.

I feel like this is the big issue with people, technology and social media today: people are so preoccupied with recording life, rather than processing/living life in the moment. Great talk.

Long Covid messed with my working memory. It also gave me a passion for understanding how brains work. Thank you for sharing your knowledge.

"If we're not processing life, we're not living it." So true and so cruel😢

What he says at the end is completely true. From what I can tell, most of everyone including myself who remembered those words to the end did so by doing something like painting a bizarre picture including those words, thereby processing them.

Damn that closing statement was deep

i thought he was going to ask what the five words were again at the end of the video 

Short, but straight to the point.  I really enjoyed it.

Great message! Loved this. I admire Ted videos so much! You guys are all doing a great thing.

Very helpful talk. every bit. Esp the 5 points solution explained in second half of the talk to improve working memory. THANKS!!! I usually come to youtube to watch ted talks, as it is faster. but now going to ted back, and take notes from transcript.

Woke up to this new TED talk on my Youtube feed- breakfast.

i couldn't focus on anything he said because i was trying to remember tree, car, highway, saturn, electrode

Great ending message

I still memorized the 5 words: Tree, highway, mirror, Saturn, electrode. I wouldn't want to explain how because I use the most bizarre ways to remember things and that's how I process them haha. Moral of the story is to connect something in your life to the present moment for that moment to have meaning. 

Wow, I love that last sentence at 9:00, the final take home message: What we process, we learn, if we're not processing life, we're not living it.

Anybody else get here from a Super learning course on Udemy?

Brilliant!  Most of us are completely unaware of this concept.  Well presented by a very effective speaker!