Meet your amazing brain. Basic brain anatomy ; How the brain changes over time ; Cooperation and competition in the brain ; How the brain learns -- Preparing the brain for school. What to do to get a child's brain ready for school ; Sensitive periods in brain development ; Developing social and emotional skills ; The importance of nutrition ; The dynamic teenage brain -- Rules we learn by. How to increase student engagement ; Variations on repetition ; The importance of prior knowledge and mental models ; Ways to take advantage of the body's natural rhythms ; The role of hormones ; Trial-and-error learning ; How positive and negative emotions affect the brain -- Movement and learning. The mind-body link ; How exercise affects cognition ; The importance of play, recess, and physical education -- Emotional states. Why emotions are now "mainstream" ; How emotions are processed in the brain ; The power of emotional states ; How to influence emotional states -- Physical environments for learning. Neuroscience's new interest in physical environments ; How seating, temperature, lighting, noise, and building design affect learning ; Factors to consider when designing smarter schools -- Managing the social brain. How social interaction affects the brain and cognition ; The effect of stress, bonding, bias, and peer pressure ; How to make school a more positive social experience -- Motivation and engagement. Common causes of demotivation ; The brain's reaction to rewards ; The nature of intrinsic motivation ; Tools for motivation ; The SuperCamp model -- Critical thinking skills. How gender, culture, disorders, and life experience shape a unique brain ; How the brain tackles problem solving ; How the brain's maturation process affects learning ; How the brain adapts to changing circumstances -- Memory and recall. Links between memory and survival ; How the brain encodes and maintains memory ; The different kinds of memory ; Ways to enhance memory retrieval -- Brain-based teaching. What to do before, during, and after teaching to take full advantage of what we know about the brain and learning -- Schools with the brain in mind. Connecting brain research to curriculum, assessment, and staff development ; Supporting good instruction and good instructors ; Effecting change with the brain in mind.