“My vision keeps expanding. It’s not easy to leave mid-career, or step out…and then I realized, I’m not stepping out of it, I’m just going down a different path. It allowed me to see it from a different perspective.” together for me. Without law school, I wouldn’t have had completion with math. I keep asking myself what could have been different for me as a child, who was predominantly right-brain? How could my math experience have been different?” O’Kelley, remains fascinated by how to shift a predominantly rightbrained kid to the left brain in order to grasp mathematical principles. She brings a strong work ethic to her newest pursuit, which she insists has been the key to her achievement. “That’s
the other thing I bring to my teaching. I maintain if people have the work ethic, they can tackle and overcome just about anything.” Today’s math is a far cry from the baffling experience O’Kelley had in Walhalla, South Carolina. “I grew up in the traditional math classroom where the teacher lectured and the student listened. Now, I want kids to be able to articulate their mathematical understanding … to carry on a dialogue, or write about what they’re making sense of…because I think that’s a huge piece
The Split Brain: M A P P I N G T H E M I N D ’ S M Y S T E R I E S
----------------------------------------------------------
“The great pleasure and feeling in my right brain is more than my left brain can find the words to tell you.” —Roger Sperry, winner of the Nobel Prize While we’ve heard of the left- and right-sided tendencies of the human brain, we are only beginning to grasp the deeper significance . According to the Nobel Foundation’s Web site, initial research into the idea of a “split” brain began by observing individuals who had suffered brain injuries. By the 19th century, it was believed that the language center of the brain was within the left hemisphere. The study of patients with injury or trauma to certain regions of the brain bolstered evidence about where certain other abilities resided . In the1960s, scientist Roger Sperry and his colleagues carried out further research and experimentation concerning the functional specialization of the cerebral hemispheres. Sperry won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1981. According to the Nobel Foundation, “Sperry received the prize for his discoveries concerning the functional specialization of the cerebral hemispheres. With the help of so called ‘split-brain’ patients, he carried out experiments (just like the one you can perform by yourself in the Split Brain Experiments Game), and for the first time in history, knowledge about the left and right hemispheres was revealed.” To read more about the Split Brain Experiments Game and Sperry’s work, visit www.nobelprize.org.
24
of education.” She marvels at the difference. “The way I was brought up with mathematics was that it was something way out here to discover.” (O’Kelley gestures). “Some big mathematical principle. With all the work that has been done at the University of Georgia with Dr. Leslie Steffe, it’s less about what’s out there , more about what you create. You have to construct your own understanding; that’s a very empowering and powerful concept.” G