IN the run-up to Children’s Mental Health Week 2019 (4-10 February), here’s a look at our amazing brains, along with some tips that might help if your mind is feeling busy.

How many times a day do you think you use your brain? Maybe try to point to it. Well, just by thinking about using it you’ve been using it! In fact, we very often forget the brain is there, and yet, it is the most amazing piece of equipment we will ever own!

Scientists are learning new things about the brain all the time, but we are still only just beginning to understand how it works.

DID YOU KNOW?

• The human brain hasn’t changed that much in the last 400,000 years
• It is a highly complex organ which sits inside our skull
• It weighs about 1.5 kilograms – about the same as a large bag of sugar
• It contains about 86 billion nerve cells (neurons)
• These neurons are connected by trillions of connections or synapses
• Information can travel around the brain as
  fast as a Formula 1 racing car – up to 240mph or 386kph
• The human brain is only likely to reach full maturity when we reach about 25 years of age, but it carries on changing throughout our lives, creating new connections (neuroplasticity) all the time

Interested in knowing more? Why not watch the animation above, and follow the guided practice!