Last Day of Teaching

With only one day of teaching left, there was so much material still to cover, but so little time.  I explained to the monks that we had only scratched the surface of neuroscience and that we still had touch, hearing, smell, taste, movement, memory, learning and much more to discuss.  It would be impossible to present everything.  Instead, I said, we will just sample a few topics to finish.

We experimented with sound waves, made a model eardrum, tested our ability to detect sensation on our skin and to localize sound with one versus two ears, observed the taste of candy with and without the sense of smell, and talked about memory and learning and tested our short term memory.  It was a very quick sample of some important concepts that I wanted to introduce to the monks.

At the end of class, I thanked the monks and the Science for Monks program for inviting and hosting me in Sikkim.  I passed around boxes of Washington State-made “applets and cotlets” candies for everyone to share.  The monks presented me with many traditional white scarves as a thank you for teaching.

Then it was time for photos.  First, we took a large group picture and then we took many smaller group pictures.

I hope the monks enjoyed learning about neuroscience; I certainly enjoyed my time teaching with them.