WEBVTT - Lab 030: Signed, Sealed, Delivered 0:00:00.240 --> 0:00:01.840 Have you been seeing all this stuff going on with 0:00:01.880 --> 0:00:03.200 the USPS? 0:00:03.279 --> 0:00:07.480 Yes, honey, I am disgusted. 0:00:08.119 --> 0:00:12.799 Yeah, the USPS is so critical to everything. I don't understand, 0:00:13.000 --> 0:00:16.600 like how we can even be considering moving this money 0:00:16.600 --> 0:00:18.680 around and not giving it to them, Like how are 0:00:18.720 --> 0:00:22.079 we going to even function? I can't imagine life without 0:00:22.239 --> 0:00:23.280 the USPS. 0:00:23.560 --> 0:00:25.520 Yes, and you know I love to send a letter. 0:00:25.880 --> 0:00:28.480 Everybody and my family worked at the post office growing up, 0:00:28.600 --> 0:00:32.000 so I am wed to the post office. I used 0:00:32.000 --> 0:00:35.800 to collect stamps as a kid. Okay, so yes, I 0:00:35.880 --> 0:00:38.839 used to collect stamps, stamps, and X Men cars. Those 0:00:38.840 --> 0:00:42.800 are the things I collected. I collected POGs, Oh, I 0:00:42.840 --> 0:00:45.400 remember those. Yes, I know what you were supposed to 0:00:45.440 --> 0:00:46.000 do with them. 0:00:46.240 --> 0:00:48.640 I didn't know. I just had a little tupperware container 0:00:48.680 --> 0:00:51.040 full of them, just looked at them and that was it. 0:00:51.520 --> 0:00:53.840 I think the pog came before the beanie baby, right. 0:00:53.960 --> 0:00:56.240 I think so. And I didn't have a single beanie baby. 0:00:56.280 --> 0:00:57.640 Do y'all still have y'all beanie babies? 0:00:57.680 --> 0:00:59.400 They're dusty if you still have them, I know that 0:00:59.600 --> 0:01:01.440 unless you are they machine washable. 0:01:01.600 --> 0:01:02.960 Don't they got beans on the inside? 0:01:03.880 --> 0:01:05.000 All those beans come out? 0:01:05.480 --> 0:01:07.119 You got enough beans? To make a bean back chair. 0:01:07.200 --> 0:01:13.200 Repurpose those things you reduce, reuse, recycle. I'm t T 0:01:13.520 --> 0:01:16.520 and I'm Zachiah and from Spotify. This is dope Labs. 0:01:40.319 --> 0:01:44.000 Everybody's talking about buying stamps and showing their books to stamps. 0:01:44.040 --> 0:01:46.000 My favorite stamp right now is the Marvin Gaye stamp. 0:01:46.080 --> 0:01:48.560 It's hard to find them. It's hard to find. 0:01:48.560 --> 0:01:51.360 I'm just this is something I did not know about 0:01:51.520 --> 0:01:54.360 my friend, and it makes complete sense. 0:01:54.400 --> 0:01:59.520 Actually, you haven't been paying attention to the stamps. 0:01:59.560 --> 0:02:04.000 I send you no Okay, so zakiya. When anything big 0:02:04.080 --> 0:02:06.640 happens or anything that she feels like is significant in 0:02:06.680 --> 0:02:09.280 your life, she will send you a really really nice 0:02:09.400 --> 0:02:11.640 card with a note in it. I still have some 0:02:11.720 --> 0:02:14.760 of them where she's saying congratulations, I'm so proud of you, 0:02:14.840 --> 0:02:17.839 handwritten everything, so so nice. But I have never paid 0:02:17.840 --> 0:02:18.919 attention to the stamp. 0:02:19.360 --> 0:02:23.040 What the stamp is always on brand, it's on themes. Okay, 0:02:23.120 --> 0:02:25.079 you need to go back. If you have those envelopes, 0:02:25.120 --> 0:02:27.639 I do not post at these for the postcards you 0:02:27.680 --> 0:02:28.920 should be able to see. 0:02:29.120 --> 0:02:31.880 Okay, well, I don't have the envelopes, but I trust 0:02:31.960 --> 0:02:34.560 that they were on brand because the card itself was 0:02:34.560 --> 0:02:37.280 always on Brandy. I always had a black woman on 0:02:37.320 --> 0:02:42.280 the front. They're always very, very good. So let's talk 0:02:42.280 --> 0:02:48.160 about why folks have been stepping up to support the USPS. 0:02:48.800 --> 0:02:52.400 The post Office, or the United States Postal Service, is 0:02:53.040 --> 0:02:55.880 operated by the federal government, and for many years it's 0:02:55.880 --> 0:02:59.280 been operating at a deficit. So that's like a business 0:02:59.360 --> 0:03:01.720 is running and you're not turn a profit. But the 0:03:01.760 --> 0:03:04.680 thing to remember is that most federal agencies operated as 0:03:04.680 --> 0:03:07.480 a deficit in. The post Office is the only one 0:03:07.960 --> 0:03:12.600 that doesn't get money from the government to operate, and 0:03:12.639 --> 0:03:14.800 so it was really hit hard. Just like we talked 0:03:14.800 --> 0:03:18.119 about individuals taking a loss in a really bad financial 0:03:18.160 --> 0:03:20.600 hit from coronavirus, the post Office had the same thing. 0:03:20.840 --> 0:03:23.399 And then on top of all of that, we get 0:03:23.400 --> 0:03:26.800 a new Postmaster General who says that he's going to 0:03:26.880 --> 0:03:31.480 be using these cost cutting mechanisms and that would limit 0:03:31.960 --> 0:03:34.600 the reach of the USPS. 0:03:35.040 --> 0:03:37.640 So basically, our postal service is in trouble. 0:03:38.000 --> 0:03:40.400 One of the ways you can support the USPS is 0:03:40.440 --> 0:03:43.800 by sending more letters, and for me, that's kind of 0:03:43.840 --> 0:03:47.720 like a double his sword. I want to support the USPS, 0:03:48.240 --> 0:03:54.040 but I really hate my handwriting, so I don't want 0:03:54.080 --> 0:03:56.839 to do that. And my printer is out of ink, 0:03:56.920 --> 0:03:59.000 so typing something up is kind of like out of 0:03:59.000 --> 0:04:01.160 the question. I need to pray just more ink. And 0:04:01.240 --> 0:04:03.400 I don't want people to know what my handwriting looks like. 0:04:03.600 --> 0:04:07.920 I go to great lengths to shield everyone from my handwriting. 0:04:08.560 --> 0:04:11.240 Everybody join me in this moment of lifting tt in 0:04:11.280 --> 0:04:12.280 that handwriting up. 0:04:14.880 --> 0:04:16.920 Once you see it, you're gonna put it right back down. 0:04:20.440 --> 0:04:21.880 I welcome those bubble letters. 0:04:22.360 --> 0:04:25.840 See, I don't want to be described as someone that 0:04:25.920 --> 0:04:30.440 had that writes in bubble letters like I'm not eight, 0:04:30.800 --> 0:04:31.760 I'm not eight years old. 0:04:31.880 --> 0:04:33.840 I'm a girl. That's the way I'm saying it. Those 0:04:34.040 --> 0:04:37.800 voluptuous strokes. What about that? 0:04:39.320 --> 0:04:49.000 Your handwriting thick with two c's okay? So our question 0:04:49.440 --> 0:04:53.120 is about our writing because since we're going to be 0:04:53.120 --> 0:04:56.919 supporting the USPS more, it got us thinking about writing, 0:04:57.040 --> 0:05:00.560 different people's writing styles, how we learn to write, and 0:05:00.600 --> 0:05:03.840 so we just had more questions than answers, and so 0:05:04.080 --> 0:05:05.880 we thought we would dig into it. 0:05:05.920 --> 0:05:09.880 Take it to the experts. Today's lab is about written languages, 0:05:10.000 --> 0:05:12.240 specifically alphabetic. 0:05:11.640 --> 0:05:16.480 Languages with alphabetic languages like English, Greek, or Russian, each 0:05:16.600 --> 0:05:20.680 written symbol corresponds to an individual sound. The difference between 0:05:20.720 --> 0:05:25.000 alphabetic and non alphabetic systems is that non alphabetic languages 0:05:25.080 --> 0:05:28.920 have written symbols that correspond to larger groups of sound, 0:05:29.279 --> 0:05:33.480 like syllables or whole words like Chinese. Let's get into 0:05:33.480 --> 0:05:38.480 the recitation. What do we know? We know writing is important, yes, 0:05:38.520 --> 0:05:41.240 and we know that everybody writes differently. I think that's it. 0:05:41.279 --> 0:05:47.120 I think that's all that we know about about handwriting sadly, 0:05:49.360 --> 0:05:50.600 So what do we want to know? 0:05:51.279 --> 0:05:53.800 I think I need to know more about how we 0:05:53.839 --> 0:05:56.320 actually learn to write, what's happening in our brains? 0:05:56.560 --> 0:06:00.680 Yeah, And I want to know the history of writing, 0:06:00.720 --> 0:06:05.000 because I mean, it's definitely changed over time, I think. 0:06:05.600 --> 0:06:07.719 And so I just want to know, like how it 0:06:07.760 --> 0:06:10.159 all started and how we got to this place that 0:06:10.200 --> 0:06:10.840 we are now. 0:06:11.360 --> 0:06:14.120 And I think the million dollar question, you know, we 0:06:14.160 --> 0:06:17.760 see it in different places. Does handwriting have much meaning? 0:06:17.839 --> 0:06:20.279 Does it say something about who you are? Right? 0:06:20.440 --> 0:06:22.719 Because I would like to believe that the way that 0:06:22.800 --> 0:06:26.599 I write and the judgment I receive is unfounded, like 0:06:26.720 --> 0:06:30.960 no base and those two things don't there's no connection. 0:06:31.320 --> 0:06:33.679 Whoever's judging TT you need to stop it right. 0:06:33.520 --> 0:06:38.599 Now, it's probably mostly me judging myself, Like I'll write 0:06:38.600 --> 0:06:42.440 a sentence, I'll be like, oh girl, type Itney. 0:06:43.240 --> 0:06:50.640 Free you from that. Let's jump into the dissection. So listen, 0:06:50.680 --> 0:06:53.640 this is a very broad subject. There's a lot that 0:06:53.680 --> 0:06:54.840 we want to unpack here. 0:06:55.279 --> 0:06:59.320 Yes, and I mean, we can't fit everything that has 0:06:59.360 --> 0:07:03.320 to do with the language into this episode, but there's 0:07:03.360 --> 0:07:05.000 a lot of things that we're going to hit and 0:07:05.040 --> 0:07:08.480 we have the perfect person to take us through it all. 0:07:08.800 --> 0:07:11.480 My name is Bob Wiley, and I'm an assistant professor 0:07:11.520 --> 0:07:15.160 in the Department of Psychology at the University of North Carolina, Greensborough. 0:07:15.280 --> 0:07:18.240 Doctor Wylie's area of focus is on written language and 0:07:18.280 --> 0:07:23.160 specifically how learning affects perception and how cognitive psychology can 0:07:23.240 --> 0:07:25.920 be used to improve learning outcomes. And when you study 0:07:26.000 --> 0:07:28.600 letters for a living, doctor Wyllie says, you start to 0:07:28.640 --> 0:07:29.960 see them everywhere. 0:07:30.080 --> 0:07:32.440 Oh it's bad. I see them in places that they're not, 0:07:32.680 --> 0:07:34.600 you know, Like I'm looking at your door behind you 0:07:34.720 --> 0:07:36.760 right now, and I see l's and t's in there 0:07:36.880 --> 0:07:38.840 right I see letters all the time. 0:07:39.080 --> 0:07:41.920 And he's not making this up. We started by asking 0:07:41.960 --> 0:07:45.840 doctor Wylie where letters actually come from and he says, 0:07:46.720 --> 0:07:48.200 they're all around us. 0:07:48.440 --> 0:07:52.680 There's a fascinating theory about so why do our letters 0:07:52.680 --> 0:07:55.400 look the way they do? And so people have looked 0:07:55.440 --> 0:07:58.040 at all the different written languages across the world and 0:07:58.080 --> 0:08:00.720 across history, and so what they found is that there 0:08:00.720 --> 0:08:03.360 are certain shapes like an L, a T, and X 0:08:03.400 --> 0:08:05.720 those are different that seem to come up across the 0:08:05.720 --> 0:08:09.200 world's languages. And what they found is that the prevalence 0:08:09.240 --> 0:08:12.800 how common those are seems to match with how commonly 0:08:12.960 --> 0:08:16.080 we see those types of intersections in nature. 0:08:16.360 --> 0:08:18.679 If you think about the way a tree trunk meets 0:08:18.680 --> 0:08:21.640 the ground, that's a vertical line hitting a horizontal line 0:08:21.680 --> 0:08:24.960 that forms a T like intersection. So what doctor Wily 0:08:25.080 --> 0:08:27.560 is saying is that the intersections that actually occur in 0:08:27.640 --> 0:08:29.840 nature more often seem to be the ones that we 0:08:29.880 --> 0:08:32.000 see more often in our written language as well. 0:08:32.080 --> 0:08:34.199 I'm looking at my window right now, and based on that, 0:08:34.320 --> 0:08:37.840 I do see a lot of x's, a lot of t's, 0:08:38.520 --> 0:08:40.439 and a lot of l's. Like I'm looking at this 0:08:40.760 --> 0:08:45.120 brick house next door, and I see l's, I see t's. 0:08:46.200 --> 0:08:49.120 When I look in the window, I see well, not 0:08:49.280 --> 0:08:51.559 in the window at the window, I'm not looking. 0:08:51.280 --> 0:08:54.600 Into the way. I don't know. You probably got tom. 0:08:55.080 --> 0:09:00.120 You gotta keep folks. I see l's and t's. That's 0:09:00.120 --> 0:09:02.360 so crazy. There's a lot of A frame houses. How 0:09:02.360 --> 0:09:04.920 come we don't have p framed houses? And you frame 0:09:05.240 --> 0:09:06.560 you want to live in a U house? 0:09:07.720 --> 0:09:09.360 No, no, you. My friend would complain. 0:09:09.480 --> 0:09:12.920 She would not like, and you're complaining. 0:09:12.960 --> 0:09:14.559 Now you're complaining clothes. 0:09:16.920 --> 0:09:20.000 Aside from the intersections that we commonly see in nature, 0:09:20.480 --> 0:09:24.040 early adaptations of letters were also derived from pictures or 0:09:24.200 --> 0:09:25.880 symbols of the objects they represent. 0:09:26.080 --> 0:09:27.599 So when you go back and you look at the 0:09:28.040 --> 0:09:32.040 earliest forms of languages, they were pictographic. So they started. 0:09:32.320 --> 0:09:35.679 What people would do is they would draw a shape, 0:09:35.880 --> 0:09:39.160 you know, so to write the word son, you draw 0:09:39.240 --> 0:09:40.240 a shape of the sun. 0:09:40.559 --> 0:09:43.160 So from there people were like, okay, I have this 0:09:43.240 --> 0:09:46.440 symbol which means son. And the first sound of the 0:09:46.480 --> 0:09:50.840 word son is the S sound, so sun. So from 0:09:50.880 --> 0:09:52.880 there they were like, okay, I can use this symbol 0:09:53.120 --> 0:09:56.040 just to represent the S sound. 0:09:56.520 --> 0:09:59.120 Doctor Wilie gave us another example of how the letter 0:09:59.160 --> 0:09:59.960 A came about. 0:10:00.080 --> 0:10:04.080 Out A was alip, which was the word for ox. 0:10:04.800 --> 0:10:06.400 And you can still kind of see it if you 0:10:06.480 --> 0:10:09.200 turn an a upside down and it looks like an 0:10:09.280 --> 0:10:11.880 ox or like a cow with its horns. So that's 0:10:11.920 --> 0:10:12.800 where that came from. 0:10:12.880 --> 0:10:15.120 And doctor Wiley says that this is true for a 0:10:15.200 --> 0:10:19.559 lot of letters, that they all started from pictographic representation 0:10:19.840 --> 0:10:23.679 of an object and then over time it slowly became 0:10:23.880 --> 0:10:26.079 what we know as our alphabet today. 0:10:26.320 --> 0:10:28.960 Writing is slow drawing pictures. I mean, can you imagine 0:10:29.000 --> 0:10:32.480 if we had to draw our emojis? It would take 0:10:32.600 --> 0:10:36.800 so long. And so as languages developed and in order 0:10:36.840 --> 0:10:41.079 to be faster, they changed their shapes. They became simplified. 0:10:41.400 --> 0:10:44.600 He also brought up another good point that affects the 0:10:44.640 --> 0:10:47.880 way we have our written alphabet now, and that's the 0:10:48.040 --> 0:10:49.440 tools that were available. 0:10:49.640 --> 0:10:51.439 So if you look at a culture where they were 0:10:51.520 --> 0:10:55.320 using a stylus in clay, that led to different types 0:10:55.360 --> 0:10:57.720 of shapes than if you were using a brush and ink. 0:10:58.200 --> 0:11:00.800 If you're putting a chisel and stone. That's because you 0:11:00.800 --> 0:11:03.480 can manipulate those things differently. It's easier or harder to 0:11:03.480 --> 0:11:06.480 make different shapes. And so that actually ended up influencing 0:11:06.520 --> 0:11:07.679 what our letters look like. 0:11:07.840 --> 0:11:11.400 Imagine trying to write the letter S with a chisel 0:11:11.440 --> 0:11:11.920 and stone. 0:11:11.960 --> 0:11:12.640 It's not happening. 0:11:12.679 --> 0:11:14.400 That's gonna be way too hard. That's a lot of 0:11:14.480 --> 0:11:16.560 chipping that you got to do. But the letter X, 0:11:17.120 --> 0:11:18.120 that's very easy. 0:11:18.200 --> 0:11:22.080 It's crazy to think that those things determine the letters 0:11:22.120 --> 0:11:25.320 that we ended up learning in kindergarten or whenever we 0:11:25.400 --> 0:11:27.360 learned them. Do you remember, you. 0:11:27.280 --> 0:11:30.800 Know, sometimes I have little memories of when I could 0:11:30.800 --> 0:11:33.559 not read, and I was trying to figure out how 0:11:33.559 --> 0:11:36.280 to read because I knew kind of like what certain 0:11:36.360 --> 0:11:40.800 letters sounded like. But then you know, you get to 0:11:40.800 --> 0:11:43.079 certain words and that letter doesn't sound like that, a 0:11:43.160 --> 0:11:46.280 C sounds like an S, and being very confused. 0:11:46.360 --> 0:11:47.679 I mean, I don't have to tell you right. English 0:11:47.720 --> 0:11:49.880 is a mess, right, Even C isn't always cut right. 0:11:50.040 --> 0:11:52.720 Sometimes it's like circle. I don't say. Actually, when I 0:11:52.760 --> 0:11:55.320 was a kid, I used to say kirkle because to me, 0:11:55.559 --> 0:11:58.760 I was like C camp be both uh and cu. 0:11:59.200 --> 0:12:02.440 So either it's a circle, but it can't you know, 0:12:02.480 --> 0:12:04.080 you can't mix them. But it took me a while 0:12:04.120 --> 0:12:06.959 to figure that out. That's a that's a problem English has. 0:12:07.080 --> 0:12:10.920 The only thing I remember from the actual learning part 0:12:11.080 --> 0:12:13.920 of reading and writing was trying to figure out what 0:12:14.080 --> 0:12:17.120 my parents were spelling to each other. I know they 0:12:17.120 --> 0:12:19.840 were spelling it, so I wouldn't know exactly that. I 0:12:19.920 --> 0:12:21.120 was like, what is that? 0:12:21.280 --> 0:12:24.720 No secrets kept from my friend Zakia. So she's like, 0:12:24.760 --> 0:12:29.480 I've got to learn how to read quick quickly. I 0:12:29.520 --> 0:12:31.360 think all of our parents did that when they didn't 0:12:31.400 --> 0:12:33.280 want to want us to know what was going on. 0:12:33.640 --> 0:12:35.720 You know, when we take all of that into account, 0:12:35.800 --> 0:12:40.720 it's really crazy to think that your ease of or 0:12:40.760 --> 0:12:43.720 your mastery of the written language depends on things that 0:12:43.760 --> 0:12:47.640 happened so long ago, like when you were three, four 0:12:47.640 --> 0:12:51.360 and five. Doctor Wilie really helped us hone in the 0:12:51.400 --> 0:12:53.280 importance of those early years. 0:12:53.400 --> 0:12:56.079 Something we have to keep in mind about written language, 0:12:56.480 --> 0:12:58.080 like one of the biggest things that makes it different 0:12:58.120 --> 0:13:02.200 from spoken languages you have to learn it. So you know, 0:13:02.240 --> 0:13:06.160 you probably know that a child will learn any language 0:13:06.280 --> 0:13:09.600 you know, verbal that it grows up around effortlessly. No 0:13:09.640 --> 0:13:11.960 one has to teach them. You just learn your language. 0:13:12.400 --> 0:13:15.280 And that's not the case with written language. You have 0:13:15.360 --> 0:13:17.000 to be instructed to learn it. 0:13:17.120 --> 0:13:20.600 That's such a good point, right, It's not inherent the 0:13:20.679 --> 0:13:24.360 ability to write and read. Somebody has to teach it, 0:13:24.360 --> 0:13:27.160 and so much of your ability to do this rest 0:13:27.240 --> 0:13:32.760 on the access to quality education at a young age. 0:13:32.440 --> 0:13:35.520 And throughout history there have been people who have been 0:13:35.840 --> 0:13:40.080 denied that access. And it is only in very recent 0:13:40.320 --> 0:13:45.600 history that people have been allowed to learn how to 0:13:46.000 --> 0:13:46.600 read and write. 0:13:46.720 --> 0:13:49.880 Up until not that long ago, very very few people 0:13:49.960 --> 0:13:51.840 could read and write, you know, so you think that, oh, 0:13:51.920 --> 0:13:54.400 but they had written language in ancient Egypt, and you're like, sure, 0:13:54.640 --> 0:13:57.600 for twenty people who are like recording things in the court, right, Like, 0:13:57.640 --> 0:14:00.160 no one, hardly anyone knew how to do this. 0:14:00.160 --> 0:14:01.960 This wasn't granted at the same time to all. 0:14:01.920 --> 0:14:05.280 People, and it's not at the same level, even though 0:14:05.320 --> 0:14:08.480 it's granted now, definitely not at the same level. In fact, 0:14:08.520 --> 0:14:11.320 a lot of schools now are de emphasizing the importance 0:14:11.320 --> 0:14:13.840 of learning handwriting since so many of us are using 0:14:14.040 --> 0:14:15.920 phones and computers to write keyboards. 0:14:15.960 --> 0:14:19.680 Basically, cursive has mostly gone from schools, and even just 0:14:19.680 --> 0:14:23.160 the time given to handwriting it's really decreased because it's 0:14:23.160 --> 0:14:26.920 not part of them, right, it's not technically science, technology, 0:14:27.000 --> 0:14:29.120 education or math. But you know what some of us 0:14:29.120 --> 0:14:30.680 always point is, you don't do any of those things 0:14:30.680 --> 0:14:32.920 without reading and writing. Like, please try to do a 0:14:32.920 --> 0:14:35.360 science project without reading something. Please try to do that, 0:14:35.400 --> 0:14:38.360 it's not going to happen. And I think there are 0:14:38.360 --> 0:14:43.240 getting seminis that there are costs to this shift away 0:14:43.760 --> 0:14:46.640 from the actual handwriting. 0:14:46.400 --> 0:14:49.880 Aspect, and it's not just about needing to write in 0:14:50.000 --> 0:14:54.280 order to study other subjects. Writing by hand also helps 0:14:54.360 --> 0:14:56.560 us actually learn better. 0:14:56.680 --> 0:14:59.720 You can, for example, take people who either children who 0:14:59.800 --> 0:15:03.520 are still just learning language or adults learning in new alphabets, 0:15:03.560 --> 0:15:06.400 so as they're learning the letters, they actually learned to 0:15:06.400 --> 0:15:10.000 write them by hand. There's all kinds of benefits. So 0:15:10.640 --> 0:15:13.560 in terms of behavior, they are going to memorize those 0:15:13.600 --> 0:15:17.320 letters more quickly, they're going to retain them for longer 0:15:17.840 --> 0:15:22.440 compared to if you just study them visually or if 0:15:22.480 --> 0:15:24.440 you learn them by typing as well. 0:15:24.680 --> 0:15:29.440 And this rings true for me specifically, because that is 0:15:29.480 --> 0:15:32.480 the way that I learned pretty much all things. And 0:15:32.560 --> 0:15:36.600 it started in high school for me when I realized, oh, 0:15:36.680 --> 0:15:38.720 my goodness, I think I've cracked the code on how 0:15:38.760 --> 0:15:42.840 to really memorize or learn some things. Because I was 0:15:43.280 --> 0:15:46.440 awful in biology, just awful. It was really really hard 0:15:46.440 --> 0:15:49.640 for me to remember all of these things. So what 0:15:49.680 --> 0:15:52.840 I started doing was this. If my teacher said, oh, 0:15:52.880 --> 0:15:55.200 we're going to be having a quiz on chapter three. 0:15:55.920 --> 0:15:59.800 I would read chapter three and then I would write 0:16:00.720 --> 0:16:02.840 the entire chapter. So I would look at each word 0:16:02.880 --> 0:16:05.400 and write them down in a separate notebook. And when 0:16:05.440 --> 0:16:09.880 I did that, I felt like everything was like being reinforced. 0:16:09.880 --> 0:16:12.880 It was like pouring concrete over all that information. And 0:16:12.920 --> 0:16:17.640 so writing in my own handwriting definitely has a strong 0:16:17.760 --> 0:16:18.840 link to learning for me. 0:16:19.200 --> 0:16:22.960 For me, it's also reading handwriting that makes a difference 0:16:23.000 --> 0:16:24.840 for me if I have notes and I go back 0:16:24.920 --> 0:16:28.400 and I can remember things like I can see, oh, 0:16:28.400 --> 0:16:31.640 I wrote this. There has also been some evidence about 0:16:31.640 --> 0:16:34.640 the tie in for other people reading handwriting. It's also 0:16:34.680 --> 0:16:37.680 a teaching strategy where folks are adding handwriting to type 0:16:37.720 --> 0:16:39.920 texts to help you retain information. 0:16:40.040 --> 0:16:42.200 So what do we know about why that might be. Well, 0:16:42.240 --> 0:16:44.280 here's a few things we know about that. When we 0:16:44.360 --> 0:16:47.560 look at things like letters, we don't just look at 0:16:47.560 --> 0:16:51.160 the pattern in terms of a static image. We also 0:16:51.480 --> 0:16:55.080 automatically think about how was that created? And this is 0:16:55.200 --> 0:16:59.200 especially true when we're reading handwriting as opposed to print. 0:16:59.560 --> 0:17:01.960 And that's why when people are reading, we see all 0:17:02.000 --> 0:17:04.399 kinds of activity in the motor part of the brain, 0:17:04.920 --> 0:17:06.320 there's a lot of activity in the part of the 0:17:06.320 --> 0:17:08.800 brain that you use for writing. Even when you're not writing, 0:17:08.840 --> 0:17:12.359 you can just be laying there board as hell looking 0:17:12.440 --> 0:17:14.520 at words, and that part of your brain that thinks 0:17:14.520 --> 0:17:17.040 about how would I write that, it's very, very active, 0:17:18.040 --> 0:17:20.520 and so that seems to be part of why it's 0:17:20.560 --> 0:17:24.360 so important to have that handwriting experience because we actually 0:17:24.480 --> 0:17:27.280 use that not just for writing, we also use that 0:17:27.320 --> 0:17:27.879 for reading. 0:17:28.280 --> 0:17:31.520 So we've learned a lot about writing from a historical perspective, 0:17:32.119 --> 0:17:36.200 but also psychological and sociological. We're going to take a 0:17:36.280 --> 0:17:38.200 quick break and when we get back, we're going to 0:17:38.280 --> 0:17:42.159 talk all about the biological aspects of writing and reading. 0:17:42.800 --> 0:18:03.080 What's actually happening in our brains. And we're back, let's 0:18:03.280 --> 0:18:06.240 actually talk about the brain and what's happening when we 0:18:06.280 --> 0:18:06.919 see letters. 0:18:06.960 --> 0:18:08.960 So the first stage is a stimulus. This is just 0:18:09.000 --> 0:18:10.720 seeing letters on the page. 0:18:10.359 --> 0:18:13.120 When we look at say just a single word, right 0:18:13.240 --> 0:18:16.320 like cat when you are a fluent reader. All right, 0:18:16.320 --> 0:18:18.399 so let's just talk about adults. It's a separate thing. 0:18:18.440 --> 0:18:20.119 You know, with children who are in they're first learning, 0:18:20.280 --> 0:18:22.200 but once you're adult and you know how to read, 0:18:22.440 --> 0:18:25.439 all that process it's automatized to the point that you 0:18:25.600 --> 0:18:28.919 cannot help but recognize that word. And that's because the 0:18:29.040 --> 0:18:32.640 average adult has read billions of letters. By the time 0:18:32.680 --> 0:18:35.720 they're say forty or fifty, you've seen billions of letters. 0:18:36.320 --> 0:18:38.600 And so one of the things that's so crazy about 0:18:38.600 --> 0:18:41.280 that is there aren't that many things like you know, 0:18:41.320 --> 0:18:44.600 that many objects that we get that much exposure to. 0:18:44.920 --> 0:18:47.680 This relates back to what doctor Wiley was saying earlier 0:18:47.680 --> 0:18:50.919 about the origins of letters. We see them everywhere, not 0:18:51.080 --> 0:18:53.320 just in nature, but in our day to day lives. 0:18:53.320 --> 0:18:55.560 We're just exposed to letters all the time. 0:18:55.640 --> 0:18:58.919 What we do really quickly when we're reading is we 0:18:59.000 --> 0:19:03.600 actually abstract from what we're seeing. Whether I write kat 0:19:03.840 --> 0:19:05.919 by hand, or I see it typed in you know, 0:19:06.040 --> 0:19:09.480 capital letters, or I see it in lowercase letters, we 0:19:09.640 --> 0:19:12.920 really quickly abstract away that information at some level is 0:19:12.960 --> 0:19:14.399 sort of discarded by the brain. 0:19:14.520 --> 0:19:17.200 Your brain takes what it needs and it discards everything else. 0:19:17.520 --> 0:19:20.400 It doesn't care about the font, if it's handwritten or tight, 0:19:21.119 --> 0:19:23.560 the color, none of that matters. It just goes straight 0:19:23.600 --> 0:19:24.240 to processing. 0:19:24.480 --> 0:19:28.000 So once you've taken in c at there's actually two 0:19:28.119 --> 0:19:31.160 routes that the brain can take to process that information. 0:19:31.359 --> 0:19:33.639 So the first route we call the phonological route. 0:19:33.800 --> 0:19:37.119 Phonological is sounding it out. You're using your memory, but 0:19:37.200 --> 0:19:39.480 you're trying to remember the sounds of each letter. So 0:19:39.800 --> 0:19:44.000 C is A T to cat cat. 0:19:44.040 --> 0:19:46.439 And then we go into our long term memory, and 0:19:46.480 --> 0:19:48.800 that long term memory is for the sounds of words. 0:19:49.160 --> 0:19:51.359 So then we're searching. We're saying, okay, have I heard 0:19:51.480 --> 0:19:55.320 that sound cat? And then you say, oh yeah, I 0:19:55.359 --> 0:19:57.520 have that story in my long term memory. And then 0:19:57.560 --> 0:20:00.240 I say, oh yeah, cat, it's an animal, it's feeling, 0:20:00.359 --> 0:20:02.680 it's a pet. And that's how we identify the word 0:20:02.880 --> 0:20:05.879 through a phonological route. But we have another route, and 0:20:05.920 --> 0:20:07.280 it's an orthographic route. 0:20:07.600 --> 0:20:11.280 Orthographic is when I see these string of letters, I 0:20:11.359 --> 0:20:14.359 remember they mean a thing. So it's the string of 0:20:14.440 --> 0:20:17.439 letters and remembering the meaning. No sound is associated with this. 0:20:17.480 --> 0:20:19.000 You're skipping the sound all together. 0:20:19.119 --> 0:20:22.120 What it does. It says I have this abstract representation 0:20:22.359 --> 0:20:25.320 that the letters are C, A, and T, and then 0:20:25.359 --> 0:20:27.919 we go into our long term memory, not for the sound, 0:20:28.440 --> 0:20:31.080 but just have I seen this string of letters in 0:20:31.119 --> 0:20:33.320 this order? And then I say, oh yes, When I 0:20:33.320 --> 0:20:35.800 see that string of letters, it means a fee line, 0:20:35.880 --> 0:20:38.479 a small animal, a pet, all of that. So what 0:20:38.520 --> 0:20:40.760 we do is we always do that when we see 0:20:40.760 --> 0:20:43.080 any word, we try in both ways to figure out 0:20:43.080 --> 0:20:45.840 that word. We try to sound it out basically, and 0:20:45.880 --> 0:20:47.760 we just try to find a memory for that string. 0:20:47.920 --> 0:20:50.560 So it's like you see the letters c at and 0:20:50.600 --> 0:20:52.879 then they shoot off the gun, and it's like whoever 0:20:52.920 --> 0:20:55.720 gets there first is the winner. Even as an adult, 0:20:55.760 --> 0:20:57.359 when you get to a word that you don't know. 0:20:57.680 --> 0:21:00.800 That's so funny. I don't feel the orthological as much. 0:21:01.119 --> 0:21:04.520