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Doing a professional job

I've been chatting to a friend tonight who has recently completed the first year of a qualification that she's taking as a mature student (over 50). She got a distinction in her first year and over 80% for every piece of work that she submitted.  Its a pattern that I have seen for many people that I know who have taken up new learning later in life. I know at least one other person who got a distinction and another who achieved a first.

One of the reasons that these people have done so well is that they have done a really professional job.  They have approached the study and preparation of work in the same way that they would approach projects at work where there are deadlines, quality standards for reports and targets or goals to be achieved. This maturity of  approach comes from having spent time in a working environment which gives mature students a huge advantage.  Its not surprising that they are welcomed by most institutions.

Through delivering my older workers programmes I meet many people who are considering going back into studying in later life.  One of their fears is that they will be outstripped by the enthusiasm of the young.  However what I remind them about is all those years of relevant experience that they have in work which really help them to put things into context, make linkages to the real world and produce excellent work.

So as you take on new areas of study remember that your life and work experience are probably more relevant than the sheaf of A levels that your fellow students might be equipped with.

Do something different

All the research evidence tells us that as we get older we need to use our brains more to avoid mental decline.  However there are actually things that we get better at doing with our brains as we get older. One of these is pattern recognition.  We are better able to notice when there is a repeating pattern of behaviour, events, incidents and we also better remember if we have previously encountered conceptual things before such as a story, news article, piece of music or we can quickly associate images with those we have seen before.

So I believe that our brains become more powerful as we get older.  Maybe they are a bit like my computer - its more powerful to me now than when I bought it as it actually has more stuff stored in it.  Your brain does store more stuff every day so its not surprising it can recognise patterns more easily as it has more data to work with. Any time you enc outer a new experience in life you brain tries to classify or categorise it with something that it already recognises.  This is a bit like me asking my computer to find a file containing the word "happiness".  The more data it has to compare with, the more likely it is to make a positive association.

When the brain is doing this work it is laying down new connections and developing new pathways.  This build up your brains ability to do things, giving it greater choices of the pathways it uses.  So its like a road map - if I wanted to go from A to B and only one road existed, with a slow tractor on it which I couldn't overtake I'd take a long time to get there.  If I had a choice of roads I'd be able to make the journey more effectively.

You don't have to do things outrageously differently to make your brain work that little bit harder and make new connections.  You could just take a different route to a familiar place, eat your lunch in a new cafe, go to the cinema instead of the pub.  What are you going to do that's different today?  What else will you do that's different tomorrow?

Keep Learning

A study in Finland, reported in today's Times of India, has linked learning with protection from Alzheimer's disease.  This really backs up a lot of the work that we do in our Fresh Steps programme with some hard evidence.  We already know that as we get older we are into a use it or lose it situation in relation to "the little grey cells" so extra cerebral exercise is a great insurance policy.  We now know from this study reported in the learned journal Neurology that the risk of Alzheimer's correlates inversely with the years of education that you have experienced.  Basically what they are saying, having studied 1400 people over 20 years, is that the longer you have been in education, the less your risk of Alzheimer's.

Now you could sit back and say that it's too late now to do anything, my education is over.  That would be fatalistic and definitely very un-Fresh Stepish!  Or you could choose to say "Wow what great news!  That just spurs me on to find out about that evening course/sign up for that training course at work/enquire about study leave/buy that new teach yourself electronics textbook/go back to my French class/learn some new Salsa steps" (delete as appropriate).  That would be a much more positive response, to keep topping up that insurance policy constantly with new education and learning.

It's invigorating, stretches your mind, gives you added confidence and is of course fun (and we all need more fun as we get older!).  So what are you waiting for, make that phone call, send that email or fill  that application form in TODAY!  The longer you leave it the closer you are getting to your brain frying itself.