Newport Beach group part of PBS series

Deirdre Newman

The secret life of the brain is about to be unveiled on national

television and a local learning center in Newport Beach is helping to

unravel the mystery.

Lindamood-Bell Learning Processes, an internationally renowned leader

in educational instruction and research with a center in Newport Beach,

will be included in a PBS special that begins Tuesday. “The Secret Life

of the Brain,” a five-part series, will explore radical new ways of

mapping and facilitating learning.

The second episode of the PBS series details the learning company’s

involvement in a five-year research study with Georgetown University’s

Center for the Study of Learning, funded by the National Institute of

Health.

The collaborative study on reading and behavioral intervention is in

its second year and uses MRI brain-imaging techniques to measure the

effectiveness of the company’s programs.

The preliminary results have been encouraging, said Paul Worthington,

Lindamood-Bell’s director of research and development.

“It’s not only giving insight into the neurophysiology of when a

disabled student learns how to read but also providing evidence that it

actually changes brain function,” Worthington said. “We see it change in

reading behavior, but we could never before show what happens in a

brain.”

The series explores the new map of the brain that has emerged from the

past decade of neuroscience study. This new perspective offers hope for

dramatic advances in the areas of addiction, depression and learning

disorders, schizophrenia and Alzheimer’s Disease.

Lindamood-Bell works with individuals of all ages in intensive

one-on-one instruction to develop and improve sensory-cognitive

processing for language and literacy skills.

Its programs focus on sensory-cognitive issues surrounding language

and literacy development including the symptoms of dyslexia, attention

deficit disorder and autism.