Neuroscience isn't on many elementary school lesson plans. But this spring, a second grade class at Fairmont Neighborhood School in the South Bronx is plunging in.

Sarah Wechsler, an instructional coach with wide eyes and a marathoner's energy, asks the students to think about the development and progress that they've made already in their lives.

"You probably don't remember, but there was a time when you didn't know how to speak and you were just like 'Wah wah wah blah blah blah, mama, mama!' " she tells the kids. "Our brain grows and changes when you try hard things, when you learn new things."

The children offer their own ideas. "Brains are pink!"

"Your brain can get smarter. For example, if you need help with your work, your brain is there in your head for you."

After watching a video with a cartoon brain, and doing an exercise where yarn stands in for connections between neurons, they seem to have absorbed the main point of the lesson. "There is stuff in your brain that if you take on a challenge and if you stick with it, it makes your brain smarter and it makes you smarter," says one girl.

And Wechsler makes sure they also know the day's big vocabulary word.

"Neuroplasticity! Say it to the light! Say it to the floor! Tell it to your brain!"

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