Ensure all participants are involved, and that the conversation maintains focus. Let's talk more about specific mechanisms that will encourage productive conversation. For example, one may consider emailing discussion questions to the class at least two days previous to the session. The parallels between human speech and birdsong have provided a neurobiological animal model to understand a higher cognitive process presumed to be unique to humans. Both human and songbirds learn their complex vocalizations early in life by imitating their parents, and by auditory feedback from themselves as they practice - the early phase of learning is primarily perceptual, which serves to guide later vocal production.
Innate predispositions exist for perceiving and learning the correct sound in both groups.
Both humans and songbirds have developed a complex hierarchy of forebrain areas in which auditory and motor areas interact. Both speech and song acquisition have critical periods for vocal learning. Some of the highlights will include novel findings on neurogenesis in adults, neurons specific for autogenous song in the forebrain, and gene expression that is social context-dependent. V.S. Ramachandran, a neurologist, has devised very simple and ingenious experiments to search the secrets of the human mind. In synesthesia an individual experiencing a sensation in one modality, involuntarily experiences a sensation in another modality.