Clickable Brain Atlas¶
Run the Clickable Brain Atlas fullscreen
About This MicroSim¶
This MicroSim is a stylized, procedurally drawn human brain that you can explore by hovering and clicking. It has two views:
- Lateral view (side): the left side of the brain, front facing left. It shows the prefrontal cortex and the motor areas of the frontal lobe, the parietal, temporal, and occipital lobes, the cerebellum, the brainstem, the spinal cord, and two landmark grooves, the central sulcus and the lateral sulcus.
- Midsagittal view (cut down the middle): the brain sliced along the midline. It shows the inner surface of the cerebrum, the corpus callosum, thalamus, hypothalamus, pituitary gland, midbrain, pons, medulla oblongata, cerebellum, fourth ventricle, and spinal cord.
Clicking a region opens an info panel with its name, its main jobs, what happens if it is damaged, and a Brain Bee fact. The shapes are simplified, but every structure is drawn in its correct anatomical position. A Quiz me mode hides the labels, names a structure, and checks whether you click the right one.
How to Use¶
- Choose a view from the View menu.
- Move the mouse over the brain. The region under the pointer turns gold and its name appears.
- Click a region (or a black groove line in the side view) to read its info panel.
- Uncheck Show labels to test yourself without the name tags.
- Press Quiz me. Read the structure named in the panel and click it. You get one try per question. A wrong answer tells you what you clicked, gives a location hint, and highlights the correct structure in gold.
- Press Next question to continue. Your score is shown next to the buttons. Press Stop quiz to return to exploring.
Learning Objective¶
Bloom level: Remember (identify). Students will identify 19 major brain structures and landmarks in a lateral view and a midsagittal view, scoring at least 80% in quiz mode in each view.
Iframe Embed Code¶
You can add this MicroSim to any web page with the following iframe:
<iframe src="https://aaryavvatts-lab.github.io/neuroscience-textbook/sims/ch04-brain-atlas/main.html" height="682px" width="100%" scrolling="no"></iframe>
Lesson Plan¶
Grade level: 9 to 12
Duration: 25 to 30 minutes
Prerequisites: Students know what neurons, axons, and myelin are (Chapter 1) and have read the sections of Chapter 4 on the lobes, deep structures, brainstem, and ventricles.
Activity:
- Predict (5 minutes). Before opening the sim, students sketch a side view of the brain from memory and label as many structures as they can.
- Explore (10 minutes). In pairs, students click every region in both views. For each one, they record one main job and one "if damaged" effect in a two-column table.
- Localize (5 minutes). The teacher reads three short symptom stories (for example, "clumsy left arm with normal strength," "trouble understanding speech," "personality change after a forehead injury"). Students click the region they think is damaged and justify their choice using the info panel.
- Quiz (5 to 10 minutes). Each student completes the quiz in both views and records their scores. Students below 80% repeat the quiz after reviewing the regions they missed.
Assessment questions:
- Which groove separates the frontal lobe from the parietal lobe, and which kinds of cortex lie just in front of it and just behind it?
- In the midsagittal view, which structure arches above the thalamus, and what does it connect?
- Name the three parts of the brainstem in order from top to bottom.
- A patient has unsteady walking and a clumsy right arm but normal strength. Which structure in the atlas is most likely damaged, and on which side?
- Why does the atlas accept a click on the prefrontal cortex as a correct answer for "Frontal lobe"?