because it was the most difficult.

Jimmy Wilson, 82, agreed to learn to use a computer, a camera and Photoshop for the trial. "That was really quite a challenge for me when I got into the photo class," Wilson says, "because it involved a computer and I had never even touched a computer."

Wilson is motivated to fight dementia, in part because he saw what the disease did to his wife toward the end of her life.

"When my wife died," he says, "it would have been real easy to just become a total recluse." Instead, Wilson embraced being socially and mentally active. He's a member of the choir at his church, and when he's not reading current events and books on his Kindle, he gets together with family for Mexicanfood.

Since Wilson participated in the trial, he says, he has noticed improvement in his memory, although he says it still isn't perfect. He admits it can be frustrating learning to use new technology, but he knows it's good for his brain.

So how does learning a new skill help ward off dementia? By strengthening the connections between parts of your brain, says cognitive psychologist Scott Barry Kaufman. While brain games improve a limited aspect of short-term memory, Kaufman says, challenging activities strengthen entire networks in the brain.

"It really is strengthening the connectivity between these team players of these large-scale brain networks," he says.

Denise Park likens it to an orchestra.

"Players come in and players go out," she says. "Sometimes when something is really demanding, the whole orchestra is playing, but