by Sarah Major, M.Ed
Children who benefit most from hands-on activities are tactile or kinesthetic learners
(“Tactile” has to do with receptors on the skin – touching and feeling texture, shape, etc. “Kinesthetic” has to do with registering body movement.)
We all know that teaching-by-talking is the least effective way to communicate knowledge to our youngsters and that hands-on activities with concrete materials are the best way to go. But in spite of the large numbers of students who are visual or kinesthetic learners, the primary mode of teaching is still verbal and oral – the teacher talks, explains, and reviews while the children listen and maybe take notes. The reason this practice of teaching-by-talking needs to be revised is that the percentage of visual and kinesthetic learners is pretty high in the early grades.
“Most of the school population excels through kinesthetic means: touching, feeling, experiencing the material at hand. “Children enter kindergarten as kinesthetic and tactual learners, moving and touching everything as they learn. By second or third grade, some students have become visual learners. During the late elementary years some students, primarily females, become auditory learners. Yet, many adults, especially males, maintain kinesthetic and tactual strengths throughout their lives."
(Teaching Secondary Students Through Their Individual Learning Styles, Rita Stafford and Kenneth J. Dunn; Allyn and Bacon, 1993)
How to identify your kinesthetic learner:
Does your child like to
· Touch and handle everything
· Try it for themselves without listening for directions or instructions
· Move pretty constantly (swinging a foot, waving hands around while talking, hopping, tipping chair, jumping, rolling)
· Show you rather than tell you
· Have trouble verbalizing at times
· Listen for only a short span of time and then get moving again
These active children are often labeled with ADHD, but reality is that they learn through movement, and activity helps them think and process. When their attention begins to wander, rather than trying to force them to sit quietly, let them get some exercise and then they can come back and refocus on their task.
Some children who are kinesthetic might focus more effectively in school if they are allowed to stand up by their desk as they work (rather than sitting still), if they can manipulate objects as they are working, and if they are encouraged to draw pictures or charts and graphs of what they are learning. Many older kinesthetic children will doodle and take notes as they are listening in order to improve their focus and comprehension.
Their focus will be closely tied to what their hands and bodies are doing.
How to help your kinesthetic learner in school:
· Make sure the child understands his / her learning gift so that he or she will be able to learn to help himself/herself rather than just feeling incapable.
· Teach him / her to create movements that reflect the concepts they are learning. The movements might be whole body gestures that mimic the action in the learning piece, or they might be small motor actions such as those utilized in drawing a picture or scene that includes the concepts they are learning.
· When learning a new procedure, encourage the child to visualize himself / herself doing the action very much like a gymnast visualizes himself going through his routine before a performance.
· When dealing with abstract symbols such as math equations, rather than just using pencil and paper to solve problems, encourage your child to replicate the problem using real objects. For example, when you are teaching your child the math facts, don’t just give him or her flash cards with the problems on them, give children manipulatives and have them figure out for themselves the various combinations of numbers that equal a particular target number. For sums to 8, for instance, you will give the child 8 objects and have him or her work out for themselves the combinations of numbers that equal 8 (1+7, 2+6, 3+5, 4+4).
· Use rhythm like clapping or beating on a drum for repetitive learning such as counting by two’s or ten’s.
· Be sure to not try and limit the child’s need to move. It is very true that when we try to get our active learners to sit still and listen, to stop fidgeting, and to stop swinging their legs or tipping their chairs, we might actually be stopping their ability to think! The rule of thumb is to share with your child that he or she can be active as long as they are focusing better than when they are still. They can learn to self-monitor!
Physical activity also helps children think and reason better
Just like the most effective teaching practice stimulates many regions in the brain at one time (visual, motor, image, symbol, etc.) and gets them working together in concert, activities that involve the whole body activate many regions in the brain and get the communication going that helps with learning. From birth children instinctively move in ways that results in the creation and elaboration of neural networks. They handle and taste everything they can, they wave their arms and legs, they roll over, crawl, walk, run, spin, jump, climb on things, whirl, hang upside down, and so much more. Each of these full body activities get the various regions in the brain communicating – and this facilitates full brain communication necessary for learning.
Many children today don’t get the opportunities they need to move in these non-structured ways. Playing an organized sport provides exercise, but the types of movements described above literally help with physical development and with neural organization. This type of movement actually helps children think better!
So let’s put away the electronics and get our active children outside for some good free play with friends!
Sarah Major, CEO of Child1st Publications, grew up on the mission field with her four siblings, all of whom her mother homeschooled. As an adult, Sarah has homeschooled a small group of children in collaboration with their parents, and has taught from preschool age to adult. Sarah has been the Title 1 director and program developer for grades K-7, an ESOL teacher, and a classroom teacher. As an undergraduate student, Sarah attended Wheaton College in Wheaton, Ill. and then received her M.Ed. from Aquinas College in Grand Rapids, MI. In 2006 Sarah resigned from fulltime teaching in order to devote more time to Child1st, publisher of the best-selling SnapWords™ stylized sight word cards. In her spare time Sarah enjoys gardening, cooking, pottery, quilting, and spending time with her family.
Child1st Publications, LLC
www.child1st.com
800-881-0912
PO Box 150226
Grand Rapids, MI 49515
Children who benefit most from hands-on activities are tactile or kinesthetic learners
(“Tactile” has to do with receptors on the skin – touching and feeling texture, shape, etc. “Kinesthetic” has to do with registering body movement.)
We all know that teaching-by-talking is the least effective way to communicate knowledge to our youngsters and that hands-on activities with concrete materials are the best way to go. But in spite of the large numbers of students who are visual or kinesthetic learners, the primary mode of teaching is still verbal and oral – the teacher talks, explains, and reviews while the children listen and maybe take notes. The reason this practice of teaching-by-talking needs to be revised is that the percentage of visual and kinesthetic learners is pretty high in the early grades.
“Most of the school population excels through kinesthetic means: touching, feeling, experiencing the material at hand. “Children enter kindergarten as kinesthetic and tactual learners, moving and touching everything as they learn. By second or third grade, some students have become visual learners. During the late elementary years some students, primarily females, become auditory learners. Yet, many adults, especially males, maintain kinesthetic and tactual strengths throughout their lives."
(Teaching Secondary Students Through Their Individual Learning Styles, Rita Stafford and Kenneth J. Dunn; Allyn and Bacon, 1993)
How to identify your kinesthetic learner:
Does your child like to
· Touch and handle everything
· Try it for themselves without listening for directions or instructions
· Move pretty constantly (swinging a foot, waving hands around while talking, hopping, tipping chair, jumping, rolling)
· Show you rather than tell you
· Have trouble verbalizing at times
· Listen for only a short span of time and then get moving again
These active children are often labeled with ADHD, but reality is that they learn through movement, and activity helps them think and process. When their attention begins to wander, rather than trying to force them to sit quietly, let them get some exercise and then they can come back and refocus on their task.
Some children who are kinesthetic might focus more effectively in school if they are allowed to stand up by their desk as they work (rather than sitting still), if they can manipulate objects as they are working, and if they are encouraged to draw pictures or charts and graphs of what they are learning. Many older kinesthetic children will doodle and take notes as they are listening in order to improve their focus and comprehension.
Their focus will be closely tied to what their hands and bodies are doing.
How to help your kinesthetic learner in school:
· Make sure the child understands his / her learning gift so that he or she will be able to learn to help himself/herself rather than just feeling incapable.
· Teach him / her to create movements that reflect the concepts they are learning. The movements might be whole body gestures that mimic the action in the learning piece, or they might be small motor actions such as those utilized in drawing a picture or scene that includes the concepts they are learning.
· When learning a new procedure, encourage the child to visualize himself / herself doing the action very much like a gymnast visualizes himself going through his routine before a performance.
· When dealing with abstract symbols such as math equations, rather than just using pencil and paper to solve problems, encourage your child to replicate the problem using real objects. For example, when you are teaching your child the math facts, don’t just give him or her flash cards with the problems on them, give children manipulatives and have them figure out for themselves the various combinations of numbers that equal a particular target number. For sums to 8, for instance, you will give the child 8 objects and have him or her work out for themselves the combinations of numbers that equal 8 (1+7, 2+6, 3+5, 4+4).
· Use rhythm like clapping or beating on a drum for repetitive learning such as counting by two’s or ten’s.
· Be sure to not try and limit the child’s need to move. It is very true that when we try to get our active learners to sit still and listen, to stop fidgeting, and to stop swinging their legs or tipping their chairs, we might actually be stopping their ability to think! The rule of thumb is to share with your child that he or she can be active as long as they are focusing better than when they are still. They can learn to self-monitor!
Physical activity also helps children think and reason better
Just like the most effective teaching practice stimulates many regions in the brain at one time (visual, motor, image, symbol, etc.) and gets them working together in concert, activities that involve the whole body activate many regions in the brain and get the communication going that helps with learning. From birth children instinctively move in ways that results in the creation and elaboration of neural networks. They handle and taste everything they can, they wave their arms and legs, they roll over, crawl, walk, run, spin, jump, climb on things, whirl, hang upside down, and so much more. Each of these full body activities get the various regions in the brain communicating – and this facilitates full brain communication necessary for learning.
Many children today don’t get the opportunities they need to move in these non-structured ways. Playing an organized sport provides exercise, but the types of movements described above literally help with physical development and with neural organization. This type of movement actually helps children think better!
So let’s put away the electronics and get our active children outside for some good free play with friends!
Sarah Major, CEO of Child1st Publications, grew up on the mission field with her four siblings, all of whom her mother homeschooled. As an adult, Sarah has homeschooled a small group of children in collaboration with their parents, and has taught from preschool age to adult. Sarah has been the Title 1 director and program developer for grades K-7, an ESOL teacher, and a classroom teacher. As an undergraduate student, Sarah attended Wheaton College in Wheaton, Ill. and then received her M.Ed. from Aquinas College in Grand Rapids, MI. In 2006 Sarah resigned from fulltime teaching in order to devote more time to Child1st, publisher of the best-selling SnapWords™ stylized sight word cards. In her spare time Sarah enjoys gardening, cooking, pottery, quilting, and spending time with her family.
Child1st Publications, LLC
www.child1st.com
800-881-0912
PO Box 150226
Grand Rapids, MI 49515
