Not everyone learns in the same way. I know you all know this, but it never hurts to review. There are three ways people learn. Some learn using a combination of these.
- Auditory
- Visual
- Kinesthetic
If you’re a classroom teacher, and you are only using one of these modes to relay the content of your lessons to your students because most of them are, for example, visual learners, then how are the other students in your class going to learn the material effectively? The truth of it is, it will be difficult for them. Your goal is for all of your students to learn the material, so use a combination of the three ways above.
Example:
You are teaching spelling/language.
Visual: List words on the board. Students look up each word and write down the definitions.
Auditory: As a class, the students say the words aloud.
Kinesthetic: Assign a different word to each student. Each student draws a picture of their word. When they are finished, student 1 says his/her word aloud and its meaning, at the same time, he/she puts an action to the word. Then student 1 holds up his/her picture. The class then repeats student 1’s word and the action student 1 put to it. This cycle repeats with student 2 doing the same thing with his/her word. The class repeats student 1’s word and student 1’s actions, then repeats student 2’s word and actions. This cycle continues throughout until all students have done their words.
Once the whole class goes through the words, the teacher will give the definition of one of the words and the students will write down the matching word. You can do the reverse of this as well.
Yes, this method works. I used it in my high school junior language class. The words were extremely difficult for the students, as they had never seen them before. I used this method and they went from C’s and D’s to A’s and B’s. They had a great time with this as well.
If you have any questions, please leave a message in the comments section.