How Does Your Child Learn?
 

What Research Says
about
How Students Learn Best  

  

 

1.The brain seeks, creates, and retains patterns.

2.Learning is social.

3.Learning begins with prior experience.

4.Learning requires risk taking.

5.Learning involves constructing meaning.

6.Learning mandates active involvement

7.Learning allows for choice.

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Here are some short digests of educational research findings related to how students learn best.

Research shows that active learning is best.

While reading and listening play a role in learning, there is overwhelming evidence that lasting learning and retention of information require that students interact with materials and ideas. An effective teacher or parent is one who involves students in learning by doing, working in groups, discussing, writing, and reflecting, in addition to reading and listening.
Research shows that true understanding goes beyond vocabulary.

Facts and formulas are important in math and science. However, true understanding involves a much deeper approach to learning about concepts. Learning concepts takes longer than rote memorization. Effective teachers and parents seek to present topics in greater depth in order to deepen student understanding.
Research shows that there are recognized phases of learning.

Students need chances to explore phenomena and ideas, receive information, apply what they have learned to new situations, and investigate their own questions. Effective teachers and parents know how to sequence these types of activities so that children learn best.
Research shows that children of different ages have different needs.

Younger children need lots of free exploration and experiential learning opportunities. Older students are more capable of abstract thinking and of applying what they've learned to more complex situations--though research shows that they still need direct interaction with materials. Effective teachers and parents know how to provide children of different ages with the experiences they need.
Research shows that a balanced diet of learning experiences is healthiest!

There's a diverse menu of learning experiences available: hands-on experiments, reading an article, listening to a parent talk about science in his or her career, making a model of the solar system, writing a letter to Bill Gates about a new invention, watching a video, acting out a chemical process, or working together on group presentations are just a few examples. It's good for all children to experience all approaches to learning. Like nutritionists, most educators recommend a "balanced diet" of education. An effective teacher or parent provides a balance of different learning approaches.
More than one way of being intelligent?

Harvard psychologist Howard Gardner argues that intelligence has to do with the capacity for solving problems and the human ability to create in a complex real-life setting. Taking into account the findings of modern brain science and psychology, Gardner put forward his theory of "multiple intelligences." It suggests that humans have at least seven different kinds of intelligence, including linguistic intelligence, logical-mathematical intelligence, spatial intelligence, bodily-kinesthetic intelligence, musical intelligence, interpersonal intelligence, and intrapersonal intelligence. As Gardner has been quoted as saying, "It's not how smart you are, but how you are smart!" It is broadly recognized that IQ tests and other traditional standardized tests measure only a few of these intelligences.
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Helping Your Children Establish High Standards for Their Schoolwork

There's lots of research evidence showing that students who know the standards for good work themselves are best able to produce good work. Asking questions like the following can help a child begin to learn these standards. When your children begin working on their own tasks, they may ask themselves the same kind of questions.
  • Explain how you figured that problem out.
     
  • How do you know that's correct?
     
  • Why do you think that? Write your thinking down.
     
  • Can both of these things be true?

     

  • Can you find a better way to convince the reader of
    your answer?
     
  • Can you make a drawing that shows what you mean?

     

  • Have you labeled your drawing?
     
  • Did you describe the units correctly? (inches, milliliters, meters, teaspoons, etc.)
     
  • How is this similar to what you did in class?
     
  • What part is hard for you? How could we make that part easier?
     
  • If a child has an incorrect solution, suggest two or three other solutions and ask her to compare them.
     
  • Does one look more correct than the others?

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Source: http://lhsparent.org/research.html