If You Want Learning to Stick, Go Big or Go Home

Children often struggle to retain and recall information despite understanding the subject matter or study materials. 

We often hear them say “I understood it in class, but now I don’t remember anything” or “I know the answer, it’s on the tip of my tongue, but I can’t recall”  

This is not surprising at all. See how our brain is stacked against learning!

Our brain is designed to forget!: Our brain is wired to forget so that it can go on learning. Even though our brain is capable of storing huge amounts of information in its long-term memory, the active working memory that we use while being taught is of a measly size.  So the information is actively getting edited out in real-time. 

Overworked brain

Our brain is designed to be distracted: Our ability to focus happens in short bursts amidst a long continuum of distractions. That is, our brain, in its default mode, is always distracted and in order to learn, one has to make the most of those short bursts of attention spans. 

Our brain is designed with a bad filter: Our brain consumes at least 34 GB of information daily – “a sufficient quantity to overload a laptop within a week”. So, we now have a brain that has a short attention span and a poor filter that lets in lots of noises along with signals that are important to us. 

To make learning stick to this forgetful, distracted, chaotic brain, you have to go big or go home!

1. Big visuals make learning sticky
2. Big movements make learning sticky
3. Big laughs make learning sticky 

Big visuals make learning sticky

Our brain is big on visuals. A whopping 80% of what we learn is visual. When compared to text, visual input is absorbed faster, understood quicker, engaged stronger and retained better, all in a short attention span. 

And my favorite big visual aid for learning is mind maps – “A big picture in one glance”

Mind maps help us to organize information visually by breaking them into bite-size nuggets and relate them spatially to the main idea. 

This is superior to serial single-level note-taking, in that, the mind map teases out the main idea and connects the multi-dimensional branches directly to the main idea. 

This stimulates already stored memories by associations and connects new ideas by pattern recognition, which is important for retention and recall. 

Make the already sticky mind maps stickier by allowing your child to use color codes, keywords and curvy lines.

Example: Mind map made by my daughter to understand the different characteristics of solids, liquids and gasses. 

Also, use an abundance of other visual aids to peel layers and get to the core or fundamental idea:

Pictures, graphs, flowcharts: These visual aids speak directly to you which otherwise are lost in the complex nature of language. When possible, convert written information (timeline, data, procedures) into visual input. In order to do this, one must understand and then categorize information. These exercises will further enhance the learning process. 

Big movements make learning sticky

“Development of his mind comes about through his movements.”

— Maria Montessori

That’s right! Gone are the days when you tell your child to sit tight and study up. It seems moving around while learning enhances the learning process. 

The moment the child moves, the brain 

• Senses a change in activity 
• Detects change in spatial reference
• Sharpens focus
• Blood flow increases to the body and the brain
• Gets boosts from brain-break

And when active movements and altered spatial references are combined with learning, the brain sharpens its focus and releases chemicals that enhance learning and retention. 

Example: A few days ago, I was a helper in my son’s science experiment for learning the phases of the moon. Click here for the steps. 

The entire experiment involved lots of activities and movements.  I noticed an increase in our excitement and engagement during the process. When I casually asked him about the concepts a few days later, not one detail was forgotten! I believe involving the whole brain – sensory, motor, cognitive and social – makes the learning process effective and memorable as opposed to textbook learning!

Even if you cannot engage the whole body, being just hands-on increases the stickiness of learning.

Hands-on learning engages both sensory and motor-related areas and the right and left side of the brain. This enriched stimulation facilitates deeper learning that helps in better retention, transfer and recall. 

Big laughs make learning sticky 

If the brain is all too forgetful, distracted and overloaded, what is one sure way to get its attention? – Shock it! NO, not literally, but surprising your brain by doing something out of the ordinary makes the brain stop and take notice. The newness or wackiness aspect will stimulate both sides of the brain. Inducing humor into your routine learning process sharpens attention and boosts retention.

Credit: fusionyearbooks 

Example: This funny picture is worth 1000 punctuation lessons!

Click here to get some great ideas on how to use humor when learning!

Honorable mentions:

Bigmouth makes learning sticking (reading aloud): That’s right. Your brain loves your voice so much that it gives special treatment to the information that’s coming from you!

When you read the text aloud in your voice, the brain registers it as a distinctive input and retrieves it effectively due to the unique production effect of your voice. 

Big recall makes learning sticky (retrieval practice): Become golden retrievers and quiz, self-test yourself constantly so that your brain gets an opportunity to revisit and recall previously stored information. Instead of re-reading your notes, strengthen your learning process and stop the loss of information by “checking in” with your previous learning at constant intervals. 

Let’s use these big ideas to get the attention of our brain, engage them to make life-long connections and meaningful relationships with our learning.