Multisensory Learning

General Overview of a Subject

Before you start learning any subject, or reading a book, it’s always a good idea to do a general overview of a subject. For instance, if you’re going to read a book, you should start by reading the short author biography (which are usually added to the start of most of the books these days), review the content overview and just browse through the book. This way you’ll find out more about the book, its content and you will feel more motivated by knowing that there are important subjects for you in the book.

Another great idea is to make a simple list of things you already know about the subject. By making such a list, you will recall all you know about the subject, also you will find out what else you need to learn.

The last part of general overview should consist of questions for yourself about the subject. You need to ask yourself what you need to learn, and what parts of the subject you don’t know about enough. By asking correct questions and answering them you will be learning easier. These questions will be like a learning plan for you.

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Multisensory Learning

Every person has one favorite sense when learning. Some people like to listen to audio tapes and lectures, others enjoy watching video tapes and making diagrams or graphs. Also there are people, who love to use the gained knowledge in practice instantly, they enjoy learning by touching, constructing and using their hands.

In order to learn easier and better, one needs to find out, which sense is his favorite and use it for learning. For instance, if you are a visual learner, you might want to make a lot of graphs and diagrams when learning. Watching video lectures is also a great idea. As for the auditory learners, you should listen to lectures, audio files or make a song or a jingle when you need to memorize something. The practical learners should always use the learned subject in practice to memorize it and learn it better.

Fortunately there is another technique, by using which you can learn any subject faster, no matter what senses you use in learning. It’s called multisensory learning. The essence of this technique is to use all of your senses in learning. By using all of your sense you can memorize any subject easier and enrich the learning process.

Let’s imagine for a moment, that you’re a student. Let’s say you’re studying philosophy. You could just listen to lectures at the university and do some homework, and you would probably learn the subject well. However, if you would listen to the lectures, made special graphs or watched videos about the subject, made small notes, which you could carry around or stick on your desk in a logical order or talked about philosophy with a mate, you learnt the subject much easier and faster. The best way to make all of these techniques into a habit is making a plan. For instance, you can learn visually for an hour (making diagrams, watching videos, making notes etc.), then make after a short break you can learn using auditory learning techniques (listening to audio tapes, listening to online lectures, and, of course, talking with your mates). You should also explore the practical learning techniques. It’s a little harder to use them for highly theoretical subjects, but you should still try them. For instance, you could make small sticky notes with various ideas written on them, and then lay them out in a logical order. Also you can make a poster, with the most important points of the subject.

Scientific survey with the students of the University of Yale has shown:

1)      Student’s memorize about 20% of what they read;

2)      30% of what they heard;

3)      40% of what they saw;

4)      50% of what they said;

5)      60%  of what they did ;

6)      90% of what they saw, said, did or hear.

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