Khushy Shakeel
Everyone learns a different way—some individuals are visual learners, some require hands on activity, and others may just need to ponder over a textbook. This phenomena is not new information; decades worth of research has proven that learning, comprehension and retention occurs divergently from one person to the next. A study completed by Elizabeth Wakefield at the University of Chicago has highlighted the importance of integrating gestures into teaching rather than just teaching through speech alone. The results of this study exemplified how interactive gestures in a classroom environment led to increased comprehension and retention rates among students, as well as increased levels of attention in general. The results of this study illuminated how important interactive learning is, while we are in an age where learning and work is being fast tracked to be done virtually, with hardly any interactive, person to person contact remaining.
Wakefield found through her research that hand gestures during instruction not only guided visual attention and engagement, but also had vast affects on retention due to its ability to synchronize with speech. In her experimental set up, she testes two groups of students with sets of addition problems—one group was given instruction via speech only, while the other group of students was given instruction via speech and gesture from the instructor. The ages of the individuals being tested were between 8- 10 years old. A math pretest given to the participants revealed that none of them had knowledge of how to solve the math problems provided to them during the instruction, and thus had to rely on the instruction completely to learn how to solve the equations. Results following the experiments showed a direct relationship between gesture based instruction and increased retention and comprehension compared to solely auditory learning alone. Along with this relationship, the results of the study also established that children focused their attention more on the gesture space and the mathematical problem, and less at the instructor. This finding led to the conclusion that visual focus on the problem presented allowed the children more time to comprehend what was being taught and apply it to the problem.
Given the numerous findings that indicate the link between in person, engaging learning and increased comprehension and retention rates, we find ourselves in an era of technology that is pushing many learning and work platforms to a virtual platform. Virtual learning and remote work involves minimal engagement—many online classes premise on an instructor lecturing via zoom to a large population of students using PowerPoints and speech heavy teaching. A study done by Papia Bawa highlighted that online learning displays heightened issues related to retention rates and is not limited to any specific age group. The findings from this research indicated that online courses have a 10%-20% higher failed retention rate than traditional classroom settings and a on average, between 40% to 80% of students taking online courses end up dropping the course due to feeling overwhelmed and a lack of comprehension of the material. Other findings from this comprehensive research also indicated that given the nature of online learning being primarily lecture and PowerPoint based, the average attention span of students was severely reduced which ultimately led to a significant lack of retention of the material.
There is still much research to be done on the most effective teaching methods to improve retention and comprehension in students, but seemingly small factors such as gestures play a significant role in the way individuals learn and retain information. The significance of these techniques can ultimately be paramount to many students, especially in a world that is being revolutionized by virtual contact.
Wakefield found through her research that hand gestures during instruction not only guided visual attention and engagement, but also had vast affects on retention due to its ability to synchronize with speech. In her experimental set up, she testes two groups of students with sets of addition problems—one group was given instruction via speech only, while the other group of students was given instruction via speech and gesture from the instructor. The ages of the individuals being tested were between 8- 10 years old. A math pretest given to the participants revealed that none of them had knowledge of how to solve the math problems provided to them during the instruction, and thus had to rely on the instruction completely to learn how to solve the equations. Results following the experiments showed a direct relationship between gesture based instruction and increased retention and comprehension compared to solely auditory learning alone. Along with this relationship, the results of the study also established that children focused their attention more on the gesture space and the mathematical problem, and less at the instructor. This finding led to the conclusion that visual focus on the problem presented allowed the children more time to comprehend what was being taught and apply it to the problem.
Given the numerous findings that indicate the link between in person, engaging learning and increased comprehension and retention rates, we find ourselves in an era of technology that is pushing many learning and work platforms to a virtual platform. Virtual learning and remote work involves minimal engagement—many online classes premise on an instructor lecturing via zoom to a large population of students using PowerPoints and speech heavy teaching. A study done by Papia Bawa highlighted that online learning displays heightened issues related to retention rates and is not limited to any specific age group. The findings from this research indicated that online courses have a 10%-20% higher failed retention rate than traditional classroom settings and a on average, between 40% to 80% of students taking online courses end up dropping the course due to feeling overwhelmed and a lack of comprehension of the material. Other findings from this comprehensive research also indicated that given the nature of online learning being primarily lecture and PowerPoint based, the average attention span of students was severely reduced which ultimately led to a significant lack of retention of the material.
There is still much research to be done on the most effective teaching methods to improve retention and comprehension in students, but seemingly small factors such as gestures play a significant role in the way individuals learn and retain information. The significance of these techniques can ultimately be paramount to many students, especially in a world that is being revolutionized by virtual contact.
Works Cited
Bawa, P. (2016). Retention in online courses. SAGE Open, 6(1), 215824401562177. https://doi.org/10.1177/2158244015621777
Wakefield, E., Novack, M. A., Congdon, E. L., Franconeri, S., & Goldin‐Meadow, S. (2018). Gesture helps learners learn, but not merely by guiding their visual attention. Developmental Science, 21(6). https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.12664
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