Learning Styles: Strategies for Kinesthetic Learners

Be Hands-On (Not Just Proactive) with Learning

Kinesthetic learners are learners who tend to remember what they have seen and experienced better than what they’ve read or heard. These children (of any age) are generally good at sports as well as crafts and anything involving the use of their hands. They therefore tend to perform better academically if they are taught when their teachers keep in mind their unique learning preferences.

Strategies for Teaching

Outside of formal educational experiences, parents can help their children recall school lessons and process information better by using or adapting the following 10 home teaching strategies for their children.

• Watch to see for what time limit your learner is able to sit and focus on their lessons. Once you’ve figured out this magic number of, say, 20 or 30 minutes, try to encourage her to get up and move around for 5-10 minutes before sitting back down to focus on her studies again. These mini-breaks will help kinesthetic learners improve their concentration levels.
• For language studies, create worksheets for students with elevated or raised (embossed) letters, or encourage your students to do the same and ask them to trace the letters on the worksheet with their fingers as they read.
• Using practical experiments will help your child understand science concepts better. You can encourage her to research practical applications of the scientific concepts taught in school to find them in her daily life.
• Encourage students to create plays out of their lessons and stage a performance for the family on weekends.
• Tactile or kinesthetic learners tend to understand math concepts better if they are encouraged to use such items as an abacus.
• Take your child on educational fieldtrips such as museums and planetariums so he can gain a better understanding of subjects like history and astronomy.
• Multi-tasking while studying can be distracting and non-supportive for some students, although it is not bad for everyone. Encourage your child to walk or pace around while reading or reciting important information.
• When your child is studying, encourage her to use plenty of colored paper to decorate her study notes; this may actually help your child concentrate better than having everything written on plain white paper.
• Encourage your child to make a scrap book of interesting facts and information he has learned over the course of the school year. This will help in his overall academic development.
• While studying geography, encourage your child to look at maps and trace her fingers over it while trying to memorize important geographical information.

When children are taught in a way which appeals to their inner passions, they start enjoying the process of learning, and children who start enjoying learning early in life never loses their thirst for knowledge. Empowering them to explore and learn how they study best will provide the means for them to embrace learning as a life-long journey to love.

Until next time, embrace your inner wisdom.

Namaste,
Karen