Be a “SENSATIONAL THINKER”! A sensational thinker has fifty percent more creative solutions when solving a problem! Why might a lesson done on a field trip be so much more effective than one done in the isolation of a classroom? Consider how many more senses are used when learning something in its natural environment. Field studies provide the sight, sound, smells, feelings, and actions that make up the entire concept. Imagine how much better our kids learned fractions when they went to California Pizza Kitchen. We use multiple senses and integrate more areas of the brain to remember knowledge or skills. Gathering data through all senses is the most powerful way to incorporate ideas and skills with any lesson. When teaching your child something new make it more conscious by identifying as many sensations as possible. Go beyond the visual, kinesthetic, and auditory. Ask questions about sight, sound, smell, taste, visual space/perspective. Be a sensational thinking coach.
Rule #9 from from Dr. John Medina’s Brain Rules:
Stimulate more of the senses.
Our senses work together so it is important to stimulate them! Your head crackles with the perceptions of the whole world, sight, sound, taste, smell, touch, energetic as a frat party. Smell is unusually effective at evoking memory. If you’re tested on the details of a movie while the smell of popcorn is wafted into the air, you’ll remember 10-50% more. Smell is really important to business. When you walk into Starbucks, the first thing you smell is coffee. They have done a number of things over the years to make sure that’s the case. Learning is no different. Those in multisensory environments always do better than those in unisensory environments. They have more recall, with better resolution, that lasts longer–evident even 20 years later.
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