Maureen Scalia

Renee Zabel

D’Alesio, Scalia, and Zabel use multisensory as a direct instruction approach to research vocabulary acquisition. Their goal was to gather evidence of marked improvement in the number of vocabulary words students recognize, understand, and use. During their research they used three different intervention approaches. One of them being Brain Gym. Their research showed that a multisensory, direct instructional approach improves student vocabulary acquisition.  The use of multi sensory methods, whether specific to Brain Gym or not are beneficial to the early elementary classrooms. D’Alesio, Scalia, and Zabel state that teachers should be doing more brain research and multisensory movement in their classroom for not only vocabulary acquisition, but other areas of content as well.

activities that promotes moving with intention that will lead to optimal learning (Brain Gym International, 2011).  Brain Gym is an official trademark of Educational Kinesiology Foundation started by a man named Paul E. Dennison and his wife. Brain Gym consists of 26 movements that if practiced by students show dramatic improvement in several areas such as concentration and focus, memory, academics: reading, writing, math, physical coordination, and attitude. The Brian Gym website promotes these activities and shares testimonials of parents with children with learning difficulties, low gross motor skills, and other academic concerns.

This article draws attention to the “typical” classroom setting; sitting in chairs, no talking, no moving. It address that concerns of not having movement in the classroom and the effects it has on our students. Pica states that the most recent brain research has done much more than suggest movement to develop motor skills, but also develop academic skills (2008). Pica points out the research of other whole brain learning promoters, Eric Jensen notes that the cerebellum is a “virtual switchboard of cognitive activity”. Several studies demonstrated a connection between the cerebellum and such cognitive functions as memory, spatial orientation, attention, language, and decision making, among others. Research shows that the brain is activated during physical activity. This encourages teachers to promote movement learning, not while sitting in a seat. According to Jensen, sitting for more than 10 minutes at a stretch “reduces our awareness of physical and emotional sensations and increases fatigue.” Movement will increase blood vessels that allow for the delivery of oxygen, water, and glucose to the brain. The can only help optimize the brain, again supporting movement learning. Pica suggests movement, is just the element that we are missing in our teaching.

What I found to be most interesting in this article by Carol Hammett was her choice to do movement during story time. This research is based on movement learning, a type of movement created by the researcher during this study. The movement based learning wasn’t specific to a program, such as Brain Gym, but conducive to physical activity during story time. The results from this study show the students choose to participate in the group conducting physical activity during story time versus a non-active read aloud. The results of this study were encouraging. It showed vocabulary acquisition improved during the active story time compared to the controlled group.  Hammett also encouraged more research into teaching vocabulary to elementary students through movement learning and the importance for teachers to research  teaching methods and strategies that promote vocabulary acquisition of children in the early primary grades. Teachers would understand the importance of kinesthetic learning, learning though movement and its benefits that may be enjoyed by all learners.  Hammett concluded with  findings that this particular study offers possibilities for an action research model that educational leaders can use to support teachers-research at the classroom level (2009). This information is encouraging for me to conduct my own research on movement learning. It suggests that overall movement my be a key to enhanced learning versus specific Brain Gym movements. Brain Gym is an expensive program that not all schools may have the option to afford.