Rule #9: Stimulate more of the senses.

We are sensory driven creatures. We gather all information through a variety of senses. The more senses we involve the mores information we gather, the better our integration and understanding of this information. When information is presented multisensory (seeing and hearing) it is retained better then when presented using a single sense. In some experiments the improvement to recall was 50-75 %. IF you involve more then 2 senses learning improves even more.

John Medina outlines Richard Mayer’s guidelines for multimedia presentations, these are well worth sharing with the teachers I work with.

1. Multimedia principle: Students learn better from words and pictures then from words alone.

2. Temporal contiguity principle: Students learn better when corresponding words and pictures are presented simultaneously.

3. Spatial contiguity principle: students learn better what corresponding words and pictures are presented near each other rather then far from each [other] on the page or screen.

4. Coherence principle: students learn better when extraneous material is excluded rather then included.

5. Modality principle: Students learn better from animation and narration then from animation and on-screen text.

(pg 210)

I was also taken with the idea the role of scent has. Smells can effect our emotions and emotions play a role in memory and learning. As I write this I am sitting in a mall food court buffeted by many scents and this notion of sensory branding really hit home. It is all I can do to fight the urge to go get some food. Marketers really understand this. I wonder how we can harness that for learning.