Additionally, "Other research highlights the hand's unique relationship with the brain when it comes to composing thoughts and ideas. Virginia Berninger, a professor of educational psychology at the University of Washington, says handwriting differs from typing because it requires executing sequential strokes to form a letter, whereas keyboarding involves selecting a whole letter by touching a key.She says pictures of the brain have illustrated that sequential finger movements activated massive regions involved in thinking, language and working memory—the system for temporarily storing and managing information. And one recent study of hers demonstrated that in grades two, four and six, children wrote more words, faster, and expressed more ideas when writing essays by hand versus with a keyboard."
NPR recently published the article, "Attention Students: Put Your Laptops Away," and while they too recognize the many benefits of typed and digital notes, they also agree with my old fashioned ways (and proved why they might be better). Here are the big takeaways:
- In the study published in Psychological Science, Pam A. Mueller of Princeton University and Daniel M. Oppenheimer of the University of California, Los Angeles sought to test how note-taking by hand or by computer affects learning."When people type their notes, they have this tendency to try to take verbatim notes and write down as much of the lecture as they can," Mueller tells NPR's Rachel Martin. "The students who were taking longhand notes in our studies were forced to be more selective — because you can't write as fast as you can type. And that extra processing of the material that they were doing benefited them."
- When testing how well the students remembered information, the researchers found a key point of divergence in the type of question. For questions that asked students to simply remember facts, like dates, both groups did equally well. But for "conceptual-application" questions, such as, "How do Japan and Sweden differ in their approaches to equality within their societies?" the laptop users did "significantly worse."
Jake Weidmann, MAster Penman
With a Psychology degree behind his more creative and artistic talents, he points out that by doing the tactile movements of creating each letter, and linking them together and putting them, as words, into a sentence, we're actually ingraining the information in our brains.
The following clip focusing not only on his skill, but also on his dedication to the need for handwriting. Consider this thought from his mentor: If we're not teaching and requiring this, thoughts our students develop when communicating through a computer will vanish as soon as they type them on the keyboard.
Furthermore, forming the individual letters helps with the recognition required for reading, spelling, and overall literacy. And cursive is even more beneficial to the brain! It is linked with higher-level reasoning.
What about using apps to handwrite on their iPads?
So maybe I'm old fashioned when it comes to requiring a notebook, but in my mind, there is something about the physical paper and turning of pages that aids in how I learn and retain information. I'm looking for research to back me up.
Current issues with using app and stylus include the fact that not all students are coming prepared with a stylus. For note taking, a finger is not even close to a good substitute. Even then, iPad handwriting, whether with a finger or stylus, is still much more sloppy and temperamental- I want students developing the real skill (and dare I say art)- again, not sacrificing the ability for the sake of technology. And of course, they're 6th graders- using a notebook is FAR less distracting.
So what does this look like in my classroom?
- Students will be asked to have a notebook specifically for my class. I will talk to them about these studies so they understand why I require them to handwrite their notes. We will set up the notebooks with a table of contents to allow for maximum organization.
- My school has just become an AVID school, and I am hoping they introduce Cornell Notes throughout the campus. Regardless, my students will be using them. Again, we will have a lesson about the advantages of creating and using Cornell Notes effectively. Up until this point, not many 6th graders have experience with note taking or studying. This is a skill that they need right now and a skill that will carry over into their higher education.
- As they learn to take notes "effectively," I will take time to point out what is important to write down and what the biggest takeaways are to help them learn to be selective and simultaneously process information as they take notes. We will focus a lot on how to study their notes after the fact as well.
- I will encourage students to have fun with their notes. Colors! Highlighters! Sticky Notes! Doodles! I went to a MENSA training for GT teachers, and they brought up how many of our honors students need to do more than just listen in order to stay focused in class because their minds are so active. For these students, doodling (especially when the doodles coincide with the subject matter) will help them process and retain even more. These images that go along with their notes create a visual to help them recall and remember. I can help by providing graphic organizers and other visuals for them to add to their notes.
And that's why I'm a tech savvy teacher in a tech savvy school district and my students are going to hand write their notes. Questions?