There is a significant amount of research devoted to memory. Why are some things committed to memory while others escape? An article in American Educator magazine titled "What Will Improve a Student's Memory" by cognitive scientist Daniel Willingham explains how the brain stores information and how memory relates to student learning. In his evaluation of the research, Willingham states that "memories are formed as the residue of thought. You remember what you think about, not every fleeing thought -only those matters to which you really devote some attention." a4a
This claim supports the idea that the more one thinks about something, the more lately it will become stored in one's memory for future reference. So thinking is central to the retention of skills taught in the classroom. If a teacher wants students to retain a specific skill in their memories, then the students need to have thought about it. This might explain why ditto sheets and drills are so ineffective in the classroom. Henry Ford observed, "Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is the probable reason why so few people engage in it." Moreover, thinking is slow. The brain does a better job with seeing and moving which are automatic processes in many ways. Our thinking system does not instantly calculate the answer to a problem the way our visual system takes in a visual scene. Thinking also takes concentration. Memory is not as reliable as one's visual and motor systems.a5a
Besides building visual-verbal connections, another powerful piece to improving writing skills, involves examining the reasons why our students struggle with writing. Willingham writes another insightful article in American Educator magazine, "Why Don't Students Like School? Because the Mind is Not Designed for Thinking" in which he addresses the issue of how to inspire and motivate students. According to Willingham, if a student finds a subject difficult, then the student will not experience successful thought, and thought is required for memory. He further explains that thinking requires concentration and effort.a6a
In answering his question about why students don't like school, he develops an argument that school does not provide what he calls a "pleasurable rush," a sense of satisfaction and fulfillment in successful thinking. Students enjoy mental activity but not when it is too hard; if there is too much mental work involved, it is more unlikely that satisfaction will be achieved. Most of what Willingham reports supports the need for differentiated teaching and learning. Differentiated teaching recognizes that not all students are alike due to their varying background knowledge, language, learning styles and interests. Students need a multitude of ways to process information and those instructional approaches should be adapted in relation to the individual students learning thresholds. Students are motivated to "think" and therefore learn when they are engaged in work that peaks their curiosity on a level that their brains find pleasurable. Therefore, it is important for teachers to recognize that in order for students to learn, they need to experience challenging activities that interest individual students, that the activities should be thought-provoking, and that the lessons have visual/verbal connections to help in the retention of skills.
Key research findings from Robert Marzano, in his book Classroom Instruction That Works: Research-Based Strategies for Increasing Student Achievement, prove that learners acquire knowledge and store knowledge in two ways: linguistic (by reading or hearing) and nonlinguistic (through visual images, kinesthetic or whole-body modes).a7a
His research supports the theory that the more students use both systems of representing knowledge, the better they are able to think about and recall what they have learned. Students can improve reading, writing and thinking skills by using visual imagery to help them organize key concepts. Visual images can be very powerful aids in remembering information, and they can make even apparently meaningless material more meaningful. Visual images help organize information because they create associations. Research supports the idea that this strategy is one of the most under-used strategies in classrooms. Marzano outlines that best teacher practices would include activities that include nonlinguistic representations in lessons such as concept maps, idea webs, and thinking maps, sketches, graphs and symbols. Creating more verbal visual connections is important to building skills.
Although the educational community has recently been embracing visual enhancements in instruction, the connection of visual to verbal information is evident throughout history. Aristotle stated that, "without image, thinking is impossible." Characters in alphabets began as pictures with meaning.a8a
Pictures, such as Egyptian hieroglyphics or Native American picture writing came before words in written language. Only after the printing press was invented were illustrations and type separated, with illustrations often falling by the wayside. Recent history shows a reversal in this separation with greater reliance on visually oriented approaches to information presentation. With the onset of computer and computer graphics, the communication of ideas and concepts became increasingly graphic.
Teachers' instructional decisions are based on a mix of theories learned through teacher education classes, professional development, acquisition of content knowledge, and success and failures in the classrooms through trial and error. The impetus in education has increasingly been to apply strategies and techniques in the classroom that have proven to be successful. The findings from cognitive science, an interdisciplinary field of researchers from psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, philosophy, computer science and anthropology, help teachers identify the best educational strategies. All the research supports that visual journaling is an effective strategy to use in language arts classrooms.
