The Effect of an Embodied curriculum based on Cognitive Developmental Theories of Learning

• In Event: Learning and the Growing Body: Embodied Learning Research Across Different Age Groups

Abstract

The importance of sensorimotor engagement for higher-order cognition is a foundational idea in classic psychological theories, such as Piaget’s theory of cognitive development (Piaget, 1972). Young children benefit from action experiences. Children’s understanding of the world is nascent, significantly updated by engaging in novel and meaningful interactions with their environment (Sommerville et al., 2005; Gerson & Woodward, 2011).
Adults, on the other hand, typically experience less frequent new discoveries, and possess more robust and stable sensorimotor and cognitive abilities. In addition, learning in adulthood is often more complex. While children are grasping fundamental motor experiences and abstract concepts, such as conservation laws or mathematical equivalence, higher education involves mastering complex concepts over extended periods. This raises three questions: (1) Does the effect of embodiment in learning extend into adulthood when dealing with complex domains over long periods? (2) If so, how can we design learning materials that support this demographic? (3) How do we evaluate the effectiveness of such longitudinal interventions?
Previous research suggests that young children, with limited prior experience, benefit more from performing relevant actions than from merely observing them (Sommerville et al., 2005; Fyfe et al., 2015). However, given the developmental and cognitive differences between children and adults, it remains unclear if physical engagement is necessary for college students learning complex subjects.
In our study, we designed, implemented, and compared two types of embodied pedagogy in the domain of statistics and data science. One approach involved students actively participating in hands-on activities, while the other had students observing their partner perform the same activities. The study was conducted as the lab component of a 10-week introductory statistics course at a large public research university, involving 227 college students. Participants were randomly assigned to either the Perform or Observe group.
During the first week, students were introduced to the lab structure and randomly paired with a partner from the other group, maintaining this partnership throughout the course. From the second week onwards, each lab session began with a set of "practice questions" completed on students’ laptops. These questions were divided into two parts: one assessing knowledge of the current lab’s concepts and the other evaluating understanding of concepts from the previous week, serving as a delayed assessment. Additionally, students’ learning was measured through two midterms and a final exam.
An analysis of students’ exam scores showed a significant interaction between students’ self-rated prior knowledge at the end of the course and type of pedagogy. Multilevel analysis of weekly pretests and delayed posttests confirmed these findings.
Together, the findings showed that learners with low prior knowledge of the concepts benefited more from performing the hands-on activities whereas learners with high prior knowledge benefited more from observing the activities. These insights can inform the design and evaluation of embodied activities in real-world college classrooms. Instructional designers and teachers might consider incorporating more hands-on activities for learners with rudimentary understanding and gradually reducing physical engagement as learners become more proficient.

Authors

• Icy Yunyi Zhang, University of Wisconsin - Madison

• Ji Son, California State University - Los Angeles

• James W. Stigler, University of California - Los Angeles