Is Your Child A Tactile/Kinetic Learner
One day I took over a colleague teacher’s class in order to free her to assess her students’ reading level. Dorothy, a 10-year-old girl was called up to read a passage. She walked jumping and swinging her arms, and moved to the place in front of her teacher. It seemed that she’s a kind of person who cannot sit-still. The teacher gave Dorothy some reading and listened to her in a matter-of-fact manner. Dorothy’s very focus on the reading but sometimes she’d kick her leg now and then. From observing this incident, I can tell Dorothy might be a kinetic learner. At another special occasion, I met her mom. Then I knew Dorothy was attending a ballet class a short time ago. Recently Dorothy was selected by her ballet teacher to perform on stage. This helps me confirm that my first guess was right. Dorothy is a kinetic learner.
Is your child a tactile/kinetic learner?
Just like we did before for checking out spatial/visual learners. As below, I have listed some important and significant traits of a tactile/kinetic learner. You can just put 0, 1 or 2 to each trait. (0= not like my child at all, 1=partially like my child, 2=very much like my child.) The higher you score, the more likely your child is a kinetic learner.
- find it difficult to sit still for long periods of time
- easily distracted by activity around them
- like doing sports, dance, drama, or physical exercises
- like hands-on, concrete activities such as role play, model building
- need to touch things in order to learn more about them
- have good coordination
- best ideas and energy will come when engaging in some physical activities
- like spending free time outdoors
- frequently use hand gestures or other forms when talking with someone
- need to learn a new skill through doing rather than simple reading about it or seeing someone demonstrating it
Tips for parenting tactile/kinetic children:
- Let them use physical actions to approach learning something instead of asking them to listen to lectures or long explanations.
- When they read, they can’t sit still. So allow them to have some body movement, like walking around.
- Let them act out the story while listening to it. Without acting, they have difficulty in absorbing and understanding the information.
- Take time to play and work with them. It’s hard for them to read, write or think on their own.
- Sign them up for some sports.
- Give them a hug. Let them “feel” your love for them.
Sometimes kinetic learners are misunderstood as people who have ADHD as it seems that they cannot sit still and focus on work quietly.
Related articles:
Is Your Child A Spatial/Visual Learner?
Is Your Child An Auditory Learner?
January 22nd, 2006 at 11:29 pm
[…] Is Your Child A Tactile/Kinetic Learner? […]
February 9th, 2007 at 1:34 pm
I am so thankful that I found your website. My youngest and most energetic child is having alot of trouble sitting still in the classroom. I an confident that now I can assist him with his stlye of learning. I dreaded the label of ADHD for him. I wanted something else to go on other than a label of ADHD, and many years of struggling in school. Great Information!
Thank you!
Mom
(Kim)
October 7th, 2007 at 9:54 am
I, too, am so happy to have found this article. My daughter is 9 and in 4th grade. She has always had trouble with reading and I have her enrolled in a parochial school, where rules, order and strict discipline are constanctly practiced. She has not thrived, except for that they send her to a special class for remedial work. They seem to routinely send her to this class, without really trying to see why she needs it.
I have been carefully monitoring her approach to her work. I have been very worried that she had some kind of learning disorder, dyslexia or ADHD. Though, she really didn’t fit the majority of qualities of any of those.
She is very coordinated, to the point that people are amazed at her abilities. Her friend’d dad is a tennis pro and my daughter had never played tennis, but was out with her friend when the dad took them to go hit a few balls. My daughter returned the serves like she had been playing for years. he called me in shock and said she had incredible coordination - and should be enrolled in sports. She will begin basketball this winter.
Anyway, what really worried me was that when she would read, she had trouble, and couldn’t sit still. Literally, she would almost stand on her head!! This has been going on for years. Whenever she was engaged in homework, reading or studying, she would move around (fidget). She does not do this at any other time and is not a hyperactive child. I mentioned it to the reading specialist, who was puzzled and said she had never heard of anything resulting in such movement. Later, she approached me and said that she, too, had begun to notice this (after I mentioned it to her).
So, here is what I have begun to do. 1. I have not agreed to the remedial class this year. I think the school is using it as a crutch and to reduce their class size. I never get any feedback from the progrma and when I ask questions, they never know the answers. They did, at my request, perform a battery of tests, which yielded interesting resuts, but no plan of action or diagnosis. 2. I spend much more time working with her. We study for tests using flas cards and prep tests that I create on the computer. We make it fun and she is allowed to move around and, at intervals, release energy in any way she wants (singing,screaming, performing for me, telling me a joke, being silly). We did this last week and she scored a 95 on a major science exam - and a 100 on her spelling test. She is a good speller - but a nervous reader. Her teachers makes them read in front of the class, which makes her very nervous and anxious. I feel so badly for her.
Now, after reading this site’s article, I think we’ve found the answer! I am going to spend time researching kinetic learning. Thank you!!!
If you have any other advice for me, please email me.
November 2nd, 2007 at 3:10 am
I is most helpful to me. I have a seven year old that has difficulty reading and following through on instructions.
March 14th, 2008 at 9:38 am
This is very interesting about kinetic learners…My son is 18 months old, and I’m already seeing his preference for moving around above doing almost anything else! Do you suppose this is too early to determine that he is a kinetic learner? I’d like to approach things in ways that will be appropriate for his “learning style”…
October 18th, 2008 at 12:44 am
These are not surprising my anymore, but thanks..
October 1st, 2009 at 8:36 am
Wow!! I pretty much knew at the age of 3 1/2 that my son was a kinetic learner. Now, at age 5, he scored a 2 on EVERY one of the questions in this article. We are waiting 1 more year to start kindergarten. Hopefully by then I will have enough info on his learning style to start him & his teacher off on the right foot.
October 6th, 2009 at 12:18 am
My 7 yr old son scores a 2 on all these things. This excites me to find that maybe he doesn’t have ADHD as severe as his dad or it’s mild like his big sister. One thing he does that isn’t listed and i’m wondering about is he is always making noises. His teacher says if he’s not talking, he’s making sound effects, beeping, motor noises, gun noises… he does this at home too. Is this part of Kinetic learning or audio learning?
November 28th, 2009 at 11:02 am
WOW!! So thankful that I have discovered this! My 6 year old scored a 2 on every point. I, too, was very worried about my little girl. I hope to learn more so I can help her, and us and her teachers and coaches!!!! Hopefully I have discovered this just in time!!!
January 8th, 2010 at 12:15 pm
my child is 7 and half and have scored 2 on three of your points aND FITS to the kinetic learners group.
i am very glad my wife discovered this site on teh web and now we can concentrate and tell teh school nurse what I think that our son is been doing all this time is normal and that we have to chage and accept.
Could you givwe more guidance how we should approach and what the future be for child, i mean will they change with age as they grow.
Thank you keep up the good work.
look forward to hear from you
thank you
January 29th, 2010 at 2:24 am
I am so grateful just to have read this brief explanation of a kinetic learner. I have been struggling through 5 months of the school year and multiple parent teacher conferences related to my son’s misconduct. He is on a daily progress report for his “lack of effort and misconduct” Another teacher happened to share with me his feeling that my son may be a kinetic learner and here I am. He scored a 2 on all but one of the traits listed above. I am now on a mission to help my son make it through the 4th grade. I also feel better prepared for an upcoming parent teacher conference. Thank you so much. I look forward to reading more.