Question

Write the summary.

To date, however, no study specifically had examined whether and in what ways physical fitness might affect how children learn. So researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign recently stepped into that breach, recruiting a group of local 9- and 10-year-old boys and girls, testing their aerobic fitness on a treadmill, and then asking 24 of the most fit and 24 of the least fit to come into the exercise physiology lab and work on some difficult memorization tasks.

Learning is, of course, a complex process, involving not only the taking in and storing of new information in the form of memories, a process known as encoding, but also recalling that information later. Information that cannot be recalled has not really been learned.

Earlier studies of children’s learning styles have shown that most learn more readily if they are tested on material while they are in the process of learning it. In effect, if they are quizzed while memorizing, they remember more easily. Straight memorization, without intermittent reinforcement during the process, is tougher, although it is also how most children study.

In this case, the researchers opted to use both approaches to learning, by providing their young volunteers with iPads onto which several maps of imaginary lands had been loaded. The maps were demarcated into regions, each with a four-letter name. During one learning session, the children were shown these names in place for six seconds. The names then appeared on the map in their correct position six additional times while children stared at and tried to memorize them.

In a separate learning session, region names appeared on a different map in their proper location, then moved to the margins of the map. The children were asked to tap on a name and match it with the correct region, providing in-session testing as they memorized.

A day later, all of the children returned to the lab and were asked to correctly label the various maps’ regions.

The results, published last week in PLoS One, show that, over all, the children performed similarly when they were asked to recall names for the map when their memorization was reinforced by testing.

But when the recall involved the more difficult type of learning — memorizing without intermittent testing — the children who were in better aerobic condition significantly outperformed the less-fit group, remembering about 40 percent of the regions’ names accurately, compared with barely 25 percent accuracy for the out-of-shape kids.

This finding suggests that “higher levels of fitness have their greatest impact in the most challenging situations” that children face intellectually, the study’s authors write. The more difficult something is to learn, the more physical fitness may aid children in learning it.

Answer 1

A study that was conducted by the researchers of Illinois University at Urbana Champaign, was definitely a remarkable study as this was a very new topic in this field who wanted to study the ways in which “physical fitness might affect how children learn.” For this study, a group of forty-eight 9 & 10-year-old boys and girls were recruited. After an aerobic fitness test on a treadmill, 24 of the most fit and 24 of the least fit were asked to come into the exercise physiology lab and work on some difficult memorization tasks.

In order to study how children, learn the researchers opted to use both approaches to learning i.e. memorization with intermittent reinforcing and without intermittent reinforcing. To carry this, the researchers provided their young volunteers with iPads onto which several maps of imaginary lands had been loaded. The maps were demarcated into regions, each with a four-letter name. During one learning session, the children were shown these names in place for six seconds. The names then appeared on the map in their correct position six additional times while children stared at and tried to memorize them. After the session, the children were asked to tap on a name and match it with the correct region, providing in-session testing as they memorized. A day later, all of the children returned to the lab and were asked to correctly label the various maps’ regions.

After the study was over, the data was analyzed and the results were published. The results showed that over all, the children performed similarly when they were asked to recall names for the map when their memorization was reinforced by testing. But in the second approach memorizing without intermittent reinforcements which involved the recall of more difficult type of learning found that children who were better in aerobic condition significantly outperformed the less-fit group by remembering about 40 percent of the regions’ names accurately, comparing with the 25 percent accuracy for the out-of-shape kids. Thus, the findings suggested that “Higher levels of fitness have their greatest impact in the most challenging situations” that children face intellectually.

Therefore, the study concludes that the more difficult something is to learn, the more physical fitness may aid the children in learning it.