How by understanding the subconscious mind of learners it is possible to increase the rate at which they progress – without them knowing
By the age of six it is thought that 95% of the time it is our subconscious mind that perceives, interprets and manipulates our environment and encounters.
In other words, the conscious mind is only involved in five percent of the activity in which children are engaged. Indeed, for some children it can be even less!
Given that it is the subconscious that is taking in so much information, it is therefore possible to imagine a situation in which we create environments which provide children with a wealth of information outside of lessons.
In short we are considering the subconscious learning they are engaged in when they are in the playground, eating their lunch or indeed doing anything else.
One simple example of making use of the child’s constant subconscious activity is through Active Learning Place Mats which sit under the child’s plate while eating but then become an educational activity full of activities and information suitable for KS1 and KS2.
Better still, because the place mats can be wiped clean using a dry cloth, they can be used again and again. And not only at lunchtime but also during wet playtimes.
Each of the Active Learning Place Mats comes as a set of six, and the pack also includes six dry-wipe pens for when they wish to exercise conscious learning.
There are four different sets of six mats plus pens available, each focussing on a different topic; Letter Fun, Key Words, Times Tables and Animal Kingdom.
The Letter Fun series has been designed to speed up an automatic response to letter recognition, alphabetical order and rhyming patterns and to develop visual and listening skills.
Topics and activities in the series include letter sequencing (mat 1), dot-to-dots (mat 2), rhyming pairs (mat 3), beginning sounds (mat 4), ending sounds (mat 5), complete the words and match the words exercises (mat 6).
The Animal Kingdom series includes themes such as pets and insects (mat 1), fish and the countryside (mat 2), birds and arctic animals (mat 3), endangered and woodland animals (mat 4), reptiles and safari animals (mat 5), and nocturnal animals and horses (mat 6).
The Times Tables series includes questions on all the times tables up to 10 experienced through both multiplication and division questions. The Key Words series of mats use word searches within shapes to stretch the children’s awareness of letter combinations.
There are more details and illustrations on our website.
You can order the Active Learning Place Mats in any of these ways:
- On our website
- By phone on 01536 399017
- By fax to 01536 399012
- By email to msl@schools.co.uk
- By post to Multi-Sensory Learning, Earlstrees Court, Earlstrees Road, Corby, NN17 4HH