The Importance of Movement

Many experts agree than in order to keep a child's mind sharp in the classroom, you have to keep them active when they aren't in one. But with most kids spending their free time online instead of on the playground, and many schools emphasizing what s happening in the classroom rather than what s happening in the gymnasium, it is not easy to keep today s students active.

We will discuss the problem and its solutions with Linnea Lyding, assistant professor at Arizona Christian University in Phoenix, and a former K-8 special education teacher and reading specialist, and with Wendy L. Ostroff, associate professor in the Hutchins School of Liberal Studies at Sonoma State University California, and the author of Understanding How Young Children Learn .

Episode Segments:

Educvii: Linnea Lyding Dr. Linnea J. Lyding is an assistant professor and the interim department chair of the Education Department at Arizona Christian University (ACU). Based on her knowledge of the complexity of classroom teaching, she redesigned the student teaching experience to maximize ACU student learning. Dr. Lyding is also instrumental in designing the new Early Childhood Emphasis.
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Educvii: Wendy L. Ostroff Wendy Ostroff has been developing curriculum on children's learning for the past 15 years in the Hutchins School of Liberal Studies at Sonoma State University; in the Department of Education and Child Study at Smith College; and most recently, as Associate Professor in the Program for the Advancement of Learning at Curry College. Dr. Ostroff has taught over 30 distinct university-level courses and has been granted three university Excellence in Teaching awards. She is deeply committed to the design and implementation of state of the art education.
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Guest(s) Appearing on this Episode

Linnea Lyding Dr. Linnea J. Lyding is an assistant professor and the interim department chair of the Education Department at Arizona Christian University (ACU). Prior to coming to ACU, her teaching background consists of 18 years of elementary school teaching in the Phoenix area. She taught in both the public and private sector with children from diverse backgrounds. She also worked as a teacher of teachers in the elementary school setting, in seminar presentations, and in teaching adjunct classes for ACU, Northern Arizona University (NAU), and Arizona State University (ASU). She completed her doctorate in Leadership and Innovation at ASU in the spring of 2012. For her dissertation and final action research, she worked with teachers in her school to incorporate movement and gestures (embodied cognition) in their instruction to increase student engagement, enjoyment, and learning. She has two articles that are scheduled to be published in the fall of 2014 about teaching with movement. More About Dr. Lyding

Wendy Ostroff Wendy Ostroff's expertise in cognitive psychology, child development, and metacognition stems from her research experience as a scientist in the Infant Perception Laboratory at Virginia Tech; as a visiting scientist at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany; and as a Carnegie Scholar with the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching at Stanford University. She has been developing curriculum on children's learning for the past 15 years in the Hutchins School of Liberal Studies at Sonoma State University; in the Department of Education and Child Study at Smith College; and most recently, as Associate Professor in the Program for the Advancement of Learning at Curry College. Dr. Ostroff has taught over 30 distinct university-level courses and has been granted three university Excellence in Teaching awards. She is deeply committed to the design and implementation of state of the art education. How Young children Learn