Learning and Fun: How to Get the Best of Both Worlds

How can we make learning enjoyable for children?

If you were to ask any student to describe their learning experience throughout their academic career, it is unlikely the word “fun” would crop up very often. In fact, even college and graduate students will be hard-pressed to admit that much of their education was entertaining.

Well, this simply won’t do. The average child needs to have fun while learning if they are expected to truly care about the subject matter at hand. Not to mention, the more interesting a topic is, the greater the chance of the students actually paying attention to the material.

So, how can you make learning fun and ensure that students actually absorb information at the same time? Well, this process is actually easier than you might imagine.

Teaching Through Storytelling

Most teachers or parents are simply trying to get children to remember particular portions of information. Now, this is a fair enough goal. After all, the main objective of students is to ensure that they pass their exams. Thus, it is only fair to try and focus on a few parts of the material.

However, when doing this, quite a bit of the context gets lost. Not only can this make the details more difficult for students to understand, but it can also take away from the quality of the material. This is especially true with subjects such as History, Science, and Geography.

This is why there should be a greater focus on storytelling. Try to turn the material into a narrative so that students are able to see the picture as a whole. Since this isn’t possible with all subjects, consider using anecdotes or fictional stories to help put the pieces of the lesson together.

Show Real-World Relevance

Even as an adult, you want to know why you should learn about something. Naturally, no one wants to store up information that they are never going to use. Students and young children are exactly the same. They may find it difficult to remember details that don’t appear to have too much connection to real life.

What’s great about this tactic, though, is that you need to encourage children to create these links themselves. Keep in mind, this can be done with virtually any subject. Once you have taught them a particular concept, ask the kids to find examples of how it can be used or connected to the world around them.

This way, you are allowing them to understand why a certain topic is so important for them to remember. Furthermore, the children are more likely to remember something when it is linked to something that they have greater familiarity with.

Contextualize the Lessons

At the end of the day, there is no getting around the fact that children do have to pass their exams. In fact, their entire academic career often depends on well they can manage to do this. As unfair as this is, it is something that teachers and parents alike need to focus on nonetheless.

This is why students must complete practice tests that are similar to their future exams. This is much simpler to do now thanks to educational preparatory websites such as TextMaxPrep. By helping children understand the structure and format of exams, you are showing them how to read and answer questions more effectively.

Use Technology Effectively

Modern technology can be used to learn, as well as entertain

Naturally, more people have begun to use technology in the classroom. If this is something that you are doing, make sure to use it effectively. In many instances, use apps, games, multimedia, and more to emphasize the subject matter that you are teaching.

Thus, technology doesn’t necessarily have to be involved in the primary teaching process. Nonetheless, it can be used to illustrate the points that you are making in your lesson. Technology also offers an excellent opportunity for children to try out different experiments and activities for themselves.

It is also important to understand that not all educational tools are created equal. So, before introducing technology into lessons or revision sessions, make sure that it is actually created to produce a certain result. Otherwise, you might find that your efforts aren’t producing the kind of learning outcomes that you want.

These are the top things to keep in mind when combining learning with fun. As you can see, it certainly can be managed. With help from these suggestions, you will now know just how to manage it.

Leslie Sherman has been a teacher for over two decades. During this period, her focus has been on how to make lessons and learning more effective. She has used the information that she has gathered to create lesson plans and learning strategies that are more suitable for the modern student.