Handwriting Is Better Than Typing When Learning a New Language, Study Finds (sciencealert.com) 78
David Nield shares the findings of a new study via ScienceAlert: Researchers tasked 42 adult volunteers with learning the Arabic alphabet from scratch: some through writing it out on paper, some through typing it out on a keyboard, and some through watching and responding to video instructions. Those in the handwriting group not only learned the unfamiliar letters more quickly, but they were also better able to apply their new knowledge in other areas -- by using the letters to make new words and to recognize words they hadn't seen before, for example. While writing, typing, and visual learning were effective at teaching participants to recognize Arabic letters -- learners made very few mistakes after six exercise sessions -- on average, the writing group needed fewer sessions to get to a good standard.
Researchers then tested the groups to see how the learning could be generalized. In every follow-up test, using skills they hadn't been trained on, the writing group performed the best: naming letters, writing letters, spelling words, and reading words. The research shows that the benefits of teaching through handwriting go beyond better penmanship: There are also advantages in other areas of language learning. It seems as though the knowledge gets more firmly embedded through writing. The research has been published in Psychological Science.
Researchers then tested the groups to see how the learning could be generalized. In every follow-up test, using skills they hadn't been trained on, the writing group performed the best: naming letters, writing letters, spelling words, and reading words. The research shows that the benefits of teaching through handwriting go beyond better penmanship: There are also advantages in other areas of language learning. It seems as though the knowledge gets more firmly embedded through writing. The research has been published in Psychological Science.
Well no shit Sherlock (Score:5, Informative)
That's why drivers who learn stick shift can drive automatics and not the other way round, why people who learn to use a manual lathe and mill make better machinists than those who learn CNC without touching the parts, and why people who learn Java alone make poorer programmers than those who take a course of two in assembly.
Learn to write it by hand, then learn to type it, and you'll master the language better.
Re:Well no shit Sherlock (Score:4, Interesting)
That's why drivers who learn stick shift can drive automatics and not the other way round,
Which is also why a large portion of people are such poor drivers. Instead of having to be engaged in the act of driving, determining when to shift for example, all people have to do is press a pedal. Crappy programming does the rest.
It's almost as if when people don't have to put in effort, they perform poorly.
Re:Well no shit Sherlock (Score:5, Insightful)
Which is also why a large portion of people are such poor drivers. Instead of having to be engaged in the act of driving, determining when to shift for example, all people have to do is press a pedal. Crappy programming does the rest.
Which is also why "driver assist" technologies assist drivers to be neglectful of the road and disengaged from the act of driving their vehicle.
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I'm in two minds about this. I see what you are saying but people who only drive automatics don't seem to be statistically any worse than people who drive manuals. Also considering how many people I see on the roads who can't say within a lane, let alone in the centre of one, overall some steering assist might be a good thing.
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Instead of being engaged in the act of DRIVING (paying attention to their surroundings, etc), they are engaged in the act of OPERATING AN ENGINE (determining when to shift for example) I can't figure out how you think that makes someone a better driver. Do you think people would be even better 'drivers' if they also had to do all the other stuff that used to have to be done manually (setting the choke, adjusting ignition timing, etc)?
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That's why drivers who learn stick shift can drive automatics and not the other way round,
Which is also why a large portion of people are such poor drivers. Instead of having to be engaged in the act of driving, determining when to shift for example, all people have to do is press a pedal. Crappy programming does the rest.
It's almost as if when people don't have to put in effort, they perform poorly.
This, learning in a manual, particularly a manual that doesn't have a lot of power teaches you what the engine is doing and how that relates to the road and the movement of the vehicle. A good instructor will teach you how best to manipulate this to drive better, faster and more efficiently. You also learn to be proactive in your driving, not just with gear changes but anticipating hazards as well as changes in traffic and conditions.
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If you're talking about racing, then sure. If you're talking about normal driving, doubtful. Since when has driving 'faster' been an issue for normal driving? As for driving 'better', how do you define better? Are there any statistics showing people driving stick shifts have fewer accidents than people driving automatics? As for 'more efficiently', yeah, maybe 30 years ago. I doubt very much that there are many (if any) drivers that can drive a stick more efficiently than modern automatics (unless you
Re: Well no shit Sherlock (Score:2)
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Says the guy who can't spell "or" reliably.
Re:Well no shit Sherlock (Score:5, Funny)
Touché :) Although that was just laziness: I didn't proof-read.
In my defense, English is my first language, so I struggle to write it as well as foreign learners, like most native speakers :)
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Heh heh, perfect comeback.
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In other news, Slashdot editors still can't do their job. The study is about learning a new alphabet, but the headline says "language". It's rather obvious that writing out an alphabet, by exercising recall rather than just recognition and by requiring more attention to reproduce the characters correctly, will be more effective than just typing with a new keyboard (or worse, just a keyboard layout).
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Actually, the Arabic script is an abjad, not an alphabet.
Is it? I thought written Arabic used vowels, albeit ones written above or below the main line of consonants.
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Seldom, and inconsistently. IIRC, some of the "ordinary" letters, while etymologically consonants, are often used as vowels in languages that use Arabic script (like Persian, Urdu, western Punjabi, and no doubt others). Even in Arabic, to a lesser extent.
Vowel diacritics (dots above in Arabic script, unlike most of the accents in European languages using the Latin alphabet) are almost never used outside of pedagogical materials in Arabic.
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Distinguishing between and an alphabet and a language is something normal human adults can do without thinking.
If you consider that "pedantic", please stick to Tiktok.
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The pedantic difference was rather obviously alphabet vs abjad. I, for one, appreciated the distinction being made because although I knew that some writing omitted vowels, I did not realize there was a name for that kind of writing system.
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Not only is it an abjad, each letter has 4 different forms depending on whether the letter is placed at the start of a word, in the middle or at the end, or if it's in isolation.
That's another factor where handwriting helps: when you type, you just press 'a' and out comes the correct form.
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Not only is it an abjad, each letter has 4 different forms depending on whether the letter is placed at the start of a word, in the middle or at the end, or if it's in isolation.
Not much different from cursive English, really. I'm still not seeing why this is not an "alphabet"; Arabic has written vowels and, I believe, those vowels have defined stand-alone forms. An abjad doesn't have written vowels, surely?
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English cursive letters look very similar when they're written as part of a word compared to their isolated form. You just add lines to connect the letters.
In Arabic, the differences are more dramatic, with entire parts of the letter going missing or getting added.
AIU, Arabic vowels exist only as diacritics, not as standalone forms. Arabic is called an impure abjad because it has vowel marks. The vowel marks are optional though.
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I've never seen Russian cursive, but have you ever seen medieval Latin manuscripts? There are long sequences of i-like shapes, which may be the letter 'i', but may also be 'm', 'u' and a few other things, I think.
Cursive (Score:2)
Back in the days when cursive was taught in schools here in the US (I don't know about other English-speaking countries), a few of the cursive letters had radically different shapes from the block letters. I recall the upper case 'Q' as being one; in one commonly taught form of cursive, it looks more like a '2'. The upper and lower case 'S' and 's', and the lower case 'f', are also very different from their block counterparts. Who knows why; I don't recall them being easier to write or read. Some time a
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I was going to post about the letter forms, but you beat me to it. FWIW, not every letter has four forms, I think most have fewer, and some have only one form. But unless you're using the Unicode Arabic Presentation Forms (U+FB50 to U+FBEF), where either a typist needs to select the correct form or software does, when you type in the ordinary Unicode Arabic script block (U+0600 to U+06FF, plus a few letters elsewhere for some special purposes), the display software automagically chooses the correct form.
Re:Well no shit Sherlock (Score:4, Interesting)
Indeed, there seems to be some benefit from building up a bit of muscle memory from writing characters even when you are just trying to recall them. I won't pretend to understand why exactly, but having done it for Japanese I feel like the act of writing them out gave my brain some kind of spacial understanding as well as just visual recognition.
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Your first example makes no sense. You're basically saying that people who have a skill (driving a stick) can also do things that don't require that skill (driving an automatic). Talk about no shit Sherlock. What does that have to do with learning something new?
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Usually the reason people drive stick first is not due to better driving skills.
1. Manual Transmission cars are/has been cheaper than automatic cars. So Driving schools with stock cars were manual because they were cheaper.
2. If you learn to drive manual, and get your license on a manual car, then switching to automatic is easier. If you are going to charge people to learn to drive, they should be able to drive most cars.
However I had learned to drive with an Automatic Car, then a few years later, I got a S
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When I went from a manual ('85 Mazda 626 coupe) to an automatic, my problem wasn't so much reaching for the clutch. I kept trying to put the damn thing into neutral at stoplights.
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In many ways learning automatic first, allowed me to focus more on the driving than the operation of the car
This.
Driving is nerve-wracking enough without having to worry about what gear the freaking transmission is supposed to be in. Not to mention, if you live in or have to commute through a major metropolitan area, driving a standard transmission in stop-and-go traffic is horribly tedious and will make you hate life.
Re: Well no shit Sherlock (Score:3)
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I do this in meetings. Write a summary in my notebook as the presenter presents. I feel it wedges it in my brain better. The research in TFA seems to support that.
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But that all depends. People tend to have a dominant sense for learning.
Tactile folks benefit from re-writing, most others don't. Audio folks benefit from hearing it, and so forth. Everyone has a bit of each, but one tends to be significantly stronger.
And then there's folks like me, who don't even get one. :(. I think it was a law school course where they were including skills that gave one of those inventory/test things, and I was below the threshold for *all* of them.
I'm a extremely theoretical per
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That's why drivers who learn stick shift can drive automatics and not the other way round
This is a flawed argument. It has nothing to do with learning by taking notes or handwritten vs typed practice. You get in and you drive, if you need to shift you practice that a few times and you are done.
The argument would be practicing manual shifting on a computer (pressing buttons) vs sitting in a car in a parking lot.
I love how those that drive a manual act like it is some all mighty skill - I have news for you: it isn't. People learn it when they need it, simple as that.
The other stupid argum
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Also, it's been known for some time that people who take notes in class by writing generally learn the material better than those who record the lectures and listen to it later. The act of writing it down seems to force the brain to actually focus on what is being written. There has also been a study that has shown typing helps students retain material better than typing on a laptop does.
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Re: Well no shit Sherlock (Score:2)
Old news (Score:1)
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It's as much about understanding the mechanisms [researchgate.net] behind the effects. We take what we do too much for granted to understand what happens behind the scenes.
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Basic study skills!
Not an impressive sample size (Score:1)
The study had 42 participant, divided over 3 groups (writing, typing, video). That's an indicative study at best. Oh, and the paper is behind a pay-wall. You can't even check the results for yourself.
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You can't even check the results for yourself.
That implies an audience capable of doing so in the first place. Much like security and quantum mechanics.
Not only languages (Score:5, Informative)
Handwriting forces you to think more about what you are writing. This helps learning, not only a new language but any subject.
The nowadays common use of powerpoint slides in universities, instead of giving lectures using only a blackboard (and making students take notes) is a huge, huge step backwards in the learning process.
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Where are the "notes" in the main story?
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Researchers tasked 42 adult volunteers with learning the Arabic alphabet from scratch: some through writing it out on paper, some through typing it out on a keyboard, and some through watching and responding to video instructions.
Writing it out on paper forces you to focus. Same as taking notes in class, then going back to your room and copying the notes into another notebook burns the lesson into your brain.
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Yes. This.
I find that I understand the material in my classes better when I take notes in class by hand, and then later type them up.
I think it's two factors. DISCLAIMER: I AM NOT A NEUROSCIENTIST. I think that part of it is that's how I learned to take notes (I'm of the ... older ... generation), so there are pathways there. And second, the transcription obviously is a second reading of the material.
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Handwriting forces you to think more about what you are writing.
For most people, yes. For others, no. I wish more educators got it through their thick skulls that not everyone learns the same way. I loathed having to take handwritten notes in class, because when I'm copying something, I'm only concentrating on the act of duplicating what I see. I'm generally not parsing the information in any meaningful way that allows it to be committed to memory.
Known since a long time (Score:2)
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You have to ask what you are trying to teach the students. Are you trying to teach the students to write letters or are you trying to teach the students to communicate effectively through written word. Personally, I think both Typing and word processors and pencil and paper are just communication tools. One is far more efficient than the other, for both the producer and receiver.
On the other hand, I found my son -1st grader last year- was completing his homework assignments on his school provided iPad thro
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If he never learns how to type and can be more efficient than his peers through voice dictate, I'm all for it.
Don't get your hopes up. My wife does a lot of writing for work and has serious issues with her hands. Typing is very painful for her, and she needs to take frequent breaks (every few minutes). She has a Microsoft ergonomic keyboard, which she says really does help, but that just means she can work for longer stretches before needing to stop.
She has access to several dictation packages, including Dragon, and a lot of expensive recording equipment, but only uses those things as a last resort as she find t
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David Pogue has preached the gospel of voice diction for years and years, and that guy publishes a LOT. I'm a lot faster typing too, but that's because I'm better at typing than diction. It's just the way my brain was wired when I was learning to write. BUT, if a kids brain learned at an early age (or an old person intentionally put forward the effort to really retrain themselves) then I can completely imagine diction being faster and more accurate.
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Are you sure the test have proven that people *learn* better when they take handwritten notes instead of typing it, or have the test proven that people *regurgitate information* better?
There is a difference.
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Chiseling into stone better than writing. (Score:2)
Sure it is. And I imagine chiseling the letters into stone better than writing.
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That's one way to get people to write what they mean rather than sharting out the non-speak dribble of emails.
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But the backspace doesn't work very well; it's more like a chip off the old block.
You learn by using your senses . (Score:5, Interesting)
While people are often considered Visual, Auditory or Tactile learners. The more senses you can use towards learning something improves your ability to learn it.
Hygienically and culturally for most fields of study we don't teach most topics with Smell and Taste, however if they can be incorporated as well into the study then you will probably get a much better level of learning over all.
So I am not surprised that Hand Writing will help with learning a language, as it will add a unique tactile experience to the learning.
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Like thinking ahead.
No auto-correct in hand writing, YOU have to do all the work, hence more attention to detail.
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I remember 'fondly' those days of having to rewrite an entire page due to one error.
I didn't get better with my first typewriter, my teachers did not allow 'white out' corrections.
Nothing like retyping an entire page to make a single correction only to find you have made another error.
Good times.
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It what, the 99th studies on that ! (Score:2)
Like don't we saw this kind of "news" evey other year ?
I got my white pencil for Python white spaces (Score:2)
relax, it's 80% a joke
Though here's a different study (Score:2)
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It all has to do with how the brain is activated. The main benefit for notes is the rephrasing into your own thoughts and organizing your thoughts; the method is not as important. If the method distracts focus, we can not multitask so it takes away from our focus. Automatic typing takes little "IQ" but so does writing; thing is, you can't quickly and flexibly respond with the computer plus most complex actions take far more "IQ" to perform and thus it becomes a distraction. Such as drawing arrows around in
Follow-up research (Score:2)
Disable the backspace, delete, and arrow keys and see whether it is still inferior to learning by writing.
Mechanical learning, not language (Score:2)
I *still* write almost everything longhand (Score:1)