Your Learner Is Already Showing You How They Learn
After more than twenty years of teaching, I've learned that the most useful information about a learner rarely shows up on a worksheet. It shows up at the edges of the day. In the car. At the kitchen counter. In the ten minutes after you said, "Time to stop."
Most of us walk right past it.
If you've been wondering whether this way of learning fits your learner, you don't need a new program to find out. You need one week of noticing. Here's how I'd spend it.
Doors, not boxes
Every learner tends to try one door first when something new arrives. Some reach for it with their hands. Some ask who it's for. Some want to see how the pieces connect before they'll touch anything. None of these is better than another. They're starting points, and they can change as your learner grows.
When you know which door your learner tries first, the rest of the week gets easier to plan.
Five places to look this week
- When nobody is directing them. Give them twenty open minutes with nothing planned. Where do they go first? Outside, to the craft bin, to a book, to a sibling? Write that down.
- When something doesn't work the first time. A tower falls, a word won't spell, a recipe flops. Do they rebuild right away, walk off and come back, ask for help, or start explaining why it fell?
- The question they keep asking. Every learner has one. It might be about animals, money, fairness or how machines work. Notice what they return to without being reminded.
- How they show you they understand. Some tell you. Some draw it. Some act it out or teach it to the dog. Some simply do it again, perfectly, and say nothing at all.
- When time disappears. Watch for the moment they look up, surprised that an hour has passed. That isn't a distraction. That's the door standing open.
Keep a sticky note on the fridge. One line a day is plenty.
What to do with what you notice
By Friday you'll have five or six lines. Read them together and look for what repeats. Maybe your learner always starts with their hands. Maybe every question circles back to people and fairness. Maybe they understand best when they get to explain it to someone else.
Then make one small change next week. Let the builder measure something real. Let the questioner lead the morning with their question. Let the explainer teach you the lesson back.
You're not grading anything. You're gathering clues.
When you want words for what you see
That's why we created the Learning Code™. It's a free discovery experience that takes a few minutes, and it gives you language for what you've been noticing: which of the six Learning Archetypes™ your learner tends to try first. Explorer, Builder, Alchemist, Systems Thinker, Steward or Visionary.
Think of it as a first idea about which door to try, never a label. Try the noticing week first, then the Learning Code™, and see where the two meet.
Start With the Learning Code™. It's free.
Your learner has been showing you how they learn all along. This week, you get to watch.
Understand your learner first. Then build the education around them.
Stay curious,
Tonya Remillard
Founder & Learning Architect, SmartHead Co.™