The study supports the cognitive neuroscience theory known as multisensory learning, a concept that “attributes the benefits of enrichment to recruitment of brain areas specialized in processing the enrichment” (Mayer et al., 2015). (2015), researchers found that self-performed gestures enhance learning a foreign language. Why did I understand and can now remember the words the security guard said? In a study done by Mayer et al. I understood and still remember nearly all the words he said after that cue. Surely, the puzzled look on my face cued him to speak slower and provide some supplemental help: gestures. I went to the security guard in my dorm and said, “Bonsoir, Parlez-vous anglais?” His reply: “Non…” I proceeded to try to tell him through hand gestures and pantomime that my card does not work. This resource came in “handy” (pun intended!) when I found out, after returning home from a group project meeting at 1am, that my room key deactivated. Over my past two weeks in France, much of my French vocabulary stems from these gestural experiences. Hand gestures not only help me communicate but help me understand what the other person is saying. The answer I dread occasionally follows, “Non…” The first thought that comes to mind is “I should have kept up with French in elementary school.” Then I resort to my next resource: my hands. “Parlez-vous anglais?” I find myself saying this phrase in almost every interaction I have with a French speaker–ordering food, asking for directions, shopping.
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