What students say

Each semester we invite students to reflect on their embodied learning experiences. They tell us that movement enhances their understanding of academic content, improves their attention and mood, decreases their stress and anxiety, and deepens the experience of academic community and collaboration.

In their own words....

"Like many MIT students, I'm used to sitting at a desk, absorbing information through readings, lectures, and problem sets. The idea that learning could be tied to the body, through broomball, weightlifting, Tai Chi, and yoga, initially felt foreign. But as I progressed through the course, I found that using my body to understand concepts not only helped solidify them, it also transformed how I connect with my peers and how I think about learning itself."

"When I was actually holding the sail, feeling the wind push against the boat, and sensing the stability change based on where I was sitting, I understood the physical logic very quickly...I understood more about buoyancy, fluid dynamics, and resistance, which were concepts that I had previously learned but had trouble retaining...It reminded me that the body often grasps ideas faster than the mind."

"Judo holds a lot of value for mechanical engineers to understand the material we learn in class. After taking 8.01 (Mechanics) and 2.003 (Dynamics), I know the equations for conservation of momentum and the impact of a force off the top of my head, but during the Judo lab, when we practiced lengthening the time of contact to decrease the amount of force imparted during a fall, I was able to connect my mathematical understanding of forces and impacts to a more intuitive physical understanding using movement."

"The square dance lab translated algorithms and conditionals into coordinated group motion. When one person missed a cue, the entire system broke down, making dependency and error propagation visible. These experiences stayed with me because they were encoded physically rather than memorized."

"The learning feels much less exhausting...despite participating in physically exhausting activities, such as Pickleball or strength training, I found myself leaving the lab feeling much more energized than I had coming in."

"I found that moving around during class has helped energize me for the day, increasing my focus in other classes as well." 

"Every day we moved, my mood lifted. Even on days when I arrived tired or stressed from other coursework, I left feeling reset." 

"Focusing on embodied learning made me much more aware of how my own study habits, which also which often involve hours hunched over a laptop, can be both physically and mentally draining. After we explored meditation and took part in less intense activities like Pickleball, I noticed a significant drop in my academic anxiety, especially during midterm week."

"These collective physical experiences reshaped our interactions…Having gone through unusual but shared physical tasks, we were more comfortable speaking openly, even about sensitive topics…This level of mutual respect can be difficult to cultivate in a conventional lecture setting." 

“The forms of collaboration found in this lab differ vastly from the kind I’m used to in my technical courses. Typically, there is minimal interaction on P sets, and group projects involve dividing up work to do separately. Physical teamwork led to a level of trust that can’t be replicated by just working on a paper or psetting together. I think the team activities could be incorporated into other classes that require a group work."

"Movement brings out a different side of people. Whenever we were active, my peers were more willing to take risks, laugh, experiment, and help each other. There was less pressure to be perfect right away. Movement makes learning social, emotional, and memorable in ways a textbook cannot."

"I now view activities like Broomball, scavenger hunts, and partner acrobatics as highly effective methods to improve many soft skills that MIT attempts to inculcate into its students and that the corporate world seeks when aiming to hire engineers with great leadership qualities."

"Movement, it turns out, isn't just a way to escape thinking, it's a way into it. Throughout the course I noticed a consistent theme: when I physically engaged the material I remembered it better."

"In a lecture, it is easy to be multitasking in some way with your computer or phone. In these labs, where your mind and body are fully occupied, I feel I am more present and more likely to retain the material once the class ends."

"Other classes give you tools. Here you ARE the tool."

"Labs have helped me understand topics in a way that would be impossible otherwise, and more than that, they have caused me to broaden my perspective both on the topics themselves and on the way I can learn them. Though many classes at MIT do not strongly adapt this model of teaching, I believe it is applicable in some capacity to almost every class." 

"This course reminded me that intellectual learning divorced from physicality is a relatively recent and culturally specific phenomenon. At a place like MIT known for its rigorous academics, re-integrating the body into learning felt both innovative and necessary."