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Mind Your Body: the Essential Role of Body Movements in Children’s Learning

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Abstract

This special issue has its genesis in the recent establishment of the Early Start Research Institute at the University of Wollongong in Australia, which aims to transform lives of young people through high-quality early year education supported and informed by high-quality research and practice. The contributions to this special issue are based on a united approach to the brain and body, which holds that learning processes and body movements are inextricably bound. The mix of theoretical papers, intervention studies, and commentary in this issue indicate that part- and whole-body movements can positively affect children’s learning performance, especially when movements are infused into the classroom and integrated into the learning task.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to acknowledge Professor Eeva Leinonen Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academic) for her choice of title and expert advice on the framing of this introduction.

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Correspondence to Paul Chandler.

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Chandler, P., Tricot, A. Mind Your Body: the Essential Role of Body Movements in Children’s Learning. Educ Psychol Rev 27, 365–370 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-015-9333-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-015-9333-3

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