When children move over, under, around, through, beside, and near objects and others, they better grasp the meaning of these prepositions. When they perform a “slow walk” or “skip lightly,” adjectives and adverbs become much more than abstract ideas. When they’re given the opportunity to physically demonstrate such action words as stomp, pounce, stalk, or slither—or descriptive words such as smooth, strong, gentle, or enormous—word comprehension is immediate and long lasting. The words are used and learned in context, as opposed to being a mere collection of letters. This is what promotes emergent literacy and a love of language.

Learning by doing creates more neural networks in the brain and throughout the body, making the entire body a tool for learning. There is a growing body of research determining that physical activity activates the brain much more so than doing seat-work. It can help increase memory, perception, language, attention, emotion and even decision making.

While engaged in movement activities children use multiple sensory processes, which create neural connections across numerous pathways in the brain. The branching of these connections is the first step in wiring the brain for all future learning.

Humans have a natural affinity for animals that is evident very early in life.

When used to introduce movement and learning, animals help reduce competition and fear of failure; there is no perfect move to master–no wrong way to “hop” like a rabbit. Everyone can succeed at their own level, feeling a sense of accomplishment.

Children naturally gravitate toward animals and are motivated to learn and imitate the sounds and moves they make.