Dual coding

Dual coding is a very powerful study technique, as it makes use of many resources of mnemonics and neuroscience for learning. It is in fact one of the first techniques used by teachers to instill in their students the most basic concepts. We see it every day from marketing, television and various media, since its effectiveness is very high and as a tool for transmitting information it is truly valuable.

Due to the importance of dual coding as a learning resource during our study sessions, we will dedicate the following guide to deepen on the basics of this technique, so that you can incorporate it effectively, making good use of it.

What does it consist of?

Dual coding is nothing more than the accompaniment of the information, making use of visual elements related to the content, which contribute to fix the knowledge more easily, since it expands the capacity of our brain to relate the different topics we study. When we read an article about the structure of cells, we unconsciously make use of our imagination to try to recreate an image of how we conceive it, that image created is usually very detached from the real one and is distorted by the understanding we have had about the text read.

However, by accompanying the same article with an illustration of that cell, we already have one more resource we can count on to fix the knowledge in the most accurate way possible. We provide our brain with elements that build the content and help us to form a more accurate idea of what we are studying.

It happens in the same way in History, where we are forced to memorize a large number of dates and historical events, where we often end up unable to relate them to a historical period or understand the logical order of events.

To do this we use the well-known "time lines", which visually locate these events and print a very valuable visual image to memorize all these dates.

Since we began to study the vowels and consonants we see the application of this technique, by marking the vowels in one color and the consonants in another, we are transmitting that there is a difference between the two groups. Also in this sense it happens with the letters when they are taught to the children, where figures that represent their initials are used.

Effectiveness

As you can see, dual coding is a technique that does not distinguish between age or student stage, since it can be applied in many scenarios to learn anything we want. It is a very effective technique because it nourishes and complements the content we are studying with visual resources that