At the end of the class, students may remember the answer to the word problem, but they’ll also remember how they found the answer through multiplication.
“This way kids basically get into the driver’s seat,” Malaia says. “They feel especially good if they discover something, if they construct knowledge themselves.”
Teachers have been using this technique instinctively for years, she adds, and now the science is backing that up. “Curiosity really is one of the very intense and very basic impulses in humans. We should base education on this behavior.”