ABSTRACT
To demonstrate how higher education pedagogy can benefit from a greater focus on embodied cognition and on the materials and environment of the classroom, this chapter discusses what thinking with things can mean for engagement and deep learning. Interaction with materials is central to human learning, and although it runs counter to conventional teaching methods, college students, like all learners, can benefit from reflective interaction with the physical world. The bulk of the chapter is an extended discussion of an historical case: the Froebel Kindergarten, which became widespread throughout Europe and North America in the second half of the 19th century. Key to the Froebel Kindergarten was a carefully designed set of manipulatives to be used by children as they created patterns of nature, science, and art. After a discussion of the Froebel approach and materials, the chapter goes on to argue for the deep impact that the system had on the adult work of modern artists (including Klee, Mondrian, Kandinsky, Albers, Braque, and architect Frank Lloyd Wright) and modern scientists (Richard Feynman, Buckminster Fuller, and brothers J. Robert and Frank Oppenheimer) in the first half of the 20th century.
