Vertical and Horizontal Learning as Opposed to Spiral Learning: Is There a DNA Learning Factor?

Learning models vary around globe.  For example, typical eastern world writing is vertical, while western world writing is horizontal. Eastern world communication is with concepts, while western world communication is through words. Eastern world reading and writing is from the top to the bottom of the page from right to left, while western world reading and writing is from the one side of the page to the other, from the left side of the page to the right.

Both eastern world writing and western world writing appear to be effective and stable. With the advent of the Internet, vertical and horizontal approaches to learning are legitimate. Spiral learning is too.

What is spiral learning?

Spiral learning suggests that one is going in a circle, but also upwards or downwards. In reality, spirals can go from left to right, or from right to left. Professional educators are encouraged to use a teaching method that involves a spiral curriculum.

What is a spiral curriculum?

Education.com suggests that a spiral curriculum is a “curriculum in which students repeat the study of a subject at different grade levels, each time at a higher level of difficulty and in greater depth.”

Vertical learning is based upon the reality that “children are builders”, and building any structure comes instinctively to them. It becomes one structure built upon another structure in a vertical direction, ad infinitum.

How does this differ from horizontal learning? Horizontal learning is “a process by which a person studies almost (sic) all the topic not in a deep manner but in a bird eye view.”

With the advent of the Internet, it is becoming increasingly apparent that eastern and western learning models are gradually becoming one, but they are not apart from spiral learning.

Different learning models are not just a part of the learning process of a child. One might suggest that an unborn infant’s capacity to learn using different learning models begins at the moment of conception, continues after he or she is born, as well as throughout the rest of his or her  life. For example, an infant understands abstract concepts like being hungry, as well as words, like ‘ma-ma’. These become one in a spiral learning process. A hungry child learns to turn to his or her mother. 

Education of children and teenagers, including higher education, as well as business education, incorporates all three kinds of learning models.

An area of concern for professional educators might be that of the ability or inability of a person to learn using different, learning models. In other words, it may be easier for one person to learn by using a vertical model than it is with a horizontal learning model. One way to find out is to use a spiral-learning model.

Spiral learning is a legitimate part of the learning process in both the eastern and western world.

One might suggest that vertical and horizontal learning, as well as spiral learning have not been researched sufficiently yet. For example, reversing spiral learning might provide answers for medical problems related to memory loss, like Alzhieimer’s disease. Is learning unlearned or is it simply forgotten? Do we really know? 

How can we find out? Is there a DNA learning factor?

Examining and researching different learning models, including their inter-relationship may reveal undiscovered answers for many existing questions.