Have you ever draw n pictures on your notebooks when you are siting in class? If so, your teacher might have told you to stop. Many people think doodling （胡写乱画） may stop you paying attention to what you are doing. But it might be just the opposite.
One study shows that doodling may help you remember things you hear. In 2009, researchers asked two groups of people to listen to a phone message. One group was encouraged to doodle, but the other was not. Neither group knew that they would be asked to remember information from the message. But the group that doodled remembered29% more.
Other people suggest other uses for doodling. Jesse Prinz, a professor who studies doodling, says it can help you think creatively. Walking away from a problem to d raw might actually help you solve it. When you come back, you will have a fresh idea and get an answer more quickly.
An author named Sunni Brown wrote a book on doodling. She argues that doodling is a tool that can help people think. She admits that people see doodling as doing nothing but she wants to change that. In fact, she owns a business that helps companies improve management effectiveness through doodling.
Brown believes doodling is helpful because it includes more than one way of learning. You learn in four ways: seeing, hearing, reading and writing. The more ways you use, the better you learn. And when you doodle while listening to a lecture, you are using all four.
You might think that being good at drawing is important for doodling. But if the point of doodling is to help you think, then it doesn't matter what the picture looks like. Even if you are not an artist, doodling can help you. So next time you need to focus, pick up a pen and doodle away.
