Dear Josie,
In ancient Greece, the "peripatetic method" was popular: many ancients believed that learning was optimized by conversation that took place while teachers and students were "walking about."
It is time to stop thinking of "the walk about" as a quaint anachronism, and to start focusing -- as you first pointed out to me (by way of Thoreau) -- the decisive importance of "sauntering."
The rest of this fine essay is at http://www.vcu.edu/engweb/