RESEARCH REVIEW: Learning Styles
From elementary schools to postsecondary programs, teaching techniques are basically the same: lectures, textbooks and exams. Some students thrive in this environment, while others are bored, confused, and ultimately left behind. The learners enrolled in adult literacy programs today were usually those whose learning styles were incompatible with their childhood instruction. Students who excel in a traditional academic environment tend to be visual learners who learn best from seeing and observing. Visual learners are usually "silent readers," while students who must move their lips or read aloud are most likely to be auditory learners. Students who move their lips or read aloud are often considered "slow" and they do not learn easily from instructional methods based on the needs of visual learners. Most individuals can be categorized as visual learners who learn from seeing, auditory learners who learn from hearing, or kinesthetic (or tactile-kinesthetic) learners who learn by doing. Adults who have not learned to read are typically not visual learners (Harmon, 1995). This generalization gives literacy providers an advantage in determining the learning styles of their students. It is important to recognize different styles in order to reach all the learners in an adult literacy class.
Experts on learning styles each have their own theories and nomenclatures for defining different styles, which may confuse the layperson. There is no one universal learning styles evaluation system. There are, rather, many different models, including the "4MAT System" (Hand, 1990) and the "Seven Intelligences" (Lazear, 1989). Whether learning styles are divided into three or 300 categories, the backbone of learning styles theories is the idea that no one style is better than another. A student with strong auditory skills may have a remarkable ability to pick up foreign languages by ear, while struggling with texts and workbooks. Learning styles focus on students' strengths, not their weaknesses.
Though no learning style indicates greater intelligence than another, some learning styles are better suited to traditional classroom techniques. Advocates of learning styles argue that the solution to reaching the majority of students is not to force students to learn according to traditional techniques, but to make the teaching techniques fit the needs of the students.
While there is not a universal test of learning styles, the recognition of different learning styles has certainly entered the basic consciousness of educators in many different fields. Learning styles experts tend to focus on children, but adult education providers have been applying the ideas in their programs as well. Adult students have skills and intelligences honed from their life experiences; these skills and intelligences are not traditionally recognized and do not reveal themselves in test scores.
The National Adult Literacy and Learning Disabilities Center (National ALLD Center) emphasizes that the key to effective teaching is to identify and apply techniques and methods that work with learners. The National ALLD Center's suggestions incorporate the concepts behind learning styles, including the following:
- build on strengths rather than repeating weaknesses
- teach new concepts by relating them to practical applications
- be creative and attempt to vary your teaching style
- use multisensory strategies to present material -- many learners must see, say, hear, and touch before they can develop full mental images that stick and make sense
- vary your lessons, reteaching and reviewing in varieties of ways
- respect different learning styles
- change an activity when it's not working
- encourage the use of learning aids and tools (e.g., calculators, highlighter pens, extra worksheets, computerized learning programs, records, tape recorders, film, demonstration, maps, charts, experiences, rulers)
- talk with learners about their learning process. Ask them what does and does not work for them.
Learning styles should not be considered an additional burden for teachers. For teachers who have more than a few learners, an individual analysis of every learner's personal style would be a massive undertaking, but this is not necessary. Rather, teacher education about learning style can be an impetus to branch out one's teaching repertoire and better accept learners' differences in the classroom. An appreciation of different student learning styles helps teachers understand different types of intelligence and their manifestations.
4MAT The 4MAT System is based upon two basic premises: 1. People have major learning style preferences and lean towards using the left brain or right brain; 2. Both teaching and learning benefit from utilizing multiple instructional strategies. The 4MAT System's four basic learning style categories describe personality types as much as they do learning styles.
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| TYPE ONE |
Imaginative Learners are imaginative thinkers interested in people and culture. They perceive information concretely and process it reflectively. For Type One learners, school is too distant from personal issues. |
| TYPE TWO |
Analytic Learners are detail-oriented, thorough and industrious learners who enjoy traditional classrooms. They perceive information abstractly and process it reflectively. Type Two learners tend to be avid readers who have excellent verbal skills. |
| TYPE THREE |
Common Sense Learners are pragmatic problem solver who value strategic thinking. They perceive information abstractly and process it actively, integrating theory and practice. |
| TYPE FOUR |
Dynamic Learners are flexible risk-takers who perceive information concretely and process it actively. They integrate experience and application, learning by trial and error. School is often tedious and overly sequential for Type Four learners. |
| Harrington, M. (1994). Addressing learning styles through 4MAT. The Ladder, (22), p.8. | |
SEVEN INTELLIGENCES The idea that every person has seven distinct intelligences emphasizes that, while certain intelligences are stronger than others in individuals, anyone can work to develop his or her weaker intelligences. People tend to rely upon their stronger intelligences, which makes them all the more dominant. According to this theory, everyone has the capacity to exercise all seven intelligences and thereby strengthen them - a concept akin to lifting weights to strengthen one's muscles.
Lazear, D.G., "Multiple Intelligences and How We Nurture Them," (Fall 1989, The Written Word, Vol. 17, No. 7, July 1995, p.4-5. |
The Written Word, Vol. 17, No. 7, July 1995, "Matching Teaching Techniques to Different Styles in the Adult Education Classroom".
Harmon, C.D. (March/April 1995). Different strokes for different folk. Networks (West Virginia's Literacy and Adult Education Newsletter), p.7.
Hand, K. (October 1990). Style is a tool for students, too; and Jaouen, P. Fostering students' awareness of learning styles. Educational Leadership, (48), 2, p. 13-14.
