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Learning Styles
Competing ideas about learning
• Range of theories• Some theories derive from research into brain
functioning.– specific neural activity related to learning can be
identified in different areas of the brain. • Other influential ideas derive from established
psychological theories.– personality traits, intellectual abilities and fixed
traits which are said to form learning styles.
• Different theorists make different claims for the degree of stability of styles.
• Some argue around “flexibly stable” – previous learning experiences and other
environmental factors create preferences, approaches or strategies rather than styles,
– or that styles may vary from context to context or even from task to task.
• Others argue that it is not about individual traits but that it is more productive to look at the context-specific and situated nature of learning and the idea of learning biographies rather than styles or approaches.
Many differing perpectives
Learning is biological/physiological process
Learner Teacher
FacilitatorLearners need to adapt to/adopt a range of styles
Learning styles are static
Learning is behavioural
process
Teaching styles need to adapt
and/or individualise
Learning styles change over
time/with context
Curry’s model revisited.
Cognitive Personality Style
Information Processing style
Instructional preferences
SignificantStable/difficult
to modify
More easily modified
Less significant
Seen as much more important
for “deep learning”
Continuum of learning theories
About genetics and cognitionWork with styles don’t try to change
Dynamic interplay between self and experience.Not about style about range of personal factors
Consequences for design/pedagogy?
Learning styles and pedagogy in post-16 learning A systematic and critical review The Learning and Skills Research Centre, 2004
Example theories
Kolb Four stage model
Concrete Experience
Active Experimentation
Reflective Observation
Abstract Conceptualization
Multiple Intelligences Gardner
V-A-K-T learning stylesThink about when someone gets a gadget for Christmas that needs setting up
• Do any of these considerations impact on your choice of approach?
• How?• How do you think e-learning may help to
address some of the other issues raised?
Assessment of learning?
• What are the learning outcomes?• How will they be measured?• Who will measure them?• How will this be influenced by considerations
around learning styles?