learning styles, language learning and learning styles

1. Learning Styles:
Controversial but Oh-So Compelling!
Dr. Erin N. O’Reilly
Intensive English Institute @
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
November 20, 2014

2. OVERVIEW
• Basics & common assessments
• Identify your personal learning styles
• Understand the controversy behind learning styles
•Examine critical questions surrounding the value of
learning styles for language teaching and learning

3. What is a learning style?
An individual’s natural, habitual, and preferred ways of absorbing,
processing and retaining new information and skills.
Are they constant and predictable?
Usually
Can learning styles change?
Yes. A learning style is an appropriate characterization of how
an individual behaves in general; s/he may use a different style
in a specific context.

4. Common Assessments
• VARK (visual, auditory, reading, kinesthetic) – 1987
• Kolb’s Experiential Learning Model (concrete, abstract,
active, reflective) – 1984
• Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) – 1962
• Barsch Learning Style Inventory - 1980
• Felder-Solomon Index of Learning Styles – 1988

5. F&S Index of Learning Styles
Provides an indication of an individual's learning preferences
4 Dimensions

6. Active-Reflective
Active learners
•Understand new information by doing something with it
•Keen to try out and experiment with the new information
•Often enjoy group work because this enables them to
do active things
Reflective learners
•Prefer to think about new information first before acting on it.
•Often prefer to think through problems first on their own rather
than discussing it in groups.

7. Sensing – Intuitive
Sensing learners
•Like learning facts and solving problems by well established
methods
•Generally careful, practical and patient
•Like new knowledge to have some connection to the real world
Intuitive learners
•Prefer discovering new relationships
•Can be innovative in their approach to problem solving
•Tend to work faster
•Dislike repetition and work which involves a lot of memorization
and routine calculations

8. Visual - Verbal
Visual learners
•Understand new information best by seeing it in the form
of pictures, demonstrations, diagrams, charts, films and so on.
Verbal learners
•Understand new information best through written and
spoken words.

9. Sequential – Global
Sequential learners
•Understand new information in linear steps where each step
follows logically from the previous one.
Global learners
•Tend to learn in large jumps by absorbing material in a
random order without necessarily seeing any connections
until they have grasped the whole concept.

10. Styles & Language Learning
• How might someone with a ______ learning style preference
react to this language learning activity?
• How might someone with a ______ learning style preference
need to adapt/change or re-learn the lesson?

11. At First Blush…
• Well-respected, established scholars build careers on
styles (e.g., Ehrman, & Oxford)
• Mainstreamed into public education
• Highly published topic
• Highly commercialized
• Frequent, general reference
• Panacea for learning woes!

12. Controversy
• Existence of preferences not debated
• Improve learning outcomes = Problematic
• Lack of rigorous, 3rd party, experimental studies
• Studies sponsored by groups w/ interest in
positive results

13. Controversy
• Match: Increase motivation and improve learning outcomes
• Mismatch: Learners had to ‘stretch’ to adapt to content
(increased long-term retention) (Hayes & Allinson, 1996)
• Match: No significant outcomes - lack rigorous, controlled
studies (Pashler, McDaniel, Rohrer, & Bjork, 2008)**
Many Other Interesting Studies/Applications:
• Link btwn. ss’ questions and styles (Pedrosa de Jesus, Albergaria
Almeida, Teixeira-Dias, & Watts, 2006)
• Diagnostic assessment at the superior/distinguished threshold
(Cohen, 2003)

14. What happens in the
language classroom?

15. Classroom Reality: Example
#1
Gerald reports that even though he knows his learning style
preference, when he started his language course it didn’t matter
what his learning style preference was because he’s been
constantly thrown into other classrooms with students who
have the complete opposite learning style.
The teachers don’t take this into account and neither do the
tests. So, it really doesn’t matter how he learns. It’s how they
teach and grade. If a teacher doesn’t teach to the student’s
preference already, the teacher is certainly not going to change
for the student. The teacher is focused on getting through
what’s on the schedule. Nothing’s tailored.

16. Classroom Reality: Example
#2
Chris’s learning styles information hasn’t been used by his
teachers. However, he’s referred to it a couple of times himself
to re-focus his learning. Sometimes, though, he feels as if he
needs to set aside his preferences and just do it the way the
teachers tell him to.
He’s a very systematic learner and would rather memorize a
dictionary than be forced to understand globally; the teachers
demand both. This means he does his systematic learning on his
own time, which he has very little of. He can’t help but feel that
he is more productive during self-study time than during class
time. He’s struggled through the course for the first 3 months
and only now feels as if he has figured out how he learns best
and he’s finally doing well.
It’s taken him this long to find his way.

17. Critical Questions for
Teachers
• What is the teacher’s role in understanding learning
styles?
• What is the learner’s role in understanding his/her
preferred learning styles?
• What is your teaching style?
• What role, if any, should learning styles play in your
language classroom? Materials development? Advising?

18. Questions for Learners
• When do they feel ‘engaged’ with a learning task or
activity? When do they connect?
• When are they lost or frustrated with a task or activity?
Why?
Challenge: Linguistic Profile / Styles Preference

19. Ultimate Value
• Reflection Tool: How an individual relates with
the content and interrelates with others

20. Questions?