Adapting multimedia for diverse student learning styles

Abstract

Multimedia can accommodate diverse learning styles. By giving students different ways to learn material, we hope to attract more novices, especially women and minorities, to computer science. We designed a user interface that is independent of both book metaphors and familiar web browsers. It supplies sound and animation for sensory learners, while letting verbal learners disable sound or switch altogether to a JUST THE FACTS mode. Interactive materials include learner-controlled simulations of algorithms, links to programs that students can try immediately after learning related concepts and before exercises that make sure the learner has studied the programs, constructive exercises in which students build programs or models by dragging pieces into place, and inquiry-based exercises in which students learn by doing research, using the web.