Abstract
Learning styles based education is becoming influential at higher education institutions around the world. Learning styles are characteristics of how students prefer to learn; they draw their origin from both biological and experiential conditions that make each student unique in the way he/she learns. An important first step in improving learning is to identify or assess students’ learning styles, and there are several instruments that can be used for this purpose. This is necessary for teachers and students who wish to improve learning and study strategies. Students who perform poorly in a conventional educational setting may suffer from a mismatch of learning and teaching styles; for example kinesthetic learners may not adapt to learning by listening or by reading. When we teach tactual and/or kinesthetic students by talking, they focus for only a brief amount of time and then wander off into their own thoughts and quickly forget (Burke & Dunn, 2002). We can improve students’ academic performance by providing them with alternative strategies and activities that respond to their learning style needs (Dunn & Dunn, 1993). In spring 2008, the learning styles of over 700 Zayed University students were assessed using the BE (Building Excellence) survey developed by Rundle & Dunn. The data collected is being analyzed with a view to making recommendations for teachers, students and parents to improve students’ learning. This paper represents the first in a series of publications on this subject; it reviews the survey process, and focuses on the nature and learning preferences of ZU students in perceptual elements (e.g. visual, auditory) and cognitive elements (e.g. Analytic-sequential (left-brain) vs. Global-simultaneous (right-brain) preferences).
Highlights
Do not train youths to learning by force and harshness, but direct them to it by what amuses their minds so that you may be better able to discover with accuracy the peculiar bent of the genius of each. — PlatoImagine you were an architect assigned to design the construction of a building
The Building Excellence (BE) tests for six perceptual learning styles: Auditory (e.g. When learning, I remember best when I hear someone talk about the topic)
The findings above suggest that Zayed University (ZU) students are varied in their preferred perceptual learning styles, and that favourite learning styles of at least half of them are other than the Auditory, Visual-word and Visual-Rahal, T. & Palfreyman, D. (2009)
Summary
Do not train youths to learning by force and harshness, but direct them to it by what amuses their minds so that you may be better able to discover with accuracy the peculiar bent of the genius of each. — Plato. Educators and psychologists have attempted to address these and other related questions They agree on some points, and disagree on many others: the emergence of many learning style models in the literature (and on the market). Most of these models support the view that students learn differently and are better served when curriculum designs and instructional methods attend to their differences. According to Dunn and Honigsfeld (2006), an individual student is likely to have significant preferences for 6-14 of these elements: these compose that individual’s learning style.
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