Gifted Secondary Students' Preferred Learning Style: Cooperative, Competitive, or Individualistic?

Abstract

The purpose of the paper is to consider the issue of cooperative learning for the gifted from the perspective of the gifted student's preferred learning style. The sample consisted of 169 intellectually bright/gifted senior high school students, 94 girls and 75 boys in Calgary. Their preferred learning style in respect to science, mathematics, and English was measured using the Learning Preference Scale-Students. Overall, the cooperative style was not significantly more preferred for any subject matter by boys or girls. In mathematics, boys preferred both the individualistic and the competitive styles to the cooperative style while girls preferred the individualistic style to both the cooperative and competitive styles. The cooperative style was not found to be positively significantly related to higher achievement outcome of any subject matter. Implications for cooperative learning for the gifted are discussed.