Learning styles among medical students: Kinesthetic learners approach to learning anatomy.

Abstract

According to Vark's modalities, there are 4 different learning styles that an individual can use: visual, auditory, read/write and kinesthetic. Each student uses one or more of these that helps them the most in learning new material. The Visual learners prefer depictions of information as figures and charts; Auditory learners prefer to hear the information as lectures and discussions; Read/Write learners prefer information presented as text‐based and the Kinesthetic learners prefer concrete experiences that connect the material to reality. Most people have a multimodal approach to learning. Traditional teaching of anatomy includes lectures and dissections. Lectures and dissections fall short for kinesthetic learners in the that their concrete experience is limited to one cadaver or a prosection lacking applicability to the widespread model. A recent study showed that 20% of the medical students are kinesthetic learners. Many studies evaluated new ways to teach anatomy including computer‐assisted learning and using live models. None of these, however, aid the kinesthetic learner. Ever since Da Vinci's drawings and Andreas Vesalius' illustrated anatomical textbook, art has been a large part of learning anatomy. Being a kinesthetic learner, I found a way to use art and modeling to create a concrete experience that satisfies my learning style and help me learn anatomy: Crochet. Through crochet I was able to take what I was learning in lecture and dissection and recreate it. To do this I dissect, study a structure and create a 3‐D mental model. This way, I was able to gain a broader visuospatial understanding of the anatomical concepts. The presentation will include number of drawings and crochet models.Support or Funding InformationSupported by the Cooper Medical School of Rowan University.This abstract is from the Experimental Biology 2018 Meeting. There is no full text article associated with this abstract published in The FASEB Journal.