Learning Styles, Teaching Performance, And Student Achievement: A Relational Study

Abstract

Learning styles have been shown to have an influence on students' academic achievement, how students learn, and student/teacher interaction. The purpose of this study was to describe relationships between students , learning styles, instructor 's teaching performance, and student achievement in an introductory animal science course. The Group Embedded Figures Test (GEFT) was used to assess students , preferred learning styles. Four instructors with GEFT scores ranging from 6 to 18 taught the course. Students rated each instructor 's teaching performance using a standard university evaluation. Learning style classifications of students were: field-independent, 56%; neutral, 22%, andfield-dependent, 22%. The mean GEFT score (13.4 f .28) was significantly higher than the national mean. Negligible to low correlation coefficients were found between students ' GEFT scores and teaching evaluation scores for all four instructors regardless of the instructor 's GEFT score. Students ' achievement in the course was found to have a low positive relationship with their preferred way of learning. Students , advising group status accountedfor 30% of the variance in their achievement in the course. The diversity of learning styles was found to have little to no influence on students , achievement in the course or their perceptions of the instructors' teaching performance.