strdog (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

I believe your arguments against visual, kinesthetic, auditory, but I'd like to hear how you refute Kolb. That's a more detailed theory than this one.

Learningpaths (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

Using your logic, if you gave a list of words and asked 100 people, how did you learn that list, you would get essentially the same answer. If you asked another 100 people how did you learn to make a youtube video, you should also get the same answer. Also 90% of people don't think in terms of learning styles. If you went down the street and asked 100 people to define learning styles, 90% probably would say I have no idea of what you're talking about.

MrTohchinseng (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

The list of words presented seems for a test for Memory Linking, and does not seems to be an ideal experiementation for identifying whether VAK learners learns better from their respective learning style. We know that how information are process in our brains. Whether the individual make use of the relevant memory skills technique is another whole different issue.

dbw8m (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

@lovemystudents yes, switching up always makes things more interesting, and it's more likely to hit on a way that students find compelling. . .

lovemystudents (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

I buy what you're saying, Daniel, but why is it, then, that my students comprehend and recall material better when I present it or have them practice/use it in lots of different ways - kinesthetically, auditorially, orally, in writing, etc.? Is it just a matter of repetition? Rote repetition doesn't seem as effective as varied repetition like this... I'd really love to know what you think!

dbw8m (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

@ialonline sure, the example in the video is just an example. . .to really explain what a proper experiment would look like with all of the appropriate controls would take much longer than the length of the whole video.

ialonline (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

There are a few flaws to your argument:1) As cognitive psychologists will be able to tell you: it takes a long more cognitive effort to process words than pictures. The test between auditory and visual inputs is not equitable and I must add that this is NOT a test that learning styles practitioners use. If necessary, it will be the spoken word vs the visual word and it should be single syllable to maintain equity.

72Yonatan (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

Thank you for presenting a good counterpoint to the commonly accepted fashionable ideas in education. We need more discussion of this type.

MaskoRightToLearn (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

Your list test is flawed. For an auditory learner you would have the list of words & meanings and then play it. For the visual learner- word, definition & a picture. My dyslexic children learn the meaning of vocab words with a visual picture & the written word which makes it stick. My kinesthetic child builds the concept or word with legos along with the written word- it is amazing how she is able to learn complex medical terms that she struggles with when left with just a pen and pencil.

comecra85 (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

@dbw8m How to teach concept of red to blind person? It's impossible. it's difficult to teach this concept to visually challenged person who grasps video information badly. But this would be slow. But what if this concept of red is not important for particular topic. But what if you can structure your information with different concept or word that are encoded difrntly. So teaching styles (kinestetic, verbaly) is structuring your information the way it would be perceived the most effectively