My Learning Styles

Many of the distance learning courses that I have been enrolled in for my masters program have included content presented in a variety of formats. A large part of my work involves research and learning about new technology in groups. From my experience with these courses and my work groups I have found that I use a variety of learning strategies, choosing styles that work best with the particular type of learning that I am engaged in.

For the majority of my learning I like to have a visual representation of the material. Seeing a visual example of the content helps me to understand the content. I then write down notes as I review the material, making my own interpretation, adding examples and pulling material from other parts of the lecture to tie things together so it makes more sense. So according to the learning style chart that also makes me a reflective learner.

However, when there is learning involving complicated topics that involves multiple layers of construct or learning which involves issues that are not clear cut then I thrive on auditory learning.

But when I am working on research at work I enjoy working in groups so that problems can be discussed and more solutions can develop, which incorporates elements of the active learner.

Then I have found that if I am able to read content that is difficult to understand and then listen to an audio lecture that reviews the written content and explains topics by using descriptive examples then I can better grasp the content. This sounds like a verbal learner.

So I really do use a variety of learning strategies depending on the content and the learning environment. I wonder if others do the same?

However, there is one learning style which I definitely do not fit. The sequential style of learning uses logical steps and progresses in a linear format. My learning tends to wander in many directions - it is anything but linear.

I would think that because we cannot teach using all of the learning styles that we need to focus on the visual style and then reinforce that with auditory because those two styles cover 95% of the population.