Understanding student learning styles and theories of learning

Overview of student learning styles and theories of learning from David Grantham (National Teaching Fellow), presented at the UKCLE event on enhancing academic practice on 3 February 2005.

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“The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be ignited”

— (Plutarch – a follower of Socrates)

Some of what we know so far about student learning

Why do students want to learn?

Student questionnaires about their attitudes and motivations in relation to learning in higher education (from the work of Gibbs, Morgan, Beaty, Boulton-Lewis, Marton, Wilss, Lewis, 1980-2000)

	Intrinsic Interest	Extrinsic Interest
Vocational	for skills and knowledge for use in a career	mainly need the qualification to enable them to get a good job
Academic	study of the subject in depth, taking an interesting and stimulating course/module	in higher education because it seemed the right thing to do – had done well academically in the past
Personal	learning will help develop them as a person and broaden horizons	gives them the chance to prove what they can do
Social	hope that the learning will help to “make a difference in the world”; wanting to learn things that would help to improve the quality of people’s lives	focused on the opportunities for active social life/sport
Independence	whole experience will help student to learn about life and become more confident, ideally, making me more confident and more independent and able to cope

Which of these:

1. Do we recognise as part of our motivations?
2. Do we recognise as motivations of our students?
3. Does higher education generally support?

Lack of purpose statements:

• “Sometimes I find myself wondering whether the work I am doing here is really worthwhile.”
• “There’s not so much of the work here that I find interesting or relevant.”
• “When I look back, I sometimes wonder why I ever decided to come here.”
• “I’m not really interested in this course, but I have to take it for other reasons.”

How do students learn?

Learning occurs when the student is confronted with something new or different from what they have known before – the examples below, taken from the law of contract, show how students can be faced with a challenge to what they already know:

• ‘offer’ may not mean it’s an offer (a)
• what in law do goods on display in a supermarket constitute? (b)

The correct response to the latter question is that they constitute both an ‘invitation to treat’ and an ‘offer’ – a chance to get into some ‘deep’ learning?

Students may respond to the new or different in three broad ways:

• incorporation (a)
• adaptation (b)
• rejection

The degree of brain activity is directly related to the level of stimulation in the learning environment. Metaphor, graphics and movies can aid learning for many students, for example:

 

Learning stimuli are not confined in time or place – they can arise continuously – formally or informally. Students can learn from unexpected sources, for example from movies that have a legal theme or connect to their study in a meaningful way – two examples are shown next:

Can you recognise the movie from the scene on the right?

Students are the major players, but not the only players, in their own learning. Other players might include fellow students, tutors, friends, writers etc.

This way of looking at learning is, in part, a feature of ‘constructivist’ learning (Biggs) where, it is argued, the students build their own understanding from various sources and make this learning a very personal construct. This can be somewhat problematic in law. There are concepts which must be clearly understood, and a personal and idiosyncratic view of them would lead to severe misunderstanding. However, ‘constructivist’ learning would be relevant in making a critique of the outcomes of that concept, for example the concept of ‘remoteness’ should be clearly understood, but a critique of that concept ‘in action’ can be constructed.

A continuous process of learning produces or enhances what have been called multiple intelligences (Gardner), together with different levels of achievement in each area, examples are:

• cognitive
• emotional
• interpersonal

Higher education has tended to focus on the first, and in some fields has more recently addressed the others. Personal and intellectual development has been a major focus for some programmes in higher education, for example work-based learning and reflective practice in professional fields. The best known research in this field is the work of WG Perry (1970).

Learning occurs best when it is ‘situated’, ie when the challenge has a ‘reality feel’ to it – a meaning in a real context – a ‘compelling’ situation. (This explains why work-based learning tends to be so successful.) In law this could be clinical work, virtual law firms, “what did you most learn about…”.

The famous, powerful and influential Kolb learning cycle is based partly upon situated learning experiences to which is added, reflection, conceptualisation and action:

This model of learning is particularly successful at linking theory and practice.

Learning is social and interactive – the learner needs:

• s upport for risk-taking
• a dvice on different ways of dealing with the challenge
• f eedback from peers and mentors on progress and validation of the ability to succeed
• e ncouragement to engage with their learning

Learning styles (also called ‘orientations’ or ‘approaches’ to learning)

The most useful website: Learning styles and multiple intelligences

Students have their own way of learning, a ‘learning style’, and they will learn best when there is a variety of learning opportunities that give them their chance to learn in their own way. In 2004 the Skills Council for England and Wales published research that revealed no fewer than 71 models of learning styles, and they reported on just 13 of these. Some of these are better known than others, but only those that may be of particular value in learning law are briefly examined here. A real word of caution here – the selections are mine and this is not meant to imply that there are no other models that are of real relevance.

Entwistle’s Approaches and Study Skills Inventory for Students (ASSIST)

A modified form of the questions asked in this model formed the pre-event assignment and you may have already completed it and found what your preferred learning style is according to the model. The focus of the model is on three dominant styles, ie surface, deep and strategic learning.

If the practitioner wanted to encourage a ‘surface’ learner towards a ‘deeper’ style then she would need to think about the opportunities available to do this. Generally, it will not work just to set a question demanding a ‘deep’ response – you are unlikely to get it. What you are likely to get from the ‘surface’ learner is a ‘surface’ answer. One way of bringing about the desired result is to get ‘deep’ learners’ to explain how they are learning to the other students. In what contexts might this be done? If different styles of learning exist in a particular student group then these could be suitably ‘mixed’ for group tasks.

Kolb’s learning styles

Kolb’s learning styles distinguishes four learning styles – observers, thinkers, deciders and doers. Each of these has strengths and weaknesses. The idea is that a student becomes more aware of their learning strengths and works on their weaknesses.

Observers

Tend to focus on factual information and learn much from seeing events, listening to the experiences of others and thinking about them, ie a focus on real life events. They like to know about how the subject is applied in practice and to be involved in their lerning.

They ask:

• how does this work in practice?
• give me a practical example?

(Both questions suggest that they would like case law.)

• do I need to know this?

Not so good at concepts, theories and more complex realities.

Get them to work with ‘thinkers’ (below).

Notes for the tutor – will thrive with group work where ideas are exchanged and problem solving is required. Like ‘real world’ issues but will need support to make sense of the concepts and theories. Will also tend to need much support with extended and individual writing tasks like projects or dissertations.

Thinkers

Like to research and read much theory. Also, like to have the opinion of experts. Meet new topics with reading and thinking about it to discover what is already known.

Can get stuck in the theory side of things rather than focus on the usefulness of a theory or its predictive capacity. Sometimes need a good measure of common sense or to be confronted by practical realities.

They ask:

• what are the theories behind this?
• have I done enough reading on this?

Get them to work with team up with a ‘decider’ or a ‘philosopher’ (below).

Notes for the tutor – you can safely expect these students to do the reading required of them, but they will not like ‘pre-digested’ learning and thrive as ‘independent’ learners. You may have to work hard to get them to engage with ‘real world’ problems.

Deciders

Like to be told the theory and rules and to be shown how to apply them, ie they prefer a clear structure and working in a practical way.

Working only ‘by the book’ can cause them difficulty when a ‘messy’ reality appears on the scene – where some creativity and flexibility is required to solve ‘real world’ problems. Not so good at making connections between concepts and theories (or cases).

They ask:

• how do I go about this?
• what is the best theory that I should learn?

Team them up with a ‘doer’ or an ‘observer’.

Notes for the tutor – most traditional teaching is geared to the ‘decider’ but there are dangers in ‘unreasonable tutor expectations’, ie that they will learn to be critical or independent learners. This will not happen unless they are supported.

Doers

Learn by making mistakes and by discovering things for themselves. These are ‘risk takers’ who tend to cope well with change and can get to an answer by intuition. Sometimes cannot explain how they arrived at a particular conclusion when they will be expected to do say how they got there. Tend to accept things quickly and uncritically and to accept concepts and decisions at face value.

Get them to work with a ‘thinker’ or an ‘observer’.

Notes for the tutor – ‘doers’ tend to be a problem for more traditional classroom-based learning but really blossom in a more open system where they can work independently. Need support to make sense of the theory.

Last Modified: 4 June 2010