Friday, June 3, 2011

VAK Learning Styles

Do You Know Your Learning Style?

Understanding the VAK Learning Styles can help improve your skills and learning at school and at work.

We learn in a variety of ways, visually, auditory and tactile or (kinesthetically).  These ways of  learning are activated through explicit or cognitive learning like lectures, textbooks, discussions and research.  However we also learn implicitly through physical and experiential means.

People commonly have a main preferred learning style, but this will be part of a blend of all three.  Some people have a very strong preference; other people have a more even mixture of two or less styles.

When you know your preferred learning style(s) you understand the type of learning that best suits you.  This enables you to choose the types of learning that works best for you.

There is no right or wrong learning style.  The point is that there are types of learning that are right for your own preferred learning style.

 Visual
     29% OF US PREFER TO LEARN BY SEEING.  We will enjoy communicating best through pictures, graphs and visuals artifacts.  We may at an early age show an ability to visualize remembered or constructed scenes.  Our spelling and memory strategies may utilize pictures rather than sounds. 
For example, in reading:   Do you like descriptive scenes or pause to imagine the actions?

Auditory
        34% OF US ENJOY COMMUNICATING WITH AND LEARNING BY SOUND INCLUDING THE SPOKEN WORD.  Discussion, audio tape, lectures, debates, orals, and spoken languages exercises will suit those of us with an auditory preference.  It may also be that we remember names rather than faces and we spell by recalling the patterns of sounds. 
For example, in reading:  Do you enjoy dialog and conversation or hear the characters talk?
    
Kinesthetic
     37% OF LEARNER'S PREFER TO ENGAGE WITH THE EXPERIENCE PHYSICALLY.  In communication we will model our point with our hands and bodies and become animated as we do so.  We learn through experience, movement and feel frustrated more readily with other forms of learning.  Learners of this sort are most critically disadvantaged by schooling which requires physical stasis for extended periods of time.
For example, in reading:  Do you prefer action stories or are not a keen reader?
B.A. Lewis and F. Pucelik, Magic Demystified: A Pragmatic Guide to Communication and Change, Metamorphous Press.

To know more about VAK Learning Styles and for a Learning Style Inventory contact
Dr. Catherine Strecker.