Positives of Learning Styles!
I believe it is very important to use Learning styles in the classroom. I am so used to hearing everything in different ways until the point is in the child’s mind, and can think about it in different ways. While it is also important to know as a teacher what is the best way to make your students comprehend a concept. For example, in science you can talk about the subject matter all you want, but do you really know if the students are listening and actually engaging in the material? But when you put the experiment in front of the child, you can tell if they are comprehending the subject. And for elementary it is very helpful to be having the students have activities to do, being more visual and hands on so they will want to be involved.
It is also hard to see in my eyes the difference between learning and teaching styles. I feel that being a teacher, I would want to go in every direction of different ways to learn because that is how it was when I was growing up. I needed that extra support to make sure that I could grasp the concept confidently.
For example, let’s say that we are in a History lesson, from the eight learning styles in Gardner’s theory it would go something like this:
Interpersonal- have someone dress up, have the students ask questions to the character asking who they are and what they did. This would be great because the student has the ability to understand people, so it may not seem like they are learning, just having a conversation with a historical figure.
Intrapersonal- Have the students become the historical figure. Have them research and know who “they are.” Once they become the character they would know one's interests and goals.
Linguistic- This could go along with the intrapersonal skills, once the student knows who they are, have the student practice a script, then once memorized have a pop culture night for them to share who they are.
Logical- Have the student compare two figures, maybe one from the past and one in the present, or both from the past, your choice. What are the similarities? What are the differences? Lastly what can you infer from comparing the two? If they are from two different periods of time is there a big difference? You could find so much out from the personalities of the figure, to even the characteristics of what they look like.
Naturalist- Let’s say we are on the Oregon trail. What would it be like? What artifacts would you see on the way? Record a journal of what the journey would be like.
Spatial- Going back to a historical figure. Have pictures of what the person looks like, what are the surroundings of the figure? What food does he eat, where does he live? Or for the science project show them what is going on, like with reactions and putting a mentos in a bottle of coke.
Bodily-Kinesthetic- I know it was always hard for me to remember who all the Greek gods and goddesses were. When we did have to learn the names and who they were our teachers made up a song and dance of who each of them were. To this day I still remember most of them. ( over 5 years ago)
Musical- It was the hardest thing for my third graders to remember some of their multiplication rules. It was so easy when we found songs that went along with the rules to their problems. It is a tune that could get stuck in your head and they would remember it for the next time test.
As I can hope you see there are many different options of how to learn, as it may go along with teaching styles, if you do even a few of these techniques, everyone has a fair chance to succeed in their future learning career!
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