The VARK questionnaire analyses learning styles and indicates preferences for learning. After doing the questionnaire, I was not at all surprise to find that I scored strongly for reading/writing (16) and visual (10), but weakly for kinestheic (3), and very weakly for aural (1). Reading and writing are my strong points, and the description that was given for this preference could have been written about me! I make lists all the time, I diarise everything (and rely heavily on that real -not virtual - diary, I'm always reading one or two books, and I love looking up words that I don't know in the dictionary. Dale Spender is my guru. As far as learning is concerned, I do read material that I have to learn over and over again, in order to memorise it, but I don't reorganise it much. I do like flow-charts, so I am happy to plan my learning into some kind of diagrammatic chart, but I don't rely on them totally.
As far as output is concerned, I LOVE dot points, bullet points, lists, etc. That is how I think and visualise my material! I also used to write out the answers to exam questions in full at uni, and learn those in preparation for exams.
I encourage my students to use these strategies too. I especially encourage them to use flowcharts, to plan what they have to learn, and how to learn it. I also encourage them to write a lot, and they always have at least one academic essay in my units. Last semester, in which I taught many (and in my opinion - unnecessary) definitions of new concepts, I encouraged the students to make their own glossary, so that they could better understand the words. I provided them with an online template, which they could download and fill in.
One message that I get from doing this exercise is that I need to rethink the exercises that I give to my students. Many of them may be more kinesthetc than read/write, or more aural than visual. I have to have activities that encompass all of these learning styles (not necessarily all at once, but throughout the semester), so that the differences between the students are acknowledged and used.
Sheena, I am predominantly Read/write as well, and also love to look words up in the dictionary! Reading your blog post gave me the idea that perhaps several alternative activities could be offered to students, and they choose the activity which best suits their preference. More prep work for us initially, but perhaps with a better learning outcome for the students.
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