Are you an oral, visual or kinesthetic learner?
I have always been a visual learner: I need to look at a picture, read a story, flip through power point slides, browse the blogs….that’s how I learn. My husband, Peter, on the other hand, always has an ipod hooked up to his ear. He learns orally: books on tape, podcasts, radio broadcasts. Peter says, “oral learning is a more complete learning experience because the brain has to work to fill in the spaces to create a picture in your head”. I say, “just let me see the picture and I can take more in faster.”
There are also kinesthetic learners. People who learn best by doing.
They need to draw the picture, take notes while listening to a lecture, act out the directions. Most people find that if they have a combination of learning styles, they retain more information longer.
It is amazing how these differences affect our daily lives.
Let’s take directions. I have to see a map. If I have a map, I can get anywhere. Tell me directions and I forget them. Take me someplace and I’ll probably get lost trying to find my way back. With a map, I always know where I am in relation to other places and I can find my way. Peter likes to have verbal directions and he can find his way back to anyplace if he has been there once (except in the mall. Somehow he ALWAYS gets lost in the mall!)
Our learning styles also affect how we communicate. If you have something important to communicate to another person, do you pick up the phone or write an email? How can you be sure that you got your message across? Often it helps to have a verbal discussion and follow up with an email.
Learning styles even affect how we relax! My daughter is a huge fan of the author, Stephanie Meyer, a science fiction writer whose main audience is teenage girls. Stephanie’s new release called “The Host” was her first novel for adults and Peter and I thought it would be fun if the three of us read the new book. Since I was going to be on a long flight, my thoughtful husband put the book on my ipod (and his). My daughter started reading the hardcopy and loved the book! I fell asleep every time I started listening…..I just could not get into it. As soon as I got back from my trip I picked up the hardcopy and could not put it down! Peter of course listened to it (he did not like it quite as much as we did—but not because it was on his ipod!)
As learning professionals it is critical that we remember that individuals have different learning styles. We can increase learning and retention if we combine learning styles so that they reinforce each other. As we help our clients solve business problems we can suggest that their Learning Strategy includes a variety of learning options.
Comments
I am a kinesthetic learner. This has has helped me to find out what kind of a learner I am.
Posted by: arunima | November 8, 2008 11:41 AM
I have experimented with Oral, Visual and Kinesthetic learning styles.
I think every learning style is good and the combination that suits is based on individual personalities.
The following aspects were useful to me,
1. I like visuals which provide the learning in a concise form. "One picture is worth a thousand words"
2. I like to read with a pen and paper, wherein I capure my learning in a mind-map form
3. Many new ideas come to me through kinesthetic approaches where I would articulate on a pen and paper or explain the concept to my team or use a white board and jot the various inferences of my learning or leverage think / brainstorm sessions for effective learning systems, we need to have a combination of all learning styles and have interaction. Based on the response, we need to emphasize the relevant knowledge or information to be conveyed through more emphasis of the individual's attentiveness, choice of words they use and their specific actions. It's a mix of body and mind, close attention to the recxipients' body language and response that will get us to be most effective.
Posted by: Ramanath Suryaprakash | November 10, 2008 03:13 AM
There are also kinesthetic learners. People who learn best by doing.
Those people who learn by doing things aren't excluded of live video ( moving pictures ) learning because as they do things and observe what's happening to things based on the video recording in mind.
I keep asking this question in my training: Do you remember the questions that were asked in your 6th semester engineering degree examination?
Do you remember most of the scenes in the movie you watched with your friends during your 6th semester of Engineering course?
Typically, I haven't come across anyone who remembered the questions ( text ) although they did things with it as it mattered a lot to them for gaining the degree but they do remember most of the scenes in the movie they watched around the same period of life.
From the research of Dr John Medina ( a Molecular brain scientist ) - All humans have a photographic memory that surpasses other kinds of memory gaining approaches that include text.
Posted by: Pradeep Soundararajan | November 12, 2008 10:31 AM
What if we add the sense of smell to the equation? Or music? Both of these always bring back memories for me. I wonder if there has been a study on this and if we should consider this in our learning approaches?
Posted by: Karen Burns | November 13, 2008 09:16 AM
What if we add the sense of smell to the equation? Or music? Both of these always bring back memories for me. I wonder if there has been a study on this and if we should consider this in our learning approaches?
Jerry Weinberg, leading Consultant and Author actually uses the "smell heuristic" to find out how a project is running.
Software Testers like Geordie Keitt have music and songs on software testing.
A google search uncovers where they have uploaded them :)
So, it's an experiment that's worth trying out.
Posted by: Pradeep Soundararajan | November 14, 2008 03:46 AM
Kinesthetic learners grasp concepts through imitation and practice . So it leaves a space for innovation too. In fact, I am more inclined to relaxed learning in a bean bag than a hard chair . Active participation while learning also gives hands-on training and also adds confidence to us. Although an ideal technique would be a suitable mix of auditory/kinesthetic/visual technique!
Posted by: Santanu Das | November 16, 2008 04:46 PM