Learning Styles (AQA GCSE Psychology)

Verbalisers

• Learning styles describe the different ways in which people learn best, according to their individual needs, skills and attributes

• Learning styles are based on the mechanics of individual learning i.e. how someone learns

• Verbal learners are those people who process and recall information according to how it sounds and how it reads

• Verbalisers may use repetition, mnemonics (e.g. Richard of York Gave Battle in Vain = the colours of the rainbow: Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet), discussion, note-making

• Verbalisers would prefer a description in text rather than a graph or diagram

Visualisers

• Visual learners are those people who process and recall information according to how it looks i.e. its shape, colour, layout, size, appearance generally

• Visualisers may use mind maps and mind palaces to process and store information 

• Visualisers would prefer a graph or diagram rather than a description in text

• Visualisers have good spatial sense and like to ‘see’ places and characters in their mind when reading

Evaluation of learning styles

Strengths 

• Understanding a student’s learning style can help teachers differentiate the lesson for them, providing them with resources and tasks that suit their individual styles

Weaknesses 

Unusually there are more weaknesses than strengths for this topic which tells you quite a lot about how well it has been accepted by the psychological community!

• Having to tailor every lesson to suit every learning style would be hugely difficult in terms of time and effort, plus it could make the lesson chaotic and unfocused

• Not everyone fits neatly into one learning style: some people may be a mixture of several different styles which means that the theory lacks reliability and consistency

• Pashler et al. (2009) conducted a review of learning styles and found that there is no adequate evidence to support the use of learning styles in teaching