Assignment 1.1

It is important to know your own learning style before you begin to assess those of others. In the Course Documents please click on the link to the learning styles assessments. You will see there are a variety of them – each of you much complete the first one, “Rightbrain-Leftbrain Assessment” and then choose at least two others to complete. Once finished, submit a post thoroughly discussing the following:

• Of the three assessments you completed, which do you feel represents your approach to learning and life the best?
• What have you learned about your learning style?
• How do you think you can utilize this information to help yourself as a learner? How about as an educator?

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I feel the assessment that best reflected my approach to learning and life best was the Memletics Accelerated learning Styles Inventory. Although a little more complicated and a little longer process, it reflected with more accuracy than the others. Although the others captured the essence of my learning styles, I am so close in visual and kinesthetic that the other two I took reflected different results. I also feel the Memletics assessment covered more areas related to a variety of learning styles instead of just using three categories.

Generally, I have learned that my preference for learning is very visual and very kinesthetic. I also know I have adapted over the years to learn to adapt the other learning styles. I have also learned in the Memletics assessment that aural and verbal can be two very different things. This explains why I can listen to a piece of music and get the beat and notes almost instantly but it takes a concerted effort to remember the words.

I can utilize these assessments to create an environment for myself that is conducive to learning that fits my style. I can also use a combination of my learning styles and mix it up every once in a while without fear that I may miss something or without fear it is outside of my comfort zone. Although I am strong in a couple areas, I don’t have any styles I just despise or cannot learn from.

As an educator, I need to be aware that people do have different learning styles and to not stick to one or two ways of presenting material just because I am comfortable with that particular style(s). It is good to mix it up a bit so everyone gets a boost at some point.

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I ended up taking the Index of Learning Styles Inventory as provided by Dr. Felder also. In taking this assessment, I was torn by almost every question of the 44 provided. The instructions were to “choose the [answer] that applies more frequently.” My results were very skewed to, yes, my preferential mode of learning but I don’t think it accurately reflected my actual learning styles given the scales used in the results.  I feel a better approach would have been to separate each question into a scale in and of itself and then average the to to come up with a more aligned learning styles assessment.

For example, the first question was:

I really do both of these to different degrees! So I would re-frame this one question into two and average the results:

I understand something better after I try it out: Strongly disagree, Disagree, Agree, Strongly agree
I understand something better after I think it through: Strongly disagree, Disagree, Agree, Strongly agree

If I chose agree, giving me 3 points for the first question and strongly agree for the second question for 4 points, I can then average these on the scale pushing my preference toward thinking vs. trying.

Results of the first way:
<— Thinking (Reflective)  – X – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – Trying (Active) —> (very skewed)

Results of the second way:
<— Thinking (Reflective)  – - – - – - X – - – - – - – - – - Trying (Active) —> (more on target with my actual learning preference)

Part of the reason I bring this up is, as I age, I am finding myself sliding in different categories more and more. It is a growing process that doesn’t have a definitive beginning or end.