Frequently Asked Questions & Answers: Different Learning Styles

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1 Frequently Asked Questions & Answers: Different Learning Styles Megan McAlpin 1. Are there different learning styles in the legal writing classroom? What are they? Not surprisingly, learning styles have been described and defined in different ways. In fact, a 2004 review of the research on learning styles identified seventy-one different theories of learning styles. Aida Alaka, Learning Styles: What Difference do the Differences Make?, 5 Charleston L. Rev. 133, 143 (2011). These many different theories promote very different ideas of what a learning style might be; there is no agreement on any one definition or framework for understanding learning styles. Given the many different approaches, it probably also shouldn t be unexpected that the idea that learning styles exist and are measurable is actually fairly controversial. There seems to be generally broad agreement that different factors have an impact on the way students learn and that learning preferences exist. But the notion of learning styles has been and continues to be, controversial within the research community. Alaka, 5 Charleston L. Rev. at 142. Despite the controversy, it s probably helpful for all teachers to be aware of the many different factors that can have an impact on learning. After all, the different ways that students absorb and process information is another aspect of the diversity in our classrooms. Some of the factors that can have an impact on learning are: (1) the student s intelligence type (Does she have mathematical/logical intelligence or linguistic intelligence or musical intelligence or interpersonal intelligence?); (2) the student s personality (Is she an introvert or an extravert? How does she gather information and make decisions?); (3) the student s preferred way to absorb and process information (is she a verbal learner or a visual learner or an aural learner or a kinesthetic learner?) (Does she typically rely on her left brain or right brain? Is she a top-down processor or a bottom-up processor?); (4) the student s social interaction needs (Is she intrinsically or extrinsically motivated? Does she prefer to work alone or in groups?); and (5) the student s instructional preferences (How, when, and where does the student like to study? Does McAlpin LWI Frequently Asked Questions & Answers 1

2 she like to work alone or with others? In a cool room or a warm room?). M.H. Sam Jacobson, A Primer on Learning Styles: Reaching Every Student, 25 Seattle U. L. Rev. 139, (2001). But students backgrounds, experiences, and prior knowledge can also have an impact on their learning. In other words, regardless of other differences, many students have at least one thing in common: they tend to learn best if they are able to relate new material to their prior experiences and allowed to express their perspectives. Paula Lustbader, Teach in Context: Responding to Diverse Student Voices Helps All Students Learn, 48 J. Leg. Educ. 402, 404 (1998). The following are a few of the many resources that discuss learning styles: Aida Alaka, Learning Styles: What Difference do the Differences Make?, 5 Charleston L. Rev. 133 (2011). Robin A. Boyle, Jeffrey Minneti & Andrea Honigsfeld, Law Students are Different from the General Population: Empirical Findings Regarding Learning Styles, 17 Persps. 153 (2009). Kate E. Bloch, Cognition and Star Trek: Learning and Legal Education, 42 J. Marshall L. Rev. 959 (2009). Eric A. DeGroff & Kathleen A. McKee, Learning Like Lawyers: Addressing the Differences in Law Student Learning Styles, 2006 B.Y.U Education and Law Journal, 499. M.H. Sam Jacobson, Learning Styles and Lawyering, Using Learning Theory to Organize Thinking and Writing, 2 J. Ass n Legal Writing Directors 27 (2004). M.H. Sam Jacobson, A Primer on Learning Styles: Reaching Every Student, 25 Seattle U. L. Rev. 139 (2001). Paula Lustbader, Teach in Context: Responding to Diverse Student Voices Helps All Students Learn, 48 J. Leg. Educ. 402 (1998). McAlpin LWI Frequently Asked Questions & Answers 2

3 2. Should I have my students do a diagnostic assessment of their learning styles? If so, how? Maybe. Just as learning styles themselves are a bit controversial, so too are assessment tools. Some proponents of diagnostic assessment identify it at the best way for teachers to tailor materials and assignments to their students different styles. Robin Boyle & Rita Dunn, Teaching Law Students through Individual Learning Styles, 62 Alb. L. Rev. 213, 216 (1998). Others suggest that, particularly in law school, an assessment can be a more helpful tool to the student than to the teacher. Alaka, 5 Charleston L. Rev. at 170. In other words, if a learning style assessment is given to students and explained as a way for them to understand their preferences and habits, then they can begin to recognize the strengths and weaknesses in the way that they study. Id. This is probably especially important as students head into the much more demanding academic landscape of law school. What may have worked for them as undergraduates reading and memorizing will no longer work for them in law school. So they may need to have a much clearer sense of their strengths in order to do the kind of legal analysis that their law school professors will require of them. If you choose to do an assessment, there are quite a few different tools that you might use. The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and the Kolb Learning Style Inventory are two of the most commonly used diagnostic tools. The VARK assessment is also a widely known tool. But there are other tools out there as well, including the Dunn & Dunn Learning Styles Model and Honey & Mumford s Learning Style Questionnaire. You could also choose a tool like the simple checklist and series of true or false questions in M.H. Sam Jacobson s article A Primer on Learning Styles, Reaching Every Student. Jacobson, 25 Seattle U. L. Rev. at 177. When you are choosing an assessment tool, you should think about what it measures and be aware of the criticisms and potential pitfalls. For instance, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator really measures personality, which may only be one aspect of learning style. The VARK questionnaire will really only help you understand your students preferred mode of absorbing information. The Kolb Learning Style is meant to assess cognitive learning preferences, so it might get more directly at the kinds of learning style questions that are most relevant to your teaching. You should also consider the practicality of implementing an assessment tool. For example, you may want to choose the assessment tool that the undergraduate institution affiliated McAlpin LWI Frequently Asked Questions & Answers 3

4 with your law school already uses. Better yet, maybe someone at your institution could come in and talk with your students about the assessment tool before you administer it. The following are some resources that discuss diagnostic assessment: Aida Alaka, Learning Styles: What Difference do the Differences Make?, 5 Charleston L. Rev. 133 (2011). M.H. Sam Jacobson, A Primer on Learning Styles: Reaching Every Student, 25 Seattle U. L. Rev. 139 (2001). Robin Boyle & Rita Dunn, Teaching Law Students through Individual Learning Styles, 62 Alb. L. Rev. 213, 216 (1998). 3. Whether or not I do an assessment of my students, should I be trying to teach to a student s particular learning styles? Again, there are different theories. Some advocate matching teaching style to learning style. Some actually advocate intentionally mismatching teaching style and learning style to encourage student growth and creativity. Alaka, 5 Charleston L. Rev. at 168. Yet others suggest that teachers should tailor their teaching strategies not to the learning style at all but rather to the subject or topic that is being taught. Even given the different approaches and theories, it seems fairly well accepted that students benefit from exposure to a variety of different teaching methods. Regardless of a student s preference for the way that she absorbs information, she will likely benefit from a variety of teaching methods. In fact, some learning theories (e.g., the Kolb Learning Style) suggest that teachers should move students through a cycle of learning, exposing students to a variety of different learning experiences. Kristin B. Gerdy, Teacher, Coach, and Judge: Promoting Learning through Learner-Centered Assessment, 94 L. Lib. J., 59, 61-65(2002). The need for exposure to different ways of absorbing and processing information seems particularly important for law students, who will soon enter a profession in which they ll be required to absorb and process information in different ways. In other words, a visual learner may prefer that a client s facts be presented in a written summary, but she will surely benefit from the opportunity to interview a client, even if it forces her to absorb the information aurally. McAlpin LWI Frequently Asked Questions & Answers 4

5 Perhaps even better would be to ask students to interview the client and take notes (good for those with an aural preference), then to relay their notes back to the client or to their assistant (good for those with an oral preference), then to write a summary of the meeting for the file, which they can compare against the written summary that you give them (good for those with a verbal preference). Approaching the assignment in this way will ensure that students get the facts but may also help them think about how they can be effective at client interviewing despite their learning preferences. The following resources deal with teaching to different learning styles: Eric A. DeGroff, Training Tomorrow s Lawyers: What Empirical Research Can Tell Us About the Effect of Law School Pedagogy on Law Student Learning Styles, 36 S. Ill. U. L.J. 251 (2012). Aida Alaka, Learning Styles: What Difference do the Differences Make?, 5 Charleston L. Rev. 133 (2011). Eric A. DeGroff & Kathleen A. McKee, Learning Like Lawyers: Addressing the Differences in Law Student Learning Styles, 2006 B.Y.U Education and Law Journal, 499. M.H. Sam Jacobson, Learning Styles and Lawyering, Using Learning Theory to Organize Thinking and Writing, 2 J. Ass n Legal Writing Directors 27 (2004). Kristin B. Gerdy, Teacher, Coach, and Judge: Promoting Learning through Learner- Centered Assessment, 94 L. Lib. J., 59 (2002). Robin Boyle & Rita Dunn, Teaching Law Students through Individual Learning Styles, 62 Alb. L. Rev. 213 (1998). Eileen B. Cohen, Teaching Legal Research to a Diverse Student Body, 85 Law Libr. J. 583 (1993). 4. Do different generations of students have different learning styles? How do I adjust my teaching for this new generation? Different generations may not have different learning styles, but they are certainly different. Actually it might be more accurate to say that different generations are simply living in different times. Today s students, for example, are digital natives, accustomed to McAlpin LWI Frequently Asked Questions & Answers 5

6 simultaneously studying, ing and texting friends, and watching a baseball game on television. This means that they re accustomed to not only ready access to information but ready access to entertainment and entertaining education. This has changed the way that they view information and education generally. But their brains aren t so very different from the brains of older generations. In fact, [m]odern brains react the same way to novel or sudden changes as the brains of the Cro- Magnon of 40,000 years ago. Shailini George, Teaching the Smartphone Generation: How Cognitive Science Can Improve Learning in Law School, 66 Me. L. Rev., (forthcoming Winter 2013)(ms. available at (quoting M.H. Sam Jacobson, Paying Attention or Fatally Distracted: Concentration, Memory, and Multi-Tasking in a Multi-Media World, 16 J. of the Legal Writing Inst. 419, 421 (2010)). So, while today s students may not be so very different from students of older generations, they are sitting in class and trying to study with phones, computers, tablets, and televisions at their fingertips. They are trying to learn, in other words, with the modern equivalent of the Cro- Magnun s tiger in the room. Because today s students are living in a different time, they essentially have an additional factor that impacts their learning: multi-tasking. But cognitive scientists know that multi-tasking doesn t really work. George, 66 Me L. Rev. at 21. It has an impact on attention, memory, and, ultimately, learning. Id. Teachers can lessen the impact of multi-tasking in two ways. First, teachers can instruct students about the hazards involved with multi-tasking. Id. at 22. And teachers can explain that while students may have been able to be successful despite their multi-tasking tendencies as undergraduates, this approach is unlikely to work in law school. George, 66 Me L. Rev. at 21. But teachers should also take some of the responsibility for capturing students attention. Multimodal teaching teaching to different learning preferences can be one way of capturing student attention. Regardless of a particular student s learning preferences, all students can benefit from different methods of teaching because when a teacher uses different methods of teaching, students use different channels of learning and therefore are less likely to suffer from cognitive overload. George, 66 Me L. Rev. at 26. The following resources deal with generational aspects of learning styles: McAlpin LWI Frequently Asked Questions & Answers 6

7 Shailini George, Teaching the Smartphone Generation: How Cognitive Science Can Improve Learning in Law School, 66 Me. L. Rev., (forthcoming Winter 2013)(ms. available at Paying Attention or Fatally Distracted: Concentration, Memory, and Multi-Tasking in a Multi-Media World, 16 J. of the Legal Writing Inst. 419, 421 (2010)). Joan Catherine Bohl, Generation X and Y in Law School: Practical Strategies for Teaching the MTV/Google Generation, 54 Loy. L. Rev. 775 (2008). Robin A. Boyle & Joanne Ingham, Generation X in Law School: How These Law Students Are Different from Those Who Teach Them, 56 J. Leg. Ed., 281 (2006). Tracy L. McGaugh, Generation X in Law School: The Dying of the Light or the Dawn of a New Day?, 9 Leg. Writing 119 (2003). 5. Where can I find concrete ideas for teaching to different learning styles? Given that students tend to learn best when they are provided with information in many different ways, it s probably a good idea to look for different teaching ideas that allow you to present material in many different ways. Conferences are a good source of teaching ideas. The idea bank also often has teaching ideas. Finally, publications like The Second Draft: Bulletin of the Legal Writing Institute can be helpful in this regard. In fact, in 2008, The Second Draft dedicated its spring issue volume 22 to Teaching to Different Learning Styles; that issue contains lots of helpful, concrete ideas for teaching to different styles and different students. When you encounter new teaching ideas, remember that many teaching ideas that are meant to help teachers teach to different learning styles really focus on helping teachers present materials in the different ways that students prefer to absorb those materials. So it can be helpful to understand something about those learning preferences. Law school classes usually work well for students with a verbal preference because information in law school is primarily conveyed through written materials. But professors can help students who prefer to absorb information differently. Students with a visual preference will usually benefit when professors choose texts that present material in a visually enhanced way. Students who absorb information visually also benefit when the professor adds a visual component to the class by using the whiteboard and McAlpin LWI Frequently Asked Questions & Answers 7

8 colorful markers or when the professor distributes handouts with charts or diagrams to show the relationship between the ideas. Boyle & Dunn, 62 Alb. L. Rev. at 228; Jacobson, 25 Seattle U. L. Rev. at Students who prefer to absorb information orally benefit from many opportunities to talk. While some oral learners will take every possible opportunity to talk in the classroom, students who contribute too frequently can be ostracized by their peers and even sometime derail discussions. But a professor can help an oral learner by encouraging her to engage in a silent conversation with herself during class and to visit office hours or join study groups. Jacobson, 25 Seattle U. L. Rev. at 155. Those who prefer to absorb information aurally benefit from having additional opportunities to listen. Professors might consider allowing students to tape classes for later review or to take fewer notes during class. Jacobson, 25 Seattle U. L. Rev. at 155. Students who prefer to absorb information through tactile modes tend to absorb information best if they are able to manipulate materials, write, draw or doodle. Professors can encourage tactile learners to create their own tactual instruction materials such as index cards. Boyle & Dunn, 62 Alb. L. Rev. at 229. Finally, kinesthetic leaners absorb information best if they are able to learn by doing. In the classroom, this could include role-playing or simulations. Jacobson, 25 Seattle U. L. Rev. at 155. The following resources have ideas for teaching to different learning styles: M.H. Sam Jacobson, Learning Styles and Lawyering, Using Learning Theory to Organize Thinking and Writing, 2 J. Ass n Legal Writing Directors 27 (2004). Robin Boyle & Rita Dunn, Teaching Law Students through Individual Learning Styles, 62 Alb. L. Rev. 213 (1998). Contact information: Megan McAlpin University of Oregon School of Law mmcalpin@uoregon.edu McAlpin LWI Frequently Asked Questions & Answers 8