The diversity of human beings can be an enormous challenge to teachers. We know from recent research that different students have significantly different learning styles (1-3). Some are active learners, retaining and understanding information best by doing something active with it, whereas others are reflective learners, thinking about it quietly first, then doing something with it. Some students like learning facts, solving problems by well-established methods and don’t mind detail or repetitive work (sensing learners); some students prefer discovering possibilities and relationships, like innovation and dislike repetition (intuitive learners). Visual learners get a lot from visual images: pictures, diagrams, graphs, demonstrations. Verbal learners get more from verbal material: written or spoken words, mathematical equations. Some students work best when they begin with specific cases (observations, data) and work toward general principles (inductive learners), whereas other students prefer to begin with general principles and deduce their consequences (deductive learners). Finally, there are students who have optimal understanding and retention when they get information in small, connected bits presented in some logical order (sequential learners). Global learners take in information in apparently unconnected pieces and achieve understanding by large leaps.

Felder (5) points out that these are not dichotomous categories (active/reflective, sensing/intuitive, etc.) but ends of continua along which students find themselves. Preferences on these continua can also be expressed as strong, moderate or mild. So, a person can be strongly visual, moderately intuitive, or mildly deductive. Furthermore, we are not fixed in position along these continua. Everyone is active sometimes and reflective sometimes (6).

According to Felder (5), most lecture courses are aimed at the students who are at once intuitive, verbal, deductive, reflective, and sequential. These students comprise a minority of college students. Sensing, visual, inductive, active, global learners, the majority, are left to fend for themselves. The trick is to devise a strategy for teaching that meets the needs of all of the students at least some of the time. The challenge is no smaller for teaching with computers (via CDs, computer programs, or web courses) than for classroom teaching. We would like to focus the discussion in this breakout session on how to meet the diverse needs of learners using computer-based instructions.

1. Barbe, W.B. and M.N. Milone, What we know about modality strengths," Educational Leadership, Feb. 1981, pp. 378-380. 2. Claxton, C.S. and P.H. Murrell. Learning styles: Implications for improving educational practice. ASHE-ERIC Higher Education Report No. 4, ASHE, College Station, 1987.

3. Corno, L., and R.E. Snow. Adapting teaching to individual differences among learners. In Wittrock, M., Ed., Handbook of Research on Teaching. Macmillan, New York, 1986.

4. Felder, Richard. "How Students Learn: Adapting Teaching Styles to Learning Styles," Proceedings, Frontiers in Education Conference, ASEE/IEEE, Santa Barbara, CA, 1988, p. 489. 5. Felder, R. Reaching the second tier: Learning and teaching styles in college science education. J. College Science Teaching. 23(5): 286-290, 1993 or

http://www2.ncsu.edu/unity/lockers/users/f/felder/public/Papers/Secondtier html

6. Felder, R.M. and Soloman, B.A. Learning styles and strategies. http://www2.ncsu.edu/unity/lockers/users/f/felder/public/ILSdir/styles.htm 7. Lawrence, G. People Types and Tiger Stripes: A Practical Guide to Learning Styles, 2nd Edition. Center for Applications of Psychological Type, Gainesville, FL, 1982.

8. McKeachie, W. Improving lectures by understanding students' information processing. In McKeachie, W.J., Ed., Learning, Cognition, and College Teaching. New Directions for Teaching and Learning, No. 2. Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, 1980, p. 32.

9. Schmeck, R., Ed. Learning Strategies and Learning Styles. Plenum Press, New York, 1988.

Most instructors want to maximize the learning of their students. To do this, it is necessary to be aware of the learning styles of the students and to apply this awareness to the courses they teach. Hopefully, this discussion will help instructors in finding ways to accommodate, in their computer-based instruction, the different learning styles of students.

Michael Mann
984575 Nebraska Medical Center
Omaha, NE 68198-4575
Phone: 402-559-7166
Fax: 402-559-4438
Email: mmann@unmc.edu

CO-AUTHORS:
Susan Batten
Medical College of Ohio
Toledo, OH 43614
Phone: 419-383-5859
Email: sbatten@mco.edu