VAK Learning Styles

VAK Learning Styles

Figure 1: VAK Learning Styles Source: https://www.hopehealth.com/one-learning-style-doesnt-fit-all-when-it-comes-to-workplace-communications/

VAK is an acronym of,

       1) Visual,
       2) Auditory
       3) Kinesthetic, learning styles.

This was developed and published by Walter Burke Barbe, An American educator and his colleagues in 1979.  Learning styles are the various methods, approaches or ways of learning things. These  learning styles  are influenced by many factors such as individual experience, different intelligences and personality factors  such  as a  preference  for  learning  alone  or  in a  group.
According to Brown (2000), learning styles are the way in which individuals perceive and process information in learning situations. Keefe (1979), defines learning styles as the “composite of characteristic cognitive, affective, and physiological factors that serve as relatively stable indicators of how a learner perceives, interacts with, and responds to the learning environment.” Stewart and Felicetti (1992) define learning styles as those “educational conditions under which a student is most likely to learn.”

Visual Learning

Visual Learners are the people who prefer to gather information and process them mentally with more graphical way, mean they use more images, graphics, charts, graphs etc. to learn their related subjects. Around 65% of the population represents this category (Nidhi, 2017).  Main characteristics of visual learners are as below,
 Thoughts wander Or making mind maps during lectures
 Remember better by seeing pictures, charts, diagrams, etc.
 Good memory for faces but forget names
 Not really talkative
 Write things down and use highlighters and underlines
 Copy what’s on the board mostly sit in front
According to a study by Constantinidou and Baker, (2002) using visual learning techniques such as pictures & presentations are very much effective for all adults.

Auditory Learning

An auditory learning style is acquiring information primarily through sound. Individual prefer to learn things by listening and talking to public or to him or herself. And also they tend to read out loudly for memorizing purposes. About 30% of population represents this category. Characteristics f auditory learners as follows,

 Prefer spoken directions more than written
 Read with whispering lips movements
 Loss concentration easily, especially in noisy places
 Record lectures for repeated listening
 Prefer verbal conversations, debates, brain storming sessions & group discussions for learning things.
 May become bored easily during silent filmstrips or when problems are to be done silently in class
Kanar (1995), argued that “auditory learners like listening and speaking, have compatible personalities, and have difficulty in following written instructions. They have to listen to an explanation and hear it to understand and learn”.




Kinesthetic Learning

Kinesthetic learning is a learning style where a person carrying out a physical activity to learn things, rather than listening to a lectures. Kinesthetic learners process information best by doing.  About 5% of the population represents these learners.

Jensen (2005) stated that there is a connection between the mind and the body and said any kind of movement activities can lead to better attention and learning. Characteristics of Kinesthetic learners as follows,
 Use activities that get the learners up and moving.
 Like to do things rather than read about them
 Prefer not to stand still and move a lot even when studying
 May listen to music while studying
 Use hand on experience for problem solving



References
 Jensen, E. (2005) Teaching with the Brain in Mind, (2nd Edition) Chapter 4, Nov 2, 2015 Alexandria: ASCD
 Kanar, C. C. (1995). The confident student. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company.
 S K, Sree Nidhi & Tay, Chinyi. (2017). Styles of Learning VAK. IJIRMF. 3. 17 - 25.
 Keefe, J.W. (1979) Learning style: An overview. NASSP's Student learning styles: Diagnosing and proscribing programs (pp. 1-17). Reston, VA. National Association of Secondary School Principals.
 Stewart, K.L., Felicetti, L.A. (1992) Learning styles of marketing majors. Educational Research Quarterly, 15(2), 15-23.
 Baker, S. (2002)Stimulus modality and verbal learning performance in normal aging. Brain and Language, 82(3), 296–311.
 Brown, D. (2000)Principles of language teaching and learning, (4th ed.).
               White Plains, NY: Longman, 2000.
 Pinterest.com; VAK Learning Styles [Online]
Available at; https://www.pinterest.com/phenomenie/vak-learning-style/
      Accessed on; 9th December 2019