Technology and Learning Styles and multiple intelligences

Technology and Learning Styles and multiple intelligences

I have read the article LEARNING STYLES AND STRATEGIES by Richard M. Felder, Hoechst Celanese Professor of Chemical Engineering, North Carolina State University and Barbara A. Soloman, Coordinator of Advising, First Year College, North Carolina State University.

The article introduces eight learning styles. The writers tried to make a comparison between each two opposite types for example, between the active and reflective learners, the sensing learners and the intuitive learners, the visual and the verbal learners and at last the sequential learners and the global learners. Then, the writer tried to introduce a solution for each type. The writer mentions how can each learner help himself if he is put in an educational situation that doesn't suit his abilities or the way he retain and understand information.


The active learners understand information by discussing, or applying or explaining it. They like group work. They like to try the information first. On the other hand the reflective learner thinks of it first. They prefer working alone. The only similarity between them is that they couldn't sit for lectures without having anything to do. The comparison tried to guide the active and reflective learners to help themselves. An active learner in a class that allows little or no class time for discussion should study in a group, take turns explaining different topics to each other and work with others. This will help him retain information better. A reflective learner in a class that allows little or no class time for thinking shouldn't read or memorize the material or review what he has read and to think of possible questions or applications. He should write short summaries and class notes. This will enable him to retain the material more effectively.


Sensing learners like learning facts. They also like solving problems. They dislike complications and surprises. They are patient with details, good at memorizing facts, practical and careful. On the other hand, intuitive learners prefer discovering possibilities and relationships. They like innovation and they dislike repetition. They are better at grasping new concepts. To help themselves, sensors in a class where most of the material is abstract and theoretical should ask the instructor for specific examples of concepts and how they are applied. But an intuitor in a class that deals primarily with memorization should ask the instructor for interpretations or theories that link the facts. He should take time to read the entire question before he starts answering and be sure to check his results.

Visual learners remember best what they see--pictures, diagrams, flow charts, time lines, films. On the contrary, verbal learners get more out of words--written and spoken explanations. To help themselves, a visual learner tries to find diagrams, sketches and flow charts. He should ask the instructor for videotapes or CD-ROM displays of the course. He should color-code the notes. The verbal learner should write summaries or outlines of course material in his own words and work in groups so as to hear classmates.

The sequential learners understand in linear steps with each step following logically from the previous one. They follow logical stepwise paths. The global learners learn in large jumps. They can solve complex problems quickly or put things together. If the instructor jumps around from topic to topic or skips steps, the sequential learner should ask the instructor to fill in the skipped steps. He should also outline the lecture in logical order. Then he should relate each new topic he studies to things he already knows. A global learner, who needs the big picture before mastering the details, should skim through the entire topic to get an overview. He should try to relate the subject to things he already knows by asking the instructor to help him see connections or by consulting references.
Resources :
http://www4.ncsu.edu/unity/lockers/users/f/felder/public/ILSdir/styles.htm 

Technology and Learning Styles

 Technology and Learning Styles


        I will introduce a simple idea about the multiple intelligences and after that I will introduce how technology can enhance this intelligence in brief. According to this theory, "we are all able to know the world through language, logical-mathematical analysis, spatial representation, musical thinking, the use of the body to solve problems or to make things, an understanding of other individuals, and an understanding of ourselves. Individuals differ in the strength of these intelligences.

I am going to deal with the learning styles and how the technology can enhance them as follows:

1- Visual-Spatial:

The learners are very aware of their environments. They like to draw, do jigsaw puzzles and read maps. They can be taught through drawings, verbal and physical imagery. Tools include models, graphics, charts, photographs, drawings, 3-D modeling, video, videoconferencing, television, multimedia and texts with pictures/charts/graphs.

Technology can play a great role with this type of learners. Many technological items can be used with this learning style as follows: 

1- Visual learning. Slides, filmstrips, and movies
2- The VCR is a flexible and adaptable tool that can be utilized for innumerable educational purposes.
3- The interactive videodisc (IVD). For example Geographic Television (GTV) is currently one of the most recent developments in interactive video for the classroom.
4- IBM's Speech Viewer for those with speech difficulties where they can actually see their speaking patterns
5- Computers allow visually oriented students to learn through their strengths as they interact with the technology.
6- HyperCard or LinkWay software: the students can create multimedia reports.
7- Scholastic "Slide Shop is a program for creating computerized slide shows, producing audiovisual aids for talks, video title and credit screens
8- Interactive videodiscs are also becoming more available in the classroom

2- Bodily-kinesthetic

         The learner uses the body effectively, for example a dancer or a surgeon. They keen sense of body awareness. They like movement, making things and touching. They communicate well through body language and are taught through physical activity, acting out and role playing. Tools include equipment and real objects.

         For technology, this type of intelligence can be enhanced as follows:

1- Computers rely mostly on eye-hand coordination for their operation for example: keyboarding and the use of the mouse or touch-screen. This kinesthetic activity reinforces learning and makes the student an active participant in the learning process.
2- Video games engage the player and increase his skilful physical response to the challenges.
3- Programs such as "Lego Logo" offer ways to connect the computer to external manipulative.
5- Multi-media technology also involves much actual physical activity as information is gathered from databanks, books, and photos

3- Musical

        The learners show sensitivity to rhythm and sound. They love music, but they are also sensitive to sounds in their environments. They may study better with music in the background. They can be taught by turning lessons into lyrics, speaking rhythmically, and tapping out time. Tools include musical instruments, music, radio, stereo, CD-ROM and multimedia.

The development of musical intelligence can be enhanced by technology in the same way that verbal fluency is enhanced by word-processors as follows:

1- Digital technology, which combines digital audio with visual input, makes it possible for many students to learn about elements of music that are often too complicated for beginners to understand.
2- Interactive videodiscs on music make it possible to "break out" and hear individual instruments

4- Interpersonal

         They are marked by understanding and interacting with others. These students learn through interaction. They have many friends, empathy for others, and street smarts. They can be taught through group activities, seminars, and dialogues. Tools include the telephone, audio conferencing, time and attention from the instructor, video conferencing, writing, computer conferencing and E-mail.

For technology, when students use computers in pairs or small groups, comprehension and learning are facilitated and accelerated.

1- Students can be videotaped as they give a presentation or performance. Groups of students can discuss their observations of each other,
2- The Internet, which is a network of computer networks, includes thousands of networks used by millions of people of all ages. For educators, telecommunications networks offer an important resource and support system.

5-Intrapersonal

         The learner is marked by understanding one's own interests, and goals. These learners tend to shy away from others. They're in tune with their inner feelings. They have wisdom, intuition and motivation, as well as a strong will, confidence and opinions. They can be taught through independent study and introspection. Tools include books, creative materials, diaries, privacy and time are fruitful with them. They are the most independent of the learners.

The development of intrapersonal intelligence can be facilitated through:

1- The use of technology to explore and expand the human mind. Technology offers the means to pursue a line of thought in great depth as well as to have random access to divergent ideas.
2- Individual student learning or personal growth plans can be well facilitated through computer programs that make possible on-going modifications or revisions, as well as the recording of accomplishments in the form of electronic or multimedia portfolios of student work.

6- Logical -Mathematical

        They reason, calculate and think conceptually, abstractly and are able to see and explore patterns and relationships. They like to experiment, solve puzzles, and ask cosmic questions. They can be taught through logic games, investigations, and mysteries. They need to learn and form concepts before they can deal with details.

        Logical-Mathematical intelligence can be exercised and developed through many challenging and innovative kinds of multimedia technology. Students of every ability level can learn effectively through interesting software programs that offer immediate feedback and go far beyond drill and practice and "workbooks on computers." Many of them offer challenging opportunities to exercise and develop higher order thinking skills that are essential in problem-solving.

7- Linguistic

         The learners use words effectively. These learners have highly developed auditory skills and often think in words. They like reading, playing word games, making up poetry or stories. They can be taught by encouraging them to say and see words, read books together. Tools include computers, games, multimedia, books, and tape recorders are helpful for them.

Technology enhances this learning style as follows:

1- The computer encourages students to revise and rewrite compositions and thus develop greater fluency and a more effective style.
2- Recopying by hand or typewriter often inhibits ongoing correction and revision, but the computer facilitates these processes and gives students a greater sense of control over their writing.
3- Technology is having an enormous impact on the development of speaking skills.
4- Computer has enhanced writing skills, so audiotape-recording, video-taping, and video-conferencing are having positive effects on oral fluency. When students observe and hear themselves speaking, they learn to express themselves effectively.
5- Technology offers new communication and learning opportunities to students with multiple handicaps and "different abilities.

Create an online course site or an exercise

Create an online course site or an exercise

         I think that creating an online course has become very easy in that time. Now we can apply some tools to build an online course: these are my real examples to be accessed

1-  I built a new class using www.nicenet.com . My class key is R344605E54

2- I built a blog using Google blogger . The URL is http://english4all4fun.blogspot.com/

3- I put a sample of an exercise in Google docs. The link is

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1jp9g4oYW5zqMkRHMSoSiWGZeIul2QDsNudCVBD1QYlQ/edit?usp=sharing

         To reach the best use of these sites, I will put my topics and tasks in the conference page of the nicenet.com . The students should follow it by adding the key into the site to be added in the class. Then the students should read the topics and tasks and try to deal with them. After that, they have to go to the blog and write their answers, comments and ideas. They can answer them in written after viewing the exercises in Google g docs.

         These sites are suitable for students of prep schools, secondary schools and university. In the earlier ages, the students mayn't know how to use these sites in a perfect way. The students of higher levels can use them in the best way. They can read and write in a suitable way. They have a technology and computer experiences that qualify them to go through them smoothly and without problems.

        This site can help the learner autonomy. I can suggest some sites for him to be used for searching for book, references and useful sites. I can put the rubrics that in his way to learn. I can provide him with similar experiences in the form of article, pictures, presentations or templates to be followed as an initial imitation.   

Teaching with Online Tools

 Teaching with Online Tools

         I accessed the site http://www.toolsforeducators.com/ . I became amazed of what the site provides for us. It is really marvelous. I called it " all in one" in my favourite. I added it to my delicious.  I think that using the word search generator provides very easy and professional activities for word spelling revisions. I liked it and I will use it in my site and in my class and in the class blog or site. The crossword generator can help in the same way. I liked the dice tool. The students can make them in groups. The teacher even can use them as a starter or a game inside the class. I liked the game generator tool. It provides printable games with pictures. It can be used as a starter or ice breaker or a plenary for our lessons. It will help the students revise and memorize vocabularies. The spelling reading worksheets can help when the teacher tries to make a word reading sheet for his class. The best think that it is accompanied with pictures to help student keep the words by heart and memorize them with their mutual pictures.

         The website http://bogglesworldesl.com/ is very useful for writing activities, word spelling and making exercises. It contains varied collections of flashcards, songs, worksheets and exercises. It provides lesson plan for the teachers. They also can use the http://poster.4teachers.org/  as it is a free tool which allows educators to create a lesson, worksheet, or class page and immediately publish it online. Teachers can also set up classes and assign projects to students. Students complete the assignments by creating their own online projects or reports. Teachers and students can even add images and links to their pages.

         The easy test maker http://www.easytestmaker.com/default.aspx is a powerful tool to make tests of all types. The site provides printed and pictured instructions for the teachers to be followed. The best part of the website is the inline tests where you can make automatic tests that are run and graded automatically online. This option is helpful for blogs and nicenet. It is also helpful for learner autonomy. Unfortunately they are used for upgraded versions only. But you can do so by using hot potatoes http://hotpot.uvic.ca/ . The site provides you a free install of the version of the software. It is easy to use it. You can use it online and offline as it provides the exercises in html form.

The levels or stages of learner autonomy and how they are assessed.

 The levels or stages of learner autonomy and how they are assessed.

 

        There are levels or stages of learner autonomy. I think that this type of learning suits all levels and stages according to the case of being intended or not intended. If it is not intended, it is suitable for students of earlier ages such as cycle 1 and cycle 2. The student can learn from the posters on the walls, the English corner, and the language center prepared by the teacher inside the class room. Doing manual projects helps much increase the experiences of the students so as to be recalled in similar situations. Many teachers realize that the students can learn indirectly, so some teachers prepare word walls for them in the class. Others ask the students to prepare a file for their flash cards and activities. In this stage the learner autonomy is limited. It lacks some of the strategies. The students in earlier ages can imitate, repeat, deduce, guess, and ask questions for clarifications. But they lack the ability take notes and have resources. But these can be provided by the teacher in an indirect way without telling the students that these resources have been put to help them work and learn autonomously. I myself put some games in the school yard for the students to learn from them.

        For higher levels and stages, this type of learning should be intended. The student himself wants to learn. He prepares his resources, references, books and websites that will be a start point to his learning process. The student assign his references according to his level and specialized learning. The students of prep and secondary schools can be active with this type of learning especially with the usage of technology as the students in this age are familiar with technology, internet and computer. The best one who can assign what suits his study life is the student of the university as he chooses materials that are suitable for his career of the future. Those who really work in specific jobs also can assign materials that are suitable for their jobs. Higher level students find it easy to find resources and the search engine play the best role here. They can imitate or even watch similar experiences in videos and websites. They can ask who know more about the topic. They have the ability to guess and deduce what's beyond what they really see. They can move through the metacognitive strategies. They can concentrate on general aspects of a task, pay attention to specific aspects of a task, check one's performance and reward oneself for success.


         The teacher can assess this type of learning according to many aspects: the traditional assessment, the alternative assessment and the continuous development evaluations. For the traditional assessment the teacher can provide the student with worksheets, questionnaires and report forms in which they have to express what they have learned and the teacher has to assess their development in accordance with the targeted development of the age, level and stage. For the alternative assessment, the teacher should help students build their rubrics which will be their guide through their autonomous learning process. These rubrics can help the students change their actions when they find that they are not on the right way. For the continuous development evaluations, the students can put notes, marks and points when they achieve a stage of their learning. The total of these marks and points can form the final assessment and the notes can provide a feedback for what was done during the learning process.


Mustafa

Learner autonomy

Learner autonomy

Hello David Bentz, Robert and everyone
First of all I would like to welcome David. I wish to learn from him.

I have read the article entitled what is Learner Autonomy and How Can It Be Fostered? (Dimitrios Thanasoulas) . I liked the idea of learner autonomy. I felt that it's a completion to the previously discussed topic about PBL. The learner is still in the center but this time, he is not only responsible for his learning process but also he goes through it autonomously. He learns a set of skills in his self-directed learning. It is the situation in which learners study on their own. The learner here controls the direction of his learning process.


To be an autonomous learner, the students should enough courage and will to communicate in the target language at all costs. The learner should guess what's coming and this will help him to have a full knowledge of the form and the content of his learning items. The learner should also have choices which will allow him to feel that he has a control or ownership over his own learning. As a result of this control and ownership, the students develop a sense of responsibility and self-motivation. The role of the teachers in this task is to provide the students of those suitable choices to help them to be responsible and autonomous.

The autonomous learning process has many strategies to be achieved. We are going to deal with them according to the priority of each. The learner should prepared his resources, materials and references such as books, dictionaries, websites, CDs and any suitable materials for his task. Then he watches others, imitate them and at last do the same. In the language learning process, he imitates and then repeats what he noticed. If he finds anything significant, he should take notes. As a good guesser, he can deduce facts according to the available noted information. At last he has to apply all what he gained using the knowledge he acquired. According to the metacognitive Strategies, first the learner decides to concentrate on general aspects of a task. Then he/she pays attention to specific aspects of a task. After that, one checks one's performance. Hence, the learner evaluates his performance. At last he rewards himself for success.

To know how the students are going on their learning process, the teacher should know what strategies they are using and asks them to report what they are thinking while they are performing it.

When we try to apply technology in this type of education, we have much to say. Search engines are great providers of information of all types. The learner can download as much books and learning programs as he can. He can check, watch, imitate and do the same as others all over then world. His usage to technology will be enhanced with the passage of time.


At last we can say that this type of learning is a value that the teacher can plant inside his students. The students upgrade this value with their development in age and experiences. At that time, the learner will decide what to learn, how, where, what tools needed, who will help, what obstacle will face him and how he will plan to over come. So, it is a complete educational and learning process that affects both the student behaviour and his learning attitudes.

One Computer in the Classroom

One Computer in the Classroom

         First the teacher should decide where to put his computer. All students should see the computer. It is advisable that the computer can be moved and secured. Then the teacher should be sure that the computer contains the software needed for his work. The teacher may need all office software such as word, excel, access, PowerPoint and publisher. The teacher should install the clipart, the fonts and the templates which will be used later. He may need internet connection, web access to access search engines and email. To work offline the teacher may use software that helps him download pages on the computer to be run without the need of internet connection.


         Then the teacher comes to the management stage. The teacher should divide the class into small groups. He should also divide the project into small modules or small parts so students can work on different sections. To help groups work fast, they should work according to templates. For safety, each group should have a portfolio folder that contains their clipart, templates and folder to save works in.


         Now we can speak about what can be done on one classroom computer. The teacher can use the computer to assign the students attendance. He should have database of the students and their data. The teacher can make the worksheets, activities and tests on it. They can use the internet to send and receive messages to and from each other. They can also access useful websites and search engines. The search engines help the class provide the materials such as pictures, articles, sound and video files to be used in projects. The students can make projects such as PowerPoint presentations. The presentations, videos and projects of the class can be shown on the projector or even published on the class blog or website. The teacher's cam or mobile cam can play a role to record and document the projects and the learning process while going on.


         Many schools have materials in a form of CD or DVD. These autorun materials are very useful. The teacher himself can make such CDs using his one computer. The software of making autorun CDs has become available on the download sites. He can introduce the materials in interactive way. He can use software such as notebook to make interactive presentations that run from the HD.


         To publish what is going inside the classroom the teacher can make his publications go in two ways: one inside the school and the other in the World Wide Web. He can make a class magazine, weekly news letter and letters of involvement for the parents. He can inform the other teachers and colleagues in the school of what is going in his class through a brochure or through e mail. Then he can publish all the class actions on the class blog.

Thank you