Learning Styles and Online Design

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Subject: [PD 3457] Re: Successful Online Learning Elements
From: Barter, Ann Marie AnnMarie.Barter at maine.gov
Date: Wed Jun 17 13:17:53 EDT 2009

Good afternoon,

Earlier today, one of the posts addressed the issue of ADA accessibility for online courses and at least one post raised the issue of learning styles.

Along these lines, my questions are:

- How do online courses address learning styles, especially for kinesthetic learners? (most of what I see for content is primarily visual and some auditory)

- Is the use of the computer or any other technology mode considered kinesthetic in and of itself solely because it involves our hands to communicate what are essentially reading and writing exercises?

- Where do the best practices reflected in research enter in online courses? For example, how does a math instructor integrate manipulatives into online learning? "doing" a jigsaw puzzle on the screen with a mouse is not the same as manipulating the pieces manually.

Thank you for this valuable and timely topic - I've been happily lurking thus far! Ann Marie

Ann Marie Barter
Professional Development Consultant
Maine Department of Education
Adult Education Team
Augusta, ME

Subject: [PD 3458] Re: Gathering Resources from this Discussion
From: Katrina Hinson khinson at almanid.com
Date: Wed Jun 17 13:17:30 EDT 2009

Bonnie,

I use videos (whether youtube or ones I find elsewhere on the web) in my F2F lectures all the time and in my online courses. When I'm looking for something, I start with the basics - up to and including the topic I'm teaching. For instance, when I teach either my Composition course, Writing About Literature or the world lit class and I'm looking for a specific piece related to a writer, I'll search for "Edgar Allan Poe". There is a great YouTube video of Vincent Price reading the "The Raven." My students have completely enjoyed it each time I've shown it. I wanted lessons related to 'grammar' so I searched for "English Grammar" and there were a ton of videos. These are sometimes great to embed into a power point that a teacher has already created. They're also good to show different view points or different ways of doing something. I use YouTube to show relevant movie clips related to lit pieces we may have read in class; I also use simple audio files. One of my favorites is an audio file of Lucille Clifton's "Homage to My Hips." To hear the poet recite her own poem is far more powerful than just simply reading it and provides a great segue for talking about the words she stressed compared to words we may have stressed differently when we read it as a class.

If I had to come up with steps:

1) Start with a simple topic; Start with what you know. Be careful not to make it too broad or too narrow.
2) Weed through the results.
3) Realize you may have to look at several horrid examples before you find one good one or one great one that works for you. Don't stop with the first one you find.
4) The databases are always changing - so if you don't find something today, check again later.

You go find videos on YouTube and Google Video. A simple google search for video and audio files will also turn up a host of data. It comes back to the time you allow yourself to search for something like this...and to perhaps not get frustrated if the first search string you attempt doesn't produce the results you want. Just don't give up. Also, another option, is if you don't find what you're looking for - make that a project - you create the video up and upload it. Most likely someone else has been looking for it too and you've then created something not only for yourself/ your class/ your colleagues but for others - people like all of us on this discussion board!

I hope this helps.

Regards,
Katrina

Subject: [PD 3469] Re: Gathering Resources from this Discussion
From: Barter, Ann Marie AnnMarie.Barter at maine.gov
Date: Wed Jun 17 15:09:16 EDT 2009

Thank you, Katrina, for these suggestions. I agree that it's powerful to hear a poet or author recite his/her own work and I've used that strategy to compare that reading of a text with students'. However, in response to this comment in your post:

"To hear the poet recite her own poem is far more powerful than just simply reading it"

To me, the act of reading a text is interactive, analytical, and is a much more engaging exercise than sitting in front of a computer and watching a diminutive screen that contains an audio text. It's not "simply reading it" when a teacher introduces poetry to learners and help them bring the words, cadence, and images alive. Hearing it read is a wonderful companion exercise, but not a substitution, in my opinion.

How is this response related to the topic at hand? The computer can be used as a substitution for TV. Online instruction can be entertaining or didactic (or both), but the determining factor is what's done with it in a learning context, not necessarily the content.

And, I'm still thinking about learning styles...do all learners find an auditory recitation more powerful than reading a text or is it dependent upon learning style/preference? Ann Marie


Ann Marie Barter
Professional Development Consultant
Maine Department of Education
Adult Education Team
Augusta, ME

Subject: [PD 3473] Re: Gathering Resources from this Discussion
From: Melinda Hefner mhefner at cccti.edu
Date: Wed Jun 17 16:19:46 EDT 2009

I think your response is a great example of how good online instructional design will address multiple learning styles and preferences and will offer learners a choice in how to access and work with instructional information. For example, if I want learners to identify five resources that will help with online collaboration, I will give them a variety of options for locating that information, i.e. internet research, uploaded white papers or other handouts, a video that I made with a small "lecturette", brainstorming with other learners in the course, e-mailing practitioners to solicit information, viewing online videos about the subject, etc. Tnen I will give them equally varied options for processing and synthesizing the information for assignment completion and learning. I try to do this to address varied learning styles and preferences, varied distance learning readiness skills, to promote information literacy, to promote interactivity, to promote relevance to the individual learner while keeping course objectives intact, etc.

Is it time consuming? Absolutely. Do I always have as many variations? No. But I try to provide as many authenic learning opportunities as I possibly can.

Melinda

Melinda M. Hefner
Director, Literacy Support Services

Basic Skills Department
Caldwell Community College and Technical Institute
Hudson, North Carolina

Subject: [PD 3480] Re: Gathering Resources from this Discussion
From: Katrina Hinson KHinson at almanid.com
Date: Wed Jun 17 18:17:24 EDT 2009

AnnMarie:

Reading a text is powerful. As a teacher of reading - reading the text can be a powerful tool by which to engage a student - to ask him or her to consider why a writer has used certain words and excluded others; to have a student relate what's read to his or her own life; to make connections; to interpret - sometimes students do all of these in ways that we can't even begin to imagine. I'm a parent of 4 - from 4-17 and I am keenly aware of the fact that my children are 'digital' students...and I am thrilled when my 4 year old would rather hear me read than to watch television or watch a DVD - and at 4, he even knows what YouTube is thanks to his brothers and sister who have introduced him to Sesame Street via YouTube!

I didn't mean to imply that we didn't read the poem - I actually pointed out that we used the poet's version to compare to what we had already read as a class...to compare the differences in points of stress when we read it - basically, how did we read it differently. It's a great way to talk about writer's intent vs reader response. By no means should any online 'aid' be the sole means of any class but when you've got the chance to hear a living poet read his or her work - so that poets and writers become 'real' for students - it would be foolish to pass that opportunity and rely solely on the teacher's reading or the student's reading of a work.

As an educator, I want my students exposed to the literary classics past and present and without utilizing the technology available, they may not ever pick up a book to read - sometimes, the only reason they've kept reading is because I first introduced them to something they heard as an auditory piece in my class and were curious enough about to want to know more.

Technology is an assistive tool - but it doesn't replace me as a teacher; it is simply a different vehicle by which to share content - an evolution of a textbook - where once there were slate tablets and chalk; or spiral bound notebooks and pens; for many of today's students - it's audio and visual media via laptops, blackberry's and other mobile devices that allow them to access. The sad thing is that it's not technology that is readily available in rural areas or to students in low income impoverished areas. The same is true for teachers - some classrooms - a lot of classrooms - still don't have computers in them let alone elmo projection systems or whiteboard technology. When we're thinking about online professional development, one thing to consider is how to encourage teachers and provide access to teachers who are never in the same classroom twice; whose' classroom really is mobile or in areas where the technology simply isn't available. We are all talking about how great it is to have resource to things like the ALE wiki yet there are teachers who might not have ever seen it or heard of a group like we have here talking about and sharing ideas.

I say this to point out that I am keenly aware that technology is only as workable as accessibility allows it to be...and accessibility is not equal. As a facilitator, that has to be taken into account; to ensure that those who cannot access what I've created online, have access to it in another way; Just as in a classroom, it's about accessibility to ensure that students who don't have access to the online resources have options....the classroom also allows me to expose my students to online technology like poets reading their own work where they might otherwise ever have the option to hear it.

Regards,
Katrina Hinson

Subject: [PD 3484] Reading and learning styles
From: Steve Kaufmann steve at thelinguist.com
Date: Thu Jun 18 00:07:20 EDT 2009

From the perspective of language learners, primarily adult learners, I believe that one change that will come with a better utilization of the internet will be greater freedom for learners to choose how they wish to engage with the language they are learning. I include in this literacy learners.

Those who like to listen to poetry can listen to poetry. Those who like to read poetry can choose to do so. Those who like to do both can do so.

Those, like me, who do not like poetry at all, can avoid poetry. Those learners who want to be asked questions about what they have read, about why the author said this and not that ,can do so.

Those who simply want to enjoy the language and to discover the world behind the language, on their own, will be able to do so. They will even be able to find discussions with their favourite authors, or about the subjects that they are interested in, to listen to and/or read.

Learners will follow their own inclinations. In more and more cases they teachers will not need not worry about learning styles. Learners will make their own decisions. Instead a major task of a tutor will be to find or create more and more lively learning content, of all kinds and on all subjects and at all levels, and make sure that as much of it as possible is made accessible to the widest possible number of learners. Tutors who create or provide this content should then make themselves available to help the learners and answer their questions.

In other words the initiative will move to the side of the learner.

-- Steve Kaufmann
www.thelinguist.blogs.com
www.lingq.com

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