Thursday, November 1, 2012

(98) different learning styles

Do you know what your learning style is?

Mine happened to be audio, that was why from day one I thrived in school. One of my brothers' learns best from ideas written as points linked to each other as spider webs. I know from the notes he puts into books for as long as I can remember. Now that method is being taught as mind mapping in seminars in leading hotels. Some of my wealthier friends spent hundreds to send each of their children for three days two night seminars teaching them what my brother has naturally learnt on his own.

One of my son's friends learns best from audio-visual means. He even could close his eyes and remember events as AV footage. Then I happened to have a dorm mate who lived in the room on top of mine. She walked night after night studying. She was a born dancer who was working hard to get into a law school. In order to register facts in her brain, she has to walk up and down her room while reciting the facts aloud to herself. I knew that well, as I lived in a building that was over a hundred years old and the flooring was made of wood. I could hear her steps if I did not get to sleep before her nightly study sessions began.

Elizabeth, my youngest daughter, studies best when she has her favorite music or songs on. A few of her friends have to turn on both the TV and the radio to do their homework. I find that difficult to believe. When I was in my senior year, my study carrel was in a corner in the basement where there was hardly any human traffic. Baby boomers may need absolute silence when generation X needs a healthy mix of white noise in order to concentrate.

The most amazing person in history who had overcome all obstacles to learn was Helen Keller. She was both blind and deaf. Her teacher used the sense of touch to reach her. I presumed she learnt Braille. Without the sense of hearing, she learnt to speak. Someone who heard her recording said she spoke like an automaton. Whatever she sounded like, she wrote beautifully.

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