Interpreting The Learning Styles Of Traditional And Distance Learning Students

Abstract

The emergence of telecommunication technologies has generated innovative strategies resulting in online education competing for student enrollment. Learning is no longer restricted by space and time, and has become more reliant on empowerment rather than confinement. This study sought to determine if the use of the Kolb Learning Style Inventory (LSI) could be used to determine which learning style(s) best reflect the traditional learner, and which are representative of the distance learning student. The study placed respondents into one of four styles, depending on how they responded to the Inventory: Diverger, Assimilator, Accommodator, and Converger. The study then compared responses within and between the groups to test for significance. It found that while there was significance between all of the groups except the Accommodator/Converger, the only group which had significance within was the group with the Assimilator style.

Exploring the Antecedents to Learning Continuance in Virtual Worlds

“…For example, the sense of group presence was particularly emphasized to lead to engaging group learning interactions because of the shared visual space for students to meet and interact via avatars in virtual worlds (Franceschi et al, 2009). In distance learning program, the missing "social presence" of the lecturer and classmates is found to impact the motivation of students, which in turn reverses the possible advantages of time and location flexibility for those programs (Schultz & Schultz, 2011). In addition, a cohesive learning experience with classmates is particularly important when interacting with people dispersed globally (Swigger et al, 2009).…”

Towards a Method for Mobile Learning Design

“…This collaboration increases active participation by students. There is a parody at play here where mobile learning affords both privacy and freedom to the learner (Alvarez et al, 2011;Ozdamli & Cavus, 2011;Patokorpi, 2006) and "it provides its users with a high degree of independence, mobility and flexibility" (Arnold, 2003 p.243) as well as allowing for teachers to respond "in ways that are meaningful to [the learner]" (Schultz, 2011).…”

“…This makes it difficult for teachers to isolate the right approach to teaching (Watkins et al, 2002). The traditional passive learning assumes that learners are best taught by giving them knowledge and allowing them to assimilate this on their own as opposed to active learning approaches that rely on a more social process; this has become a more favorable approach recently (Schultz, 2011). As can be seen in Figure 3, Bloom's taxonomy could be seen as moving learning from a passive approach to a more active approach in learning.…”