Coping with Different Learning Styles
Everyone learns differently. For example, some people may prefer to learn how to do something by experiencing it while others prefer to learn how to do something by reading or listening to an explanation. Richard M. Felder and Linda K. Silverman of North Carolina State University have identified four dimensions of learning styles: active-reflective, sensing-intuitive, visual-verbal, and sequential-global. I'd like to focus here on the sequential-global dimension.
According to Felder and Silverman, sequential learners prefer to learn things in sequence. In other words, they like information to be presented in a logical order. Unlike global learners, they don't need to know how what they are learning relates to other things they know. Global learners, on the other hand, prefer to know the "big picture" first, then learn the details. They feel comfortable receiving information in random order and at some point, they are able to suddenly understand the connections between the individual details.
Because all teachers have different teaching styles, it's important to understand your particular learning style and find ways to help yourself when your professor's teaching style doesn't match your learning style. There are some things that global and sequential learners can try to do better in their classes. The majority of people are sequential learners. As a result, information in most courses is presented in a sequential order. However, some professors tend to present information in random order while they lecture. This would probably not bother a global learner, but sequential learners might feel lost and confused. They might benefit from attempting to outline their lecture notes in logical sequence after class. It might also help sequential learners to meet with teachers or classmates weekly to ask them to provide any missing steps in their lecture notes.
Global learners understand and remember new information better when they know what they are about to learn and how the information relates to other things that they already know. For example, if they are learning a new verb tense in a language class, they might want to understand the meaning of the tense and how it relates to other tenses before they are taught how to form the tense. Often, a professor will provide a syllabus, an outline of the topics that will be taught in a course. It may be helpful for global learners to refer to their syllabi before each class to see what topics will be covered that week.
While some people may be very strongly global or sequential learners, others may fall somewhere along a spectrum, or range, of this learning style dimension. Whatever your place on the spectrum, knowing what your learning style is can help you learn more efficiently and remember things better.