QAA Podcast - Trickle Down Episode 13: Educational Fashions (Sample)

Episode Date: December 31, 2023

The root concept of “learning styles” is based on a simple and intuitive idea: different people most successfully learn through different means. Or maybe they best learn through different sensory or emotional inputs. Possibly because people with differing brains make them more receptive to certain ways of knowing and absorbing information. Some people managed to take this intuitive idea and build massively successful careers for decades. Students were labeled “Visual,” “Aural,” or “Kinesthetic” learners. The problem, as researchers discovered in the ‘00s, is that there’s no good evidence to suggest that any of the “learning styles” models popular with teachers actually improved educational outcomes. But that did little to slow the popularity of learning styles — or the mini industry built up around them. References McLaughlin, Dorene Casey EdD, "An Evaluation Case Study of the Effects of a Learning Style Awareness Program for Ninth Graders at an Independent School" (1996). Dissertations. 617. https://digital.sandiego.edu/dissertations/617 Furey, William, “The Stubborn Myth of Learning Styles” (2023) https://www.educationnext.org/stubborn-myth-learning-styles-state-teacher-license-prep-materials-debunked-theory/ Pashler, H., McDaniel, M., Rohrer, D., & Bjork, R. (2008). Learning Styles: Concepts and Evidence. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 9(3), 105-119. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1539-6053.2009.01038.x Sun X, Norton O, Nancekivell SE. Beware the myth: learning styles affect parents', children's, and teachers' thinking about children's academic potential. NPJ Sci Learn. 2023 Oct 17;8(1):46. doi: 10.1038/s41539-023-00190-x. PMID: 37848467; PMCID: PMC10582039. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37848467/ Coffield, F. (2004). Learning Styles and Pedagogy in Post-16 Learning: a Systematic and Critical Review. LSRC Reference, Learning & Skills Research Center, London. https://www.leerbeleving.nl/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/learning-styles.pdf Cassidy, Simon (2004) Learning Styles: An overview of theories, models, and measures, Educational Psychology, 24:4, 419-444, DOI: 10.1080/0144341042000228834 https://doi.org/10.1080/0144341042000228834 Rogowsky, Beth A., et al. “Matching Learning Style to Instructional Method: Effects on Comprehension.” Journal of Educational Psychology, vol. 107, no. 1, 2015, pp. 64–78., doi:10.1037/a0037478. “Belief in Learning Styles Myth May Be Detrimental.” PsycEXTRA Dataset, 2019, doi:10.1037/e504772019-001. Fleming, N., and Baume, D. (2006) “Learning Styles Again: VARKing up the right tree!”, Educational Developments, SEDA Ltd, Issue 7.4, Nov. 2006, p4-7. Knoll, Abby R., et al. “Learning Style, Judgements of Learning, and Learning of Verbal and Visual Information.” British Journal of Psychology, vol. 108, no. 3, 2016, pp. 544–563., doi:10.1111/bjop.12214. Nancekivell, Shaylene E., et al. “Maybe They’Re Born with It, or Maybe It’s Experience: Toward a Deeper Understanding of the Learning Style Myth.” Journal of Educational Psychology, vol. 112, no. 2, 2020, pp. 221–235., doi:10.1037/edu0000366. Hyman, Ronald & Rosoff, Barbara (1984) Matching learning and teaching styles: The jug and what's in it, Theory Into Practice, 23:1, 35-43, DOI: 10.1080/00405848409543087 https://doi.org/10.1080/00405848409543087 Learning Styles Network Resources Brochure https://web.archive.org/web/20050527165802fw_/http://www.learningstyles.net/2004/resource_brochure/resource_brochure.pdf

In 1996, a University of San Diego grad student published a study on the impacts of using learning styles in education. The study was conducted at an independent prep school in Southern California involved a sample of 76 ninth graders. The students were given a test that supposedly revealed their own particular method of learning and processing information, and the teachers were instructed on how to teach according to these learning styles. However, contrary to the researcher's hopes, the mean GPA of the students actually dropped from 3.2 to 3.1. It was an early clue of what would be confirmed years later through exhaustive analysis of the data.

There is no good evidence that teaching to learning styles improves educational outcomes. This is despite decades of promises that the concept of learning styles would revolutionize education. I'm Travis Vue, and this is Trickledown, a podcast about what happens when bad ideas flow from the top. With me are Julian Field and Jake Rockatansky. Episode 13. Educational Fashions.

Now, I am hard-pressed to think of a more important society-wide project than educating children. Education gives individual people the tools to engage with the world and pursue fulfilling lives. and it gives people common reference points to create a stronger, more peaceful society. And that resonates into the future as these children grow and have children of their own. So how we engage in the project of education has a huge impact on the world, not just in the next generation, but hundreds or even thousands of years after we're gone. So it's very important that teachers operate with the most effective pedagogy or method and practice of teaching.

So one would hope that over time, thanks to modern research methods, the pedagogy commonly used in classrooms would get better and more evidence-based over time. But today, I'm going to talk about a teaching method and philosophy that got very popular in the 80s and 90s and kind of remains popular to this day, despite the fact that the evidence in its favor is very thin. And in fact, in recent years, there's been evidence that it may be actively harmful. And that is the theory of learning styles in education. You probably have heard of it. So the root concept of learning styles is based upon a simple and intuitive idea, which is that different people most successfully learn through different means, or maybe they best learn through different sensory or emotional inputs, possibly because people have

differing brains, which makes them more receptive to certain ways of knowing and absorbing information. And some people have managed to, you know, build elaborate concepts based on this intuitive idea and build massively successful careers for decades. So, I mean, I assume you guys have heard about this, right? Learning styles. Yeah, I was briefly scared. You might be taking down Montessori, which is my mom's, you know, background, and I would have had to sick my dogs on you. No, no, no, not be talking about that today. Something that's kind of aggravating about reviewing the history of learning styles is that there isn't any reason to believe that the people who initially developed the concepts of learning styles were malicious. You know, there are usually, you know,

educational researchers who genuinely wanted to find new ways to improve education for as many people as possible. And they came up with these concepts which make sense like on a, you know, just a common sense kind of level. But these ideas became popularized and all of a sudden there were these financial incentives. And it turned into an industry in which people could make money by, you know, just a common sense. selling up placement tests, books, and courses on these learning styles. And all of a sudden, there was a reason to steer the science away from any indication that these learning styles techniques were actually working. And consequently, these ideas are still very hard to dislodge. When reading through the literature on the subject, I noticed that there's a huge disconnect

between how the fields of neuroscience and cognitive psychology think about the learning style concept and how educators think about it. Because in psychology, especially over the past, like, 15 years or so, there are really a ton of papers showing how there's really no good evidence to suggest that learning styles are valid or helpful in a meaningful way. It's gotten to the point where psychologists openly refer to it as the learning styles myth, or they categorize it as a popular neuro myth. Now, I think it's important to be clear about what researchers are criticizing when they talk about the myth of learning styles. They don't dispute that there are differences between students or there are instances where tailoring your teaching approach to the student can be helpful.

There are plenty of individual differences between students like intelligence, background knowledge, interest in the field. Researchers agree that teaching with these differences in mind can have a positive impact. Research also indicates that combining various educational methods like integrating text and visual aids generally enhances learning outcomes. This phenomenon is called the multimedia effect. However, modern research psychologists challenge the notion that individual students have specific learning styles and that tailoring education to a handful of specific preferred styles will notably enhance their academic achievements. In 2012, the Cognive psychologist Doug Roher and Hal Pashler published a research review about learning styles, which says this. It does indeed make sense to speak of students who, in comparison with their peers, have poor visualized.

spatial ability and strong verbal ability. But this does not imply that such students will learn anatomy better if their textbook has few diagrams. But the fact that there's no good evidence of the effectiveness of learning styles has had very little impact on the popularity of the belief all over the world. So researchers occasionally conduct polls asking if they believe in the learning styles, asking just how many people believe this. So surveys conducted in the United States, Turkey, Portugal, China, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom and Latin America suggest that the average rates of learning style myth endorsement among the general public and educators ranges from 80 to 95%. This is just one of these things that most people believe, despite the fact that there's no reason to believe it. Is this why, like, my entirety of growing up, people would tell me that I was a very visual learner. Yes. Oh, you're a more, you're a more visual learner. Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's exactly.

it. That's exactly it. That's basically a iteration or a manifestation of the learning styles myth. So, you know, you'd hope that teachers would be like, be wise about the pitfalls of learning styles myth. But actually, teacher training typically reinforces it. So in 2016, research conducted by the National Council on Teacher Quality revealed that two-thirds of teacher training programs mandated the integration of learning styles in lesson planning. Additionally, over half of the educational textbooks recommended considering students' learning styles. And these teachings seem to have a lasting impact. The study in 2017 investigating common misconceptions and neuroscience show that among 598 educators surveyed, 76% concurred with a statement that, quote, people learn

more effectively when information is presented in their favored learning style, and 71% agreed with the statement, quote, children possess learning styles that are predominantly sensory-based. It's very, I don't know, it's very weird. It's like, we're in this situation where it's like all of psychology is basically agree that it's not very good, but it's just something that even people, even educators generally do believe. Well, it's interesting because it takes a little bit of the responsibility I feel like off the educator, right? If somebody, something is, you know, a lesson isn't landing on a particular student, you know, you're going, oh, well, you know, it's because their learning, their learning style is different. I can't teach for all learning styles. You know, I have

come up with a sort of happy medium. I can't just draw pictures on the board for all the Jakes in the classroom. Right. Just the teacher being like, yo, this student's straight up stupid style. Yeah, it's like, yeah, I can't just blast like EMP waves about science through all the Julians in the classroom, you know, to penetrate their brain. Is there a way to get this Julian to shut up and stop making jokes in class? Is there a way to get them to just behave and, uh,

obey? Yeah, clearly he learns in the class clown style. Yeah, I'm the annoying style. Yeah, I need to, yeah, we need to figure out how to teach against the Jake and Brian sitting next to each other in the back of the class style. What's the style of student where they are asking for more homework? Because that style, I was always very resistant to their learning style. There are only two styles of students. There's the Stacey's and the Chads. That's true. And then, And then there's the dorks and everyone else. That's three already that you listed. So you don't, you, you're the not, not with the numbers style.

I can see. Yeah. Hey there. You've been listening to a sample clip of trickle down. This is a side project that I've been working on. It's a 10 episode series about misinformation and bad ideas that flow from high authority sources. I think it's fascinating.

And I mean, it's a way for, I guess, me to explore the way people, people who should know what they're talking about, don't always actually. I'm not going to lie, some of it's kind of a bummer, but if you're anything like me, that's actually more of a reason to dive into the subject matter. Like with the premium episodes of Q&N anonymous, all the episodes of Trickledown are available to people who support us through Patreon.

Still the same five bucks a month. Double the extra content, same price that we've been doing since 2018. We are inflation-proof. Inflation-proof. Thank you.