If you read our post last Friday, you might know about the debate over learning styles. Sachin Maharaj argues that teaching to different learning styles has not been proven to help students. The complicated part is that Howard Gardner, the scholar whose work the theory of different learning styles is generally (incorrectly) attributed to, has also recently come out against the theory, as Maharaj explains. If you didn’t get the chance to read his article in the Washington Post, Gardner discusses the “lexical terrain” surrounding learning styles, multiple intelligences, and a host of other terms that are often conflated and calls for more research on the effects of learning styles.

What’s interesting is that, despite the debate, what Gardner advocates for in the conclusion of his article is a multimodal approach that still attempts to reach as many students as possible by appealing to multiple strategies. Gardner offers three pieces of advice for teachers:

1.       Individualize your teaching as much as possible. Instead of “one size fits all,” learn as much as you can about each student, and teach each person in ways that they find comfortable and learn effectively. Of course this is easier to accomplish with smaller classes. But ‘apps’ make it possible to individualize for everyone.

2.        Pluralize your teaching. Teach important materials in several ways, not just one (e.g. through stories, works of art, diagrams, role play). In this way you can reach students who learn in different ways. Also, by presenting materials in various ways, you convey what it means to understand something well. If you can only teach in one way, your own understanding is likely to be thin.

3.       Drop the term “styles.” It will confuse others and it won’t help either you or your students.

Are these practices you incorporate in your teaching? What do you think the term “styles” adds/subtracts from these strategies?

To read more of Gardner’s original article, visit the Washington Post here.