This document provides an overview of different learning styles and how to apply them. It describes 9 learning styles: linguistic, interpersonal, modelling, intrapersonal, visual, mathematical/factual, kinaesthetic, auditory, and intuitive. Each style is associated with a different learning type and has unique characteristics. The document gives examples and techniques for how to effectively apply each style in learning and training contexts. Overall, it advocates recognizing and accommodating different styles to maximize learning for all individuals.

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Learning Styles
Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
Learning Styles
TRAINING SKILLS

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Training Skills
MTL Course Topics
The Course Topics series from Manage Train Learn is a large collection of topics that will help you as a learner
to quickly and easily master a range of skills in your everyday working life and life outside work. If you are a
trainer, they are perfect for adding to your classroom courses and online learning plans.
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ARE YOU READY?
OK, LET’S START!

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INTRODUCTION
Each of us has a particular style of learning, or mix of styles,
which we develop as we grow to suit the ways in which we
prefer to receive information from the world around us.
When we are able to identify our own style and the styles of
those we train, it means we can concentrate on how people
prefer to learn and so speed up the learning process. It also
means we can identify the ways people won't learn readily
and so design appropriate learning strategies that will
minimise the risk of failure.

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LEARNING STYLES
Educationalists such as Howard Gardner agree that, to
maximise the learning that everyone is capable of, more
recognition needs to be given to the different styles in which
people prefer to receive information. To train in one or two
styles only is the overriding reason why many people dislike
learning: it does not suit their learning style.
There are nine identifiable learning styles. These are:
1. the linguistic
2. the interpersonal
3. the modelling
4. the intrapersonal
5. the visual
6. the mathematical/factual
7. the kinaesthetic
8. the auditory
9. the intuitive.

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LEARNING TYPES
Although we are all capable of learning in a variety of ways,
each of us has one particular way in which we prefer to
learn. These ways create the nine learning personality types:
1. The Organiser whose preferred style is linguistic
2. The Interacter whose preferred style is interpersonal
3. The Adapter whose preferred style is modelling
4. The Discoverer whose preferred style is intrapersonal
5. The Picturer whose preferred style is visual
6. The Authority-seeker whose preferred style is
mathematical/factual
7. The Performer whose preferred style is kinaesthetic
8. The Reactor whose preferred style is auditory
9. The Natural whose preferred style is intuition.

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THE LINGUISTIC LEARNER
The linguistic style of learning is the learning style favoured
by our schools and colleges: the written and spoken word.
Books, handouts and written materials figure prominently in
the linguistic style of learning.
Learning type: The Organiser
Features: The Organiser likes to learn in a reasoned, logical
and linear pattern. Words enable the Organiser to do this.
For the Organiser, learning has to be planned and
structured. When an Organiser is trainer, courses have clear
aims, plans, and inputs. The Organiser trainer is a good
speaker and information is presented in a well-structured
style. Organisers tend to speak fluently often as if the
material were taken from the pages of a book. Their inputs
are neatly structured with beginnings, middles and ends,
and hold together well using sequences, steps, diagrams,
models and word-games.

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LEARNING BY THE BOOK
Linguistic learners are at home when surrounded by words:
in libraries, bookshops or their home study.
The following techniques will help a linguistic learner to
remember material: reading relevant books; quotations,
proverbs and sayings; mottos, slogans and catchphrases;
word games, anagrams, crosswords, quizzes; acronyms,
synonyms; keeping a written diary of the training;
mnemonics.
The linguistic learner is also a recipe learner. The recipe
learner is someone who likes to obtain "recipes" or
prescriptions of the best way to do something, whether
baking a cake, sowing seeds or changing a car tyre. The
recipe provides a step-by-step routine reflecting best
practice and a guaranteed outcome.

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THE INTERPERSONAL
The Interpersonal style of learning is based on learning with
others. It is group learning.
Learning type: The Interacter
Features: Interacters learn best when they are with others.
They like to check out what others think first.
Groupwork is the natural home of the Interacter. They are
intensely interested in other people's histories, feelings and
views, contact, news and gossip being the primary way in
which they learn what's going on.
Trainers who themselves are Interacters usually hit it off
with their groups straightaway. They will remain close to
their groups thoughout a course, even opting to stay with
them during meal and break times. Interacters find it easy to
communicate with any group. They quickly detect the right
idiom to use. Feelings flow quickly between an Interacter
trainer and their group.

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CO-OPERATIVE LEARNING
Learning in small groups - co-operative learning - has many
advantages over other forms of learning.
1. Small groups usually consist of people of equal status,
hence, discussion is freer and safer
2. When we work in small groups, we have no choice but
to take part. Small groups help us to articulate our views
and get involved.
3. The group is one of the best ways to solve problems
that are too complex for individuals to resolve by
themselves
4. The small group encourages comparing and copying.
5. Although copying is frowned on in traditional learning,
such as in school, it is an important way for adults to
learn.
6. Small groups that work together grow closer together.
The 12-minute rule confirms this. If you wait for 12
minutes, someone else in the group usually says what
you were going to say.

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MODELLING
Modelling means learning from others. It is what we do
when we learn from our parents as babies and infants. It is
also the way we learn when we join a new organisation or
group.
Learning type: The Adapter
Features: Adapters like to merge into any situation, tune in
to what is important to know and do and then adapt this for
their own benefit. Because of this, they appear to be very
quick learners although they have no original ideas.
Adapters don't need real role models; they can construct
mental images of the ideal person in their heads and adapt
to that instead.
One of the best examples of an Adapter learner was the
film-maker, Walt Disney, who took old stories, fairy tales and
children's stories and adapted them to the new medium of
the cinema.

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ROLE MODEL LEARNING
Anthony Robbins, the American guru who likes to be known
as "the peak performance consultant", was called in by the
US Army to improve the success rate of its four-day
marksmanship course. Until that time there had only been a
70% pass rate. Although Robbins had never fired a gun, he
reduced the course to one day and increased the pass rate
to 100%.
To achieve this remarkable feat, Robbins decided to identify
the army's most accurate marksmen. He then studied just
what their beliefs were, just how they were sure they would
be successful, what tips, tricks and knacks they consistently
used, how they stood, how they prepared and so on. These
successful performers were then used as the models which
others could copy.

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INTRAPERSONAL
Intrapersonal learning is reflective and deeply-felt learning.
It involves thinking things through to come up with
meanings that make sense to you personally. Thinking is one
of the important steps in experiential learning models.
Learning type: The Discoverer
Features: Discoverers wonder why things are the way they
are and work hard to get to the special meaning of
something. They like to discover things that nobody has
thought of before: making new connections, finding new
ways of seeing, being creative.
Discoverers tend to be loners. They like a quiet closed-off
environment where they can be at home with their
thoughts - alone in the car, wandering through the
countryside, a quiet corner at work.
Moments of sudden awareness - "ah-ah" moments - are the
key moments of learning for them.

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INVENTING
Millionaire James Dyson is the only British inventor to
appear in the list of Britain's wealthiest people, the so-called
Rich List. Dyson's inventions include the Ballbarrow and the
Dyson hoover which vacuums without the need for a dust-
bag.
Dyson's inventions are the result of noticing how things are
and thinking about ways to do things better. He says:
"The idea for the Ballbarrow came when the wheelbarrow I
was using on our first house kept getting stuck. I thought:
why not a barrow which wet concrete won't stick to...“
Dyson traces his learning style to being turned off traditional
learning at school:
"I hated being taught facts by rote. I wanted to experience
reality rather than being told about the abstract."

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THE VISUAL
The visual medium is the most prominent learning style of
our age. We live in a visual world where people are
influenced by what they see others doing and by what they
see on film, picture and image.
Learning type: The Picturer
Features: The Picturer learns by putting together pieces of
what he or she sees until a picture forms and makes sense.
Everything has to fit in. Picturers are great hoarders of
information: of all the learning types they like to acquire
knowledge. This is because without a piece of information,
the picture may be incomplete.
Picturers are endlessly curious both of abstract and actual
information. They like to know what's going on and are
equally attracted to theory and facts. They are frequent
attenders on training courses which they like to attend in
case there is some piece of information they haven't yet
acquired.

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IMAGERY
Imagery is the tool of peak performers. When a basketball
team in the United States were told to spend half their
training time visualising their moves and the other half
trying them out, they out-performed a control team that
spent all their training time on physical moves.
1. Imagery allows you to learn about places you cannot go
to in person: outer space, the insides of the body, a
computer circuit
2. Imagery helps you remember lists of items by
connecting each item with a visual image and
remembering that instead
3. Imagery is a way to reach your goals. If you visualise
yourself doing what it is you're aiming for, you give your
brain a blueprint of what is has to achieve.
"Every man takes the limits of his own vision for the limits of
the world." (Arthur Schopenhauer, 1788 - 1860)

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THE MATHEMATICAL
Those who like mathematical/factual information as a way
of learning information are seekers of certainty and
authority. Many are scientists who seek absolute truths
about our world.
Learning type: the Authority-seeker
Features: Authority-seekers prefer to learn from
authoritative sources, such as historical and verifiable facts,
authority figures, such as teachers and trainers, and
authoritative information, such as laid-down rules and
regulations. On training courses, Authority-seekers like to
have the rules spelled out and will always defer to the
trainer as authority figure.
Authority-seekers are more comfortable with facts and
policies than with open-ended subjects. They may feel
threatened in a facilitative, trainee-centred style of learning.

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THE % GAME
The % game is an exercise that will appeal to those who like
a mathematical-factual style of learning.
In "The % Game", teams devise a list of questions which
they then put to others. For example, in a Time
Management course, questions might be:
1. How often do you get interrupted in the course of a day
at work?
2. Where are you when you get interrupted?
3. Who does the interruption come from (eg manager,
colleague)?
4. How long does the interruption last?
5. How do you usually deal with it?
When everyone on the course has been questioned, the
replies are analysed and turned into bar charts, pie charts,
graphs and statistics.

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THE KINAESTHETIC
The kinaesthetic style of learning is learning by doing. It is
the starting point on the experiential learning cycle.
Learning type: The Performer
Features: Performers like to learn by getting involved. They
are good amateurs, dilettantes, Jacks and Jills of all trades.
They have a broad range of interests with appreciable
knowledge and skills in everything they do.
Performers are active learners. They touch others to get
their attention; stand or sit close to people; are fidgets and
doodlers; and need to visit places at first hand to remember
them. Performers like to move through a course at a fast
pace, acquiring information and practice as they go. They
cannot wait to try things out, although some new interest
may intervene before they get the chance.

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THE CONE OF EXPERIENCE
Edgar Dale's Cone of Experience is based on research into
how well we remember information when it is taught in
different ways. Active participation comes out as the most
effective way of receiving information with reading the least
effective:
1. up to 100% retention: doing it
2. up to 90% retention: simulate reality
3. up to 80% retention: role play
4. up to 70% retention: making a presentation
5. up to 60% retention: participating and discussing
6. up to 50% retention: watching a demonstration
7. up to 40% retention: watching a film or video
8. up to 30% retention: watching others
9. up to 20% retention: listening to others
10. up to 10% retention: reading.

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SOUNDS
Sounds play an important role in learning. Sounds were
probably the earliest way we learnt about the world from
inside our mother's womb, hearing her heartbeat and the
muffled sounds of the world outside. Sounds create moods
of different intensity, provide a means for passing
information and stimulate us to respond.
Learning style: The Reactor
Features: Reactors learn by responding to stimuli around
them, sounds being the most pervasive of stimuli in our
environment.
The phone is an important means of connecting for a
Reactor: they like to receive calls and respond, as well as
make calls. Reactors also enjoy the excitement of discussion
and debate, especially if it is loud and argumentative.
Reactors like to study with music playing in the background.

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MUSIC AND LEARNING
Researchers at the University of California have found that
brief exposure to classical music can have a strikingly
beneficial effect on the IQ of trainees. After listening to 10
minutes of Mozart's Sonata in D major, the IQ scores of a
test group rose by an average of nine points.
Dr Georgi Lazanov has found that the baroque music of
Handel, Pachelbel, Vivaldi and Bach is timed at 60 beats a
minute, the same as a resting heart rate. This music
synchronizes our minds with our bodies. Both British
Airways and Swissair use this kind of music to welcome
passengers on board their planes.
With such music in the background, the effects on trainees
is to create a more relaxed and productive state: muscles
relax, brain waves slow down and pulse and blood pressure
decrease.

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INTUITIVE
Intuitive learning is learning that is based on an instinctive
awareness of what works best in any situation. It is the kind
of awareness we describe when we have a gut feeling about
something and know that something is right without
necessarily having the evidence to prove it.
Learning type: The Natural
Features: Naturals are those who are at home following
their own instincts and moods. They learn at their own
pace, in their own way, in their own time. It is their
unhurried and natural approach that allows things to
happen as they should. Much of their learning is the wisdom
of the plain-speaker, the common-sense person who sees
things as they are without the need for a text-book or
theory.
"I have but a woman's reason - I think him so because I think
him so." (William Shakespeare)

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INSTINCT
When we learn about the world naturally, trusting our
instincts and intuition, and seeing what is there we may, to
the learned, appear simple-minded, like the homespun film
hero Forrest Gump. But the simple, spontaneous, common-
sense kind of learning is often the most perceptive.
Q: Why do birds fly south for the winter?
A: Because they do.
Q: Why do people in organisations struggle to get on?
A: Because that's what happens when you make people
work with each other.
Some things simply defy dissecting and are better for it.
"It is only when we forget all our learning that we begin to
know." (Thoreau 1817-62)

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THAT’S
IT!
WELL DONE!

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THANK YOU
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