Knowing your learning styles (how you like to learn) can help you
be more successful with your studies by incorporating your brain's
natural learning preferences into your approaches to studying and
learning.
So how can you find out how you like to learn?
The VARK questionnaire will help you identify your learning
preferences, focusing on the following areas:
• Visual (V): Visual learners prefer to learn
information via charts, graphs, flow charts, and other symbolic
means that instructors use to represent what could have been
presented in words.
• Aural / Auditory (A): Learners who have
auditory preferences like to "hear" what they are learning and learn
best from lectures, tutorials, tapes, group discussion, speaking,
web chat, and talking things through.
• Read/write (R): Some learners prefer to
receive information through words. Not surprisingly, many professors
have a strong preference for this modality. This preference
emphasizes text-based input and output-reading and writing in all
its forms.
• Kinesthetic (K): By definition, this learning
style refers to the "perceptual preference related to the use of
experience and practice (simulated or real)." In plain English,
kinesthetic learners like to learn through hands-on activities,
either in real-life situations, such as work-based learning, or in
simulated lab environments.
The VARK questionnaire is short-only 13 questions-but the
information that it will give you is invaluable to helping you
succeed in college. You may take the VARK questionnaire online or print a PDF version of the VARK
and score yourself.
Please Note: Learning styles, or preferences, are not the
same as learning disabilities, dyslexia, or other neurological
disorders. If you have any concerns about your learning abilities or
have further questions, please contact a counselor.
Take the online questionnaire
