Recently my
views about those who are multimodal have been extended. Here is my current
thinking.
Multimodal
preferences dominate the database for all populations and it clearly the most
used set of preferences when making decisions about learning. Usually one third of respondents are in
the four-part V, A R, K set and another large group complete the three and
two-part modalities. This dominance can be disappointing as some people feel
that their special characteristic have been „lumped¾ into a largely
undistinguished category and inappropriately recognised. It also means that
teachers and coaches may be at odds as to how they might help people with those
preference sets.
Those who have
a multimodal approach to learning and decision making are now seen in two
groups with a indistinct boundary or transition between them. Some act
like those people with a single preference except that they have two three or
four „single¾ preferences. They look at the information that has to be learned
or conveyed to another person and choose the mode that they believe is the best
one for that situation. In a sense they are context specific choosing the mode that best fits the
need. For example, if they are signing a legal document they
"switch on" their Read/write preference. If they have to learn
a physical skill they will use their kinesthetic preference to work with it, to
try it and to become practical. This group switches from mode to
mode and they have the flexibility to adapt to a number of different modes both
incoming and outgoing. They may
sometimes choose a mode incorrectly and when working with them we need to be
aware of the mode that they have chosen. We can match their mode or suggest
that they switch to a more appropriate one. Blank looks and inappropriate
feedback will indicate that they are out-of-sync. From the VARK Questionnaire
this group tends to have a low total score –somewhere between 16 and
25.
This second
group within the multimodal category uses a number of their modes (2, 3 or all four) in combination, to make
decisions and to learn and to present materials to others. They are
uncertain about any learning that comes in only one way and they want to
reinforce it by adding other modes of input or output. For example in a
college or university setting they may gather some of the ideas from the
teacher¼s oral explanations, and some from discussing and questioning their
colleagues. They may add to this by using the textbook or by thinking about
some practical applications of the new idea they have learned. They may
also use their visual preference to draw some form of schematic diagram of the
material to be learned. Together these choices use V, A R and K and
only then are they satisfied that they really understand something. In a
cocahing scene they may want to check out any print instructions by chatting
with the coach or other athletes
or they may want to map out their response in some diagrammatic way. Often they
will want to step through a sequence of visual, oral or written instructions in
some physical or quasi-physical way.
Some,
may criticise them for taking a long time to make a decision. That is
because they are being careful and gathering a wider view before acting. This
group tends to have total VARK scores above 30. You
may recognise their need to examine things from
many perspectives. They may
act and decide slowly which may annoy someone who acts quickly and wants to move
on.
This group
takes longer to become confident about their learning because they have to
gather in all two, three or four modes to really understand something. They are
not contnet with half-learning something. The pay-back is that, when they
do so, their understanding of their new learning is more versatile and more
sure than those with only a single preference. This is an advantage if
they have to express or hand on their learning to others (say, as teachers)
because they will have a deeper and wider understanding of it. They can
see things from many perspectives. The disadvantage that this group has is
that they may not be able to gather in the many ways that would be satisfying
so they often half-learn new material and it is not fully understood.
If their teacher or coach uses only one mode to explain something – say a
Read/write teacher who uses a text book most of the time or a coach who
only demonstrates a technique, - they may have difficulty learning that
skill or information. They are unlike those with a single preference
because they are reluctant to act on a single mode. They worry about missing
other perspectives on a problem or „making a major decision on insufficient
evidence¾. In one study of students who asked for help from a learning centre,
a high proportion were multimodal V A R K. Some complained that they did not
get enough teaching. Others said there was not enough variety in their
learning.
Another clue to
multimodality might be in the order in which people gather information.
Maybe they always begin with something written or maybe they start by trying it
themselves before asking for help from others. This may indicate that
within their VARK multimodality there is a primary mode and that they use the others only
as support. They could redo the questionnaire and select only one answer
per question. It may indicate a primary preference within their multimodality
but even so. they should not base their learning on that alone as they need all
preferences - 2, 3 or 4.
Recently I have
noted some similarities between the work done by the
Swedish theorists Marton and Saljo who pioneered the approaches-to-learning theories. Their idea was
that learners approach a learning task in one of three modes.
Some approach their learning with the intention of
fully understanding it just as one would if you had to teach it next
day to somebody else. They are similar to the second group
above. They want a „full understanding¾ The second categorisation
in Marton and Saljo's work were those who approached
their learning in a surface or superficial way. They merely
wanted to skim through the tasks and get a
very simplistic understanding of it. The third group
in this categorisation were strategic learners - those
who approached their learning using strategies that would get
them a successful outcome. They would learn only enough
to satisfy their need for a B-Grade or whatever.
These learners are probably like the VARK multimodals Type
One above who select material according
to the context and their need. This research often gets
wrongly stated as deep and surface and strategic learning. Marton and Saljo state that it
is the approach that is deep, surface or strategic not the
learning.
Neil D Fleming