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The problems and pitfalls of 'learning styles' theories
There is enormous intuitive appeal in the idea that teachers should pay closer attention to students’ learning styles: by diagnosing them, by encouraging students to reflect on them and by designing teaching and learning interventions around them. A further impetus to interest in learning styles is given by government policy that aims to develop the necessary attitudes and skills for lifelong learning, particularly in relation to ‘learning to learn’ and personalised learning. Some learning styles theories describe learners extending their skills and strategies, developing creativity, analytic thinking, intuitive thinking, reflective thinking and experimentation – key foundations for productivity and economic growth. A team at Newcastle University surveyed the field of learning styles and identified the most important and influential theoretical models, assessed the reliability and validity of the instruments developed from these theories and evaluated the extent to which they offered interesting, new or practical implications for teaching and learning. Finally, we examined the evidence that using learning styles inventories with learners and changing teaching methods based on these results had an impact on achievement or motivation (Coffield et al, 2004 a & b).We found several significant problems which affect the learning styles field, although some models were significantly more successful in avoiding these pitfalls than others. There is an emphasis away from learning on to learner characteristics, underplaying the importance of acquiring subject knowledge and skills and obscuring the differences between learning cultures in different subjects. The theoretical and practical applications of many of the leading models are either under-researched in educational contexts or mired in controversy. None of the models we reviewed passed all of the ‘good test’ criteria of reliability and validity, with the result that one cannot use a learning styles instrument and be sure that all items are measuring what they intend to, that results will be the same if the test is taken again or that results can predict how someone might approach a learning experience in the future. Most disappointingly, we found little good evidence to suggest that teaching influenced by the idea of learning styles has a significant effect on achievement or motivation.‘Matching’ versus ‘extending’Overall, we concluded that the implications for teaching and learning which spring from learning styles models are not new: many researchers do not go much further than suggesting that a variety of teaching approaches could benefit students. However, theorists do differ considerably in terms of what teaching should do for a student with a particular learning style,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], with views along a continuum from ‘matching’ teaching and learning styles to extending students’ repertoire of skills.The ‘matching’ hypothesis stems from a belief that individuals are unable or unlikely to change their learning style, with the result that teaching should follow on from diagnosis and match their style of learning. The advantage is that a ‘type’ of student can be identified and a specific curriculum designed for them. However, the strong emphasis on diagnosis and matching makes it likely that learners will accept labels and be reluctant to move beyond their ‘comfort zones’ to develop new skills or styles. This could have the effect of closing off areas of experience for lower-achieving students, particularly since some of these style ‘diagnoses’ appear to correlate strongly with low attainment.So far, there has been little empirical work that explores the extent to which aspects of personality that are more amenable to change interact with more fixed traits. As a result, it is unclear how to use greater understanding of personality to inform teaching and learning, though new developments in our understanding of the fluidity of motivation, including the recent work of Apter, suggest that the personality theorists are developing a more variable model of the role of personality in learning.The theorists we placed at the other end of our continuum tend to emphasise the process of learning as one of a complex engagement between external factors such as the curriculum, environment and culture of a course or institution, innate habits and dispositions and lived experience. Kolb’s influential concept of the learning cycle has stemmed from this focus on dynamic change.A red herring?Policy documents and inspection reports increasingly refer to the diagnosis and matching of learning styles as an example of ‘good practice’. The DfES has quick guides to the use of learning styles which lean heavily on visual, auditory and kinaesthetic modalities. As a result,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], you may well find that there is an expectation that you should be making use of them in your teaching, despite the current lack of hard evidence that they will improve students’ performance or motivation. Our research would suggest that learning styles are, at best, only one part of a series of essential and related elements of learning and thinking and at worst a red herring. The theories which underpin the better models of learning style have the potential to provide teachers and learners with concepts of learning which can be both motivating and liberating. In this respect, the theories are greatly superior to the instruments which follow them, since they can all be misused to label or limit learners. For further information see: Coffield, F,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], Moseley, D, Hall, E and Ecclestone, K (2004) Should We Be Using Learning Styles? What Research Has to Say to Practice. London: Learning and Skills Research Centre. Coffield, F, Moseley, D, Hall, E and Ecclestone, K (2004) Learning Styles and Pedagogy in Post-16 Learning: A Systematic and Critical Review. London: Learning and Skills Research Centre.
The exclusionThe head teacher wrote to the parents of R and F telling them that neither R nor F could come back to school, but that they would be given help in completing their course at home. He should, of course, have told the parents immediately, ideally by telephone followed by a letter, of their right to make representations to the governing body.

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