Learning Style Assessment

I gathered data from twenty-one students to assess each child’s learning style. From the

Venn diagram shown, one can see that nine of the students are auditory learners, three are visual

learners, and three are tactile/kinesthetic learners. However, these are just the students that fell

into one category. There were several students that had more than one learning style. Two

students were a mix of auditory and visual. Another two students were both visual and

tactile/kinesthetic, while one more student was a combination of auditory and tactile/kinesthetic.

To top it off, there was just one student that fell into all three categories. These results are very

interesting because of such a high percentage of the class being auditory learners. It is also not

often that a person gets categorized into each learning style.

From what I have observed and learned about these children in the classroom, I believe

that the findings accurately fit the students. By implementing the learning style assessment, I

now have learned their specific needs and what form of instruction would suit them best. From

the findings of the assessment, it can be determined that a majority of the class benefits from

having directions orally given and to learn new ideas through discussion. However, there are a

handful of children that would not benefit solely from this type of instruction. There are several

students that are visual and tactile/kinesthetic learners. Visual learners would greatly profit from

pictures or videos more than anything else, while tactile/kinesthetic students would prefer to

learn by using movement, such as drawing or acting something out. By learning each student’s

learning style, I could shape lessons and activities to their strengths.

I have already seen examples of lessons and activities shaped to the student’s needs. My

placement teacher, Mrs. Williams, whether aware or not, would implement activities or lessons

that applied to different learning preferences. According to my observations, Mrs. Williams does
a lot of read aloud and discussion work with the whole class. Not only does this help visual

learners who can read along, but it supports auditory learners who require sounds and talking it

out over images to learn. This simultaneously helps students that are either visual or auditory

learners, or those that are in between. Mrs. Williams also provides lessons that target

tactile/kinesthetic learners as well. For many activities, Mrs. Williams uses technology that

requires hands-on use, such as iPads, which allows the students to do more than read or write.

This is another example of how an activity ties into more than one style, because using iPads also

helps students that identify with visual learning.

 True Colors Assessment

In this assessment, the data shows that the majority of the students that were able to take

the survey (thirteen students) have Orange personalities, with eight students falling under this

category. The second highest are the Blues, with three students. Lastly, there are two students

that are Greens. Surprisingly, no students identified with a Gold personality. Unlike the learning

style assessment, there were no students that under multiple categories.

This information seems accurate to the students that were polled. Many of the students

that are Oranges, especially the boys, are rambunctious and active. In my observations, I can see

that the Orange students happen to be the students that are the loudest and get out of their seat

the most, which is fitting for an Orange personality. On the other hand, the students that are the

Blues seem to equally fit into this specific group. During my observation, the two girls that are

classified as Blue took every chance to work in collaborative groups and they also had calm-and-

collected personalities. There were two students that were sorted into the Green personality. One

of which I think definitely fits into this group, while the other, I think, does not. The one that

does not fit should most likely be an Orange. He is a boy that is usually out of his seat and makes

the most noise in the class. Like a true Orange, he is energetic and charming. The other student

that is most definitely a Green is a girl that is analytical, inquisitive, and persistent. In my

observations I noticed that she also likes to always be right; on many occasions, I would hear her

get into heated debates about whether Harry Potter or Darth Vader would win in a duel against

each other. Overall, many students, except for the boy that identified with Green but should be

Orange, agreed that their color was an accurate description of themselves.

What this assessment has taught me is that a teacher could easily devise activities that fit

to these students’ needs. I have learned that with a majority of the class being Orange lessons
that are more hands-on and interactive would be appreciated. An example of this is when I

carried out my play center in the class. For a portion of the play center, I required the students to

design their own flower out of tessellations. One student, who happened to be an Orange, made

the most intricate and creative flower, constructing it into a three-dimensional shape. I have also

learned that the Blues prefer group work and cooperative learning, much like the girls described

above that take every chance to work with others. The Green student(s) would differ with this

and would greatly benefit from independent activities. Something that I realized doing this

assessment is that although students may identify more strongly with one color, they exude

characteristics from all the colors. This means that even if you are directing a lesson or activity at

one color personality, all the students will get something out of it.
 Sociograms

Sociograms are more difficult to decipher than a learning style or True Colors

assessment. In my classroom, I asked two questions for the sociograms. The first was “pick three

people you would like to work on a project with” and the second was “pick three people you

would like to play with at recess.” These two questions can assess the dynamics of the

classroom, determine any cliques, and find students that might be loners or isolates.

For the “project” question, one can get a sense of who are friends within the class and

who are thought of as the smart ones. You can also see who the “trios” are. Within the boys,

there were two trios that formed and the girls had just one. One of the first thing a teacher wants

to do when forming groups using sociogram information is to break apart these trios, because

they usually are clique-y and might not get work done.

The red lines represent students that wanted to work with students of the other gender. At

this age, students usually like to keep to their own gender. In this case, there were six instances

in which students asked for the opposite gender. A lot of them went to one girl, T.C. However,

this isn’t an ordinary girl. She looks, talks, dresses, and acts like a boy. So it is easy to

understand why boys would feel comfortable requesting her to work with.

There are also three isolates within this sociogram, two are girls and one is a boy. For one

of the girls and the boy (L.S. and H.), I am sure as to why this is. These two are the strugglers of

the class and I believe the slowest learners. It makes sense that no one would want to pair with

them to work on something requiring a grade. As for the second girl, I only have a slight idea as

to why she is an isolate. I know that she has many friends in the class, but I have seen that when

doing group work, she is usually off task or unwilling to do much work.
 For the other sociogram that posed the question about recess there were similar results.

Once again, there were several trios, with one amongst the girls and one in the boys. There was

another interesting trio of sorts that is composed of the students D.G., N.B., T.E., and T.C. All

four of these students picked each other, so there are about three trios within these four students.

I have seen these four students work together many times; they seem to really get along and

actually get work done. The fact that they all identified as auditory learners in the learning style

assessment might have something to do with this. Although this sociogram dealt with recess, the

information about these four students might be useful when forming groups for projects or

activities.

There were less gender cross overs for this sociogram, with the only person being picked

by the opposite gender being T.C. This makes sense, however, because girls and boys usually

play differently on the playground, with boys being rougher than girls.

Once again, there are some isolates. There are two for this sociogram, and both of these

students were isolates for the previous sociogram. From my observations in the classroom, these

two students are socially awkward and do not seem to have friends.

There are numerous interpretations that can be taken from sociograms. As a teacher, the

question pertaining to projects says a lot about how to group students for activities or partner

projects. For example, I would know not to place the students in the trios together. I would also

do my best to give the isolates their first pick of who they would like to work with to try to boost

their confidence, give them a chance to socialize, and perhaps improve their popularity. As for

the seemingly popular children, the ones that had the most arrow towards them, such as C.B. or

T.C., they might be more versatile to move around in groups because many students would be

willing to work with them.

 Using this Information to Address Needs of Students
The point of obtaining data and information from assessments such as learning style,

True Colors, or sociograms, is for teachers to learn and decide what methods will best address

the needs of their students. Teachers can do this on a whole class, a targeted population, or

individual student level. By utilizing the assessments given to children, teachers can have a solid

understanding of the students’ strengths and weaknesses and learn how to fine-tune lessons to

play to these assets and incorporate play-based learning into the curriculum.

The best way to address the needs of the class as a whole with play-based learning is to

differentiate the class. By differentiating the classroom, a teacher can directly focus on the

students’ needs based off of their learning style, True Colors, and sociograms results. A teacher

can choose to devote an entire lesson to just one type of learner. For instance, Orange students

are usually competitive and energetic. Having a lesson that plays into that competitiveness would

greatly benefit these students. A sports-based or game show centered lesson, such as Family

Feud or Jeopardy, would be perfect. On the other hand, instead of focusing an entire lesson for

just one type of learner, a teacher can differentiate with play by splitting the class up into groups

that correspond to their needs. This can be done either based on interest (using True Colors) or

based on learning preference (using learning style). An example of using play with preference-

based learning is to have several different activities laid out that each concentrate on a different

style, such as auditory or visual. Then allow the students to choose which activity they wish to

complete and thus appropriately fitting to each students’ needs. Each activity is concentrated on

a single standard, but is structured differently to appeal to multiple learners. An example of this

is if a teacher is doing an activity where the whole class is focusing on vocabulary, a specific

group activity could apply to tactile/kinesthetic learners and have a cluster of these learners play
charades to guess the words. There are countless ways to use techniques that associate with the

data collected from assessments.

By bringing play into activities along with differentiating the class, a teacher can meet the

needs of the students, whatever their learning style may be. Sociograms can enhance the aspect

of play by looking into the dynamics of the students in the classroom and on the playground, and

seeing who can cooperate with whom and who can play well with each other. Both of the

sociograms focused on “projects” and “recess” can do that job. Play-based learning combined

with learning styles and personality type can increase interest and involvement in lessons by

appealing to students as well as making it fun to learn. By facilitating and incorporating these

assessments into play-based learning, a whole class can succeed and enjoy learning at the same

time.

Play-based learning and assessments can also be used for a targeted population within the

classroom. In Mrs. Williams’s class, I would focus on the girls for this area because teachers

usually tend to ignore girls and focus on boys without realizing it. First, I would not split the

class into boys versus girls because that would only encourage a divide between the genders.

Instead, I would split the class just like any other differentiated activity, based off of interest,

learning preference, or even readiness and ability. I would also try to put an equal number of

boys and girls into one group because students are usually inclined to stay with others of the

same gender. This would boost cooperation amongst the genders. As for the activity, I would

endeavor in an activity that requires every student to have equal talking or attention time, while

still making play the main focus. For example, this could be done by a competitive game where

each student is required to participate by taking turns solving a puzzle or math problem. This

way every student, and consequently every girl, gets a chance to have a voice heard and chance
to participate. Many times, boys will dominate a conversation or group. By doing an activity that

demands for equal participation, then girls get a say, too.

Lastly, by utilizing the techniques that have been applied to the previous two categories a teacher

can help and encourage one specific child in the classroom. In Mrs. Williams’s class, there is on

student that I believe needs more help than the rest. L.S. is a girl that struggles enormously

within the classroom. She is an inclusion student, and based off of my observations and

assessments done with the class she does not put much effort into her work. When watching L.S.

do the True Colors and learning style assessments, I saw that she did not read any parts of the

surveys. She simply checked off random lines for the learning style assessment. She did not

seem to care about the assessment, she only wanted to be done with it. For the True Colors, she

did not even attempt to do it, I think because it required too much work. The only assessment I

believed she really tried on was the sociograms, most likely because it was simple and easy to

do. This worried me because if she is not interested in completing the surveys, then does how

much effort does she put on actual assignments in the class? This tells me that L.S. needs

activities that interest her and are appropriate for her level. This can be done by implementing

activities where the students can choose what they would like to do. This is helpful since I do

know actually know L.S.’s learning style or True Colors because of her refusal to cooperate. By

making activities fun with play, L.S. may be more inclined to put forth effort into her work.

Sociograms would also help in this aspect. Since L.S. is an isolate, it would be beneficiary to put

her with her top pick. By pairing her this way in a group, this can motivate L.S. to complete an

assignment and encourage her to socialize with others. A teacher would have to experiment and

go through trial and error to place a student like L.S. into an appropriate group based on learning

style or personality characteristics, as well as what kind of play would help her to prosper. I
believe that her learning type would eventually show through. Students such as L.S. are the

reason that a teacher applies and utilizes the information gathered from these types of

assessments not only for the best interest of the whole class, but for every individual. A teacher

should want every student to succeed and by implementing surveys that assess a student’s

learning preference or personality, then that only gives a teacher more ways to make that success

happen.