Multiple Intelligences and Learning Styles

Hello everybody....

Do you know what are the different between multiple intelligences and learning styles.Learning styles is a term used to describe the attitudes and behaviours, which determine an individual's preferred way of learning. Most people are not aware of their learning style preferences (Honey & Mumford, 1992). Learning styles are usually more intrinsic, part of the learner’s inherent personal traits, whereas learning approaches are more externally driven by other factors, i.e. overload, assessment method, etc. This however does not mean that learning styles cannot be modified. Students can easily become bored and frustrated if the teaching method is only tapping into one types of learning style, as most classes have students with a range of learning style preferences.

In addition to intelligence, personality is the second dimension of individual traits. Students have different natures and personalities, each having a set of specific qualities. The concept of style is associated with individuality and invariably used to describe an individual quality, form, activity or behaviour sustained over time. Just as students have different personalities, they also have different styles of learning. For example, students differ in the way they learn the names of people they meet. If they learn better when they see it written down, they may be a visual learner, a person who learns best by seeing or reading, they may be linguistic learner. If they learn a name better by hearing it they may be an auditory learner. The manner in which a person habitually approaches or responds to learning tasks is defined as their personal learning style (Riding & Rayner, 1998).

Two main categories of individual traits in learning that are consistent over the long term can be identified: intelligences and style. Comparing intelligences to style, individual differences in intelligence refer to the ability with which one can do something, whereas styles refer to preferences in the use of abilities. Much research has been conducted on the integration of learning styles in the design of adaptive educational systems. In contrast, there is much evidence to support the concept of intelligence as a predictor of learning performance. Instead with intelligence, there is much debate about how intelligence can be measured and on the concept of a single general intelligence level where all abilities are correlated. Critics argue that good or poor performance in one area in no way guarantees similar performance in another and that the full range of intelligent behaviour is not completely captured by any single general ability (Snow, 1992; Sternberg, 1996).

With the explanation above, i hope you will understand about the learning styles.... bye... see you again.