Essay Sample about Learning Styles

For this week 2 overview I connected most with the concept of student learning styles and the topic of accommodations. When watching Howard Gardner’s learning styles video, I understood how I could be helping students when it comes to activities and homework and how I can implement these student learning styles into my lesson planning.  When it comes to lesson planning, I must understand that there is not just one single way that a student can learn, in fact there are seven ways that students learn. 

The first one being interpersonal learning in which students enjoy interacting with other students such as small study groups and peer to peer tutoring sessions in order to help them process the information better. The second learning style is intrapersonal leaning also known as solitary learning, which can be independent learning without distractions and a quite room. The third being kinesthetic learning which is when students enjoy movement and exercise when learning, having physical activities for them to do. The fourth is verbal learning in which students enjoys having roundtable discussions with other classmates as well as classroom debates. The fifth learning style is the visual learning style in which students enjoy seeing how problems are solved through diagrams as well as flow charts. The sixth learning style is logical learners which is best explained as students who enjoy getting right to the point having simple and reasonable and logical explanations as possible. The seventh and final learning style is auditory learning, when students make the most out of rhythms and music in order to process information much better through connections.

I connected most with understanding these seven learning styles in order to better help my students be able to absorb and understand the lessons at hand much better. Accommodating to what students enjoy best when learning is beneficial to helping a student be successful. I believe I resonated with this topic most because when I was in middle school, I was told that there are only three learning styles, auditory, visual, and verbal learners. I knew that though I fit into one of the three many others did not and now I know that there or more learning styles that describe most I can properly know when one child learns much differently than another. 

One other concept that I connected with was accommodations, I believe that the accommodations video was correct in saying that accommodations are a right not a privilege. I believe that each student should have equal opportunity to learn and be assisted as much as possible when needed. I personally have not had anyone in by family have any type of disability in which assistance is required but I do believe that I connected with this topic because I have seen a handful of occasions in which children with disabilities have been seen as being treated better because of accommodations that needed to be done for them. Though other children at young ages may not know of disability that may need assistants, adults do and many I have seen do not properly explain or give reasoning unto why children without disabilities cannot get the same treatment as those with. 

I have reaffirmed my goal of becoming a teacher by reading each lesson planning tip. I think of the topics that I connect with and the topics beyond that and I think that I want to be a teacher that inspires her students by the way that they are being taught. I believe that each student should be given the chance to learn the material at the pace and comfort that they enjoy. I know that even though building relationship skills with other classmates is fundamental and convenient, I never really enjoyed it. I would have rather work on my own than with anyone else, maybe it was because I was always stuck with doing all the work or simply because I like to concentrate and complete the task at hand to the best of my ability but I want to allow students to make their own decisions when it come to the way they like to learn as well as what accommodations they would need to feel more comfortable when completing work. 

Four components of lesson planning are motivation, procedures, closing, and connections. Motivation is how I can get the students to engage and be excited to learn, what will they enjoy most learning from or with. As a future educator I want to help students be motivated to learn, learning what motivates them or what they look most forward to when a task is complete or what their favorite character, they enjoy can help me determine what materials I would need to keep the students engaged. I believe that the same can be said with procedure, knowing how to approach a new topic or idea can be done by speaking to the children with ideas and thoughts that will catch their attention. Knowing how children engage and learn can help me benefit when lesson planning to better understand the type of procedures I can take to apply in the classroom. 

Closing is recapping what we as a classroom have accomplished, how I will tie all things to the lesson at hand. I believe that lesson planning has much to do with closing a lesson plan, making sure that the students wont instantly forget what we have learned but rather go home and come back to school and remember the work that we have done the previous days. Just like motivations and procedure going hand in hand, I come to realize that closing and connections go hand in hand as well. Connections is finding ways to make the work you did inside the classroom relate to the real outside world. I realize that so much of lesson planning is the planning part and anticipating what will be next but just as important is connections, making students remember what they learned though examples they can find at home or any place outside the classroom. I think that closing supports my plan to teach by helping student not just understand the material but realize that learning is much beyond inside the classroom but rather ideas that can be seen other places as well but helping them to not only enjoy seeing those connections but also help each student remember and practice the material, they have learned each day. 

Much of what I believed lesson planning was, consisted only of what happened inside the classroom. I thought that an educator’s plan to teach students was only for what happened and what was learned at a desk indoors, but I have learned otherwise. I have come to realize that much more goes into lesson planning such as how students can carry what they have learned and apply it to real life situations or how can we keep the children engaged and motivated to learn. Understanding how much more time goes into planning these lessons has not just made me realize that teachers do more than what is told to us as learners, but also has reaffirm me in wanting to become an educator as well.