Learning Styles and Approaches

1. Learning Styles and Approaches How is this a predictor of your success in medical school and long- term as a physician? Nancy B. Clark, M.Ed. Director of Medical Informatics Education

2. Learning Styles and Approaches • What are your characteristics? • What do those scores mean? • How can you leverage knowing your characteristics to…. • Study efficiently and effectively • Form the most effective study group • Prep for the boards • Select the right specialty

3. Goals of Understanding LS • Short Term • Self aware • Succeed in med school • Form cohesive, productive study groups • Adapt to new learning situations • Maintain Sanity • Long Term • Life long learning • Select right specialty • Work well with healthcare team • Teach students • Educate patients • Clinical competence

4. Development -- Piaget Toddler Adult

5. Adult Learning Theory • Adult Learners • Build on their experiences • Accept responsibility for their own learning • Self-directed; typically not dependent on others for direction • Learning takes place • in context of a problem to be solved • when questions are answered • the issues are applicable to work/career • when it doesn’t take too much time http://www.qotfc.edu.au/resource/?page=65375

6. Transfer of Learner Control Faculty Doctor High Control of Learning Low Faculty Student Time Medical School Residency

7. Inventory of Learning Styles Felder-Silverman Model Decision Active Reflective Perception Sensing Intuitive Sensory Reception Visual Verbal Organization Sequential Global Weak 1-3 Moderate 5-7 Strong 9-11

8. Active vs Reflective • Tend to retain and understand information best by doing something with it—discussing, applying or explaining it to others. • "Let's try it out and see how it works" • Like to work in group • Sitting through lectures hard • Usually Extroverts • Prefer to think about it quietly first • "Let's think it through first" is reflective learner's response. • Reflective learners prefer studying alone • Are quiet in group learning situations • Usually Introverts

9. Active vs Reflective • The majority of undergraduate students are Active • 83% of college student leaders were active • 65% of Phi Beta Kappas were reflective • Around 62% med students are Active • Majority of university professors are Reflective

10. Classes to Date

11. SensingvsIntuitive • like learning facts • like solving problems by well-established methods (logical) • dislike complications and surprises • want step-by-step instructions (linear) • patient with details (detailed) • Like memorizing facts and doing hands-on (procedures) work • more practical and careful than intuitors • don't like courses with no apparent connection to real world (concrete)

12. SensingvsIntuitive • prefer discovering possibilities and relationships • like innovation and dislike repetition • may be better at grasping new concepts • often more comfortable than sensors with abstractions (abstract) • tend to work faster and to be more innovative than sensors • don't like "plug-and-chug" courses that involve memorization and routine calculations

13. See the linkages in knowledge…

14. Sensing vs Intuitive • The majority of undergraduates are Sensing • 56% -72% college freshmen Sensing • 83% of national merit scholarship finalists were Intuitive • 92% of Rhodes Scholars were Intuitive • 75% of first year medical students are Sensing* Predictive of Passing Boards

15. Classes to Date

16. Visual vs Verbal • Visual learners remember best what they see--pictures, diagrams, flow charts, time lines, films, and demonstrations • 80% students are visual • Verbal learners get more out of words--written and spoken explanations • 20% are verbal

17. Classes to Date

18. Sensory Reception Preferences Auditory Visual Reading/Writing Kinesthetic

19. Organization-- Wertheimer Gestalt Theory Step 1 Step 2 Step 3 Step 4 … Big Picture Organization Global Sequential

20. Sequential vs Global • gain understanding in linear steps, with each step following logically from the previous one • follow logical stepwise paths in finding solutions • Majority of M1s are sequential • Detailed • 62% • learn in large jumps, absorbing material almost randomly without seeing connections, and then suddenly "getting it." • to solve complex problems quickly or in novel ways, but have difficulty explaining how they did it. • Want to see Big picture first. Do not like details.

21. Classes to Date

22. Personality Inventory -- Jung Myers-Briggs Orientation Extrovert Introvert Perception Sensing INtuitive Judgment Thinking Feeling Organization Judging Perceiving ENFP ISTP INTJ

24. Useful Resource Based on Types http://www.ttuhsc.edu/som/success/

25. Considerations for Specialty Selection • Specialty inventories not valid. • Lifestyle: call, free time, $, location... • Interest • Detailed versus global • Amount of patient interaction (E vs I) • Decision making style (active vs reflective) • Seeing results versus long term maintenance

27. Types and Specialty Selection • Women more likely than men to choose primary care. • Feeling more likely primary care than Thinking. • Intuitive more likely primary care than Sensing. • In non-primary care: more male, extraverts and thinking types in surgical subspecialties. Stillwell, NA, et al. 2000. Myers-Briggs type and medical specialty choice: a new look at an old question. Teach & Learn Med. 12(1), 14-20.

28. Hemispheric DominanceHerrmann • Holistic/Global • Random • Intuitive • Nonverbal/visual • Fantasy oriented processing • Creative • Linear • Sequential • Logical • Verbal • Reality based processing • List makers • Good spellers Left Brain Right Brain

29. Approach To Learning

30. Approach to Learning • More predictive of success in medical school than learning styles • Three approaches to learning • Surface • Deep • Strategic Newble, DI & Entwistle, NJ. (1986) Learning styles and approaches: implications for medical education. Medical Education. (20);162-171.

31. Surface Approach • Predominate Motivation • Passing the course • Fear of failure • Intention • Fulfill course requirements by reproduction • Gorge and regurgitate • Learning Process • Rote Learning: focus on tasks and pieces of information in isolation • Uses routine procedures and repetition to memorize facts and ideas • Outcome • Superficial level of understanding • Substantial knowledge of factual information “Is that going to be on the test?”

32. Deep Approach • Predominate Motivation • Interest in subject matter • Career relevance • Intention • Reach personal understanding • Learning Process • Relates evidence to ideas; details to big picture • Relate new ideas to previous knowledge • Read and study beyond the course requirements • Outcomes • Deep level of understanding • Integrated principles with facts • Uses evidence to develop arguments • Excellent problem solving skills • Success in medical school • Excellent physician with honed lifelong learning skills

33. Strategic Approach • Predominate Motivation • Making high grades • Competing with others • Intention • To be successful by any means • Learning Process • Whatever it takes to make good grades • Outcome • Variable level of understanding • Shallow, course specific knowledge • Depth of learning dependent on assessment strategies of courses and course requirements