EVALUATING STYLES AND STRATEGIES IN E-LEARNING Elena COCORADA, Gheorghe SCUTARU, Mariela PAVALACHE-ILIE, Sorin COCORADA Transilvania University of Braşov Bul. Eroilor Nr. 29, RO-500036 Braşov, Romania
[email protected] ;
[email protected] ;
[email protected] ;
[email protected] Abstract - The multiple virtues of the virtual environment include delivering a learning experience that is tailored to the learners’ individual needs and exclude teaching addressed to the average individual, whose peculiarities correspond to a learner’s robot-portrait. Considerable research has suggested that this approach can satisfy diverse needs: learning style and strategies, knowing pedagogical and practical struc6th Int. Conference on tures. The approach of learning styles has evolved from one-dimensional models to multidimensional ones, progressively including other personality or environment traits as well. This paper differs from previous Emerging e-learning works through approaching learning styles separately from learning strategies. As an innovative element, Technologies the study also uses psychological tools that accomplish the diagnosis of certain personality features which and Applications are strongly involved in learning: self-efficacy, anxiety, and locus of control. The findings confirm the exThe High Tatras, Slo- istence of a multidimensional typology of learning styles with our respondents. It is influenced by personvakia ality features which correlate with some of the components of the learning strategies. Nevertheless, the September 11-13, 2008 correspondence styles-strategies is only partial. Keywords: e-learning, learning style, pedagogy
1. INTRODUCTION For the benefit of European citizens, three major goals will have been achieved by 2010: to improve the quality of education and training systems, to ensure that education is accessible to everybody, and to open up education and training to the wider world [12]. In this context, e-Learning is an important tool because it has introduced different and adequate opportunities for Y generation, as compared to the traditional education, thus responding to the accelerating global competition and delivering more effective learning experiences [1][10]. The virtual environment is not only a tool, as it becomes an interaction space, where digital technology mediates communication and influences processes between individuals or groups of individuals, and collaborative learning [5][9]. The multiple virtues of the virtual environment involve delivering a learning experience that is tailored to the learners’ individual needs [7][15] and exclude teaching addressed to the average individual, whose peculiarities correspond to a learner’s robot-portrait. In order to ensure that education is accessible to everybody, the research in the last years of the 20th century focused on the learner, without disregarding external factors organized in the didactic situation [2]. Depending on the learning style and on other peculiarities, each student will then be directed to a particular version of the module content designed and of the learning scenarios [14]. Considerable research suggests that this approach can satisfy diverse needs: learning style and strategies, knowing pedagogical
and practical structures [20]. The learning style is a distinctive manner, habitual patterns to learn. Numerous tools have been created in order to diagnose learning styles, classified in [6] in styles determined by the pedagogical environment, by the encoding manner and the ways to manage information, starting from experiential learning or certain personality theories. The need to go beyond the one-dimensional approach has triggered the elaboration of the concept of complex learning style, named sometimes profile learning. Starting from this idea, first two dimensions of the style are proposed, measured by means of the computer: the verbal-imagistic one – tendency to represent information either under a verbal form or as mental images, and the global-analytical one – tendency to organize information either as a whole or in parts/ sequences [19]. Other research has emphasized the students’ tendency to approach information in various manners, which refer to learning strategies, defined as ingenious plans consisting of several operations which favor the best accomplishment of a goal in a situation whose peculiarities are known [13]. According to [17], some students prefer the holistic/ global approach (comprehension learners), and others prefer sequential strategies (operation learners). Students who are successful in both styles are called versatile learners. Reference [18] proposes an approach of the learning style which brings it close to the learning strategy, measuring the preferences for different teaching-learning methods/ techniques: projects, memorization, pair-learning, debates,
games, individuals study, programmed learning, lectures, simulations. Simultaneously with the use of unidimensional or bidimensional typologies of styles, other approaches have drawn on personality research, such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, which includes extroversion-introversion or the preferred thinking type in defining styles. Research on learning styles/ profiles from the last decade of the 20th century, considered as promising, focused on underlining the multiple connections existing at the personality level (learning style and strategies, intelligence, personality traits) which guarantee a greater accuracy regarding the students [16]. Regarding the relationship between students’ learning style and instruction, research has showed that students’ achievement increases if instruction meets their learning style. The studies show individual learning style would influence students’ perception of the learning environment, interaction, responsive ability and achievement [11]. Other researchers have found out that students with different academic achievement perform different learning styles and have different expectations from the teachers. Students’ satisfaction and attitude outcomes were significantly different for format: students in the small group were more satisfied, while those using the individual learning situation were more strongly agreed that they controlled the pace and sequence of their own instruction [3]. This paper differs from previous works in that it approaches learning styles separately from learning strategies and includes psychological tools that accomplish the diagnosis of certain personality features which are strongly involved in learning (self-efficacy, anxiety, locus of control), as well as introversion-extraversion and intelligence diagnosis. In what follows, the research design will be presented (the second section), followed by the findings and their discussion, and by concluding remarks in the last section.
2. THE RESEARCH DESIGN When conducting the research, we took into account the evolution of psychological research, differentiating the tools which diagnose learning styles from those which help us identify learning strategies. A. Purpose and Hypothesis The general objective of the research is represented by the identification of the learning styles/ profiles and strategies, personality factors and needs of the students who benefit from e-learning. The following subordinate hypotheses were derived: H1. It is possible to define a typology of learning profiles, resulted from special combinations of the researched dimensions. H2. Learning styles are evolutionary; the students in advanced years of study exhibiting a stronger orientation towards independence regarding the teacher and the context, reflection and production. H3. The typology of learning styles/ profiles is influenced
by certain personality features. H4. Learning styles vary according to the respondents’ gender, girls tending to be more dependent on the teacher and on the socio-affective context, but more rational and, implicitly, less impulsive. H5. The use of learning strategies is influenced by learning styles and gender. B. Tools Three categories of tools have been used, in accordance with our purpose, and the research in the field: some of them regard learning styles; others are guided towards learning strategies and others towards personality traits, including intelligence. 1.In order to diagnose the learning style, a multidimensional inventory has been used, drawn up by the authors by adapting a model taken from [3]; our Multidimensional Inventory of Learning Styles (MILS) comprised 27 yes-no questions, organized according to six dimensions: visual - auditory, field dependence - field independence, dependence – independence regarding the psychoaffective context, production - consumption, impulsivity – reflection, sharpening- leveling Auditory – visual: categories which are differentiated according to the “habit” to evoke images of a certain kind [3]. Field dependence – independence, proposed in [3]: those belonging to the former category do not isolate the relevant information from the irrelevant one in solving problems, while the latter category prefers to select relevant information. Example: When performing a laboratory experiment: a. You feel somehow lost, you need clear instructions; b. You prefer to be free, to have initiatives, to make your way by yourself. Dependence – independence of the psycho-affective context: the tendency to reject or to accept information entirely or, on the contrary, the acceptance or rejection depending on the person the information comes from [6]. Production – consumption: categories which are differentiated according to the tendency to invest all the energy, irrespective of the stakes vs. tendency to protect oneself. Impulsivity – reflection proposed by [6]; reflection corresponds to the preference for slow, deliberate evaluation of hypotheses and impulsivity to quick reactions and answers regarding certain issues. Example: When you have to answer a question: a. You give a quick answer, even if you may be wrong. b. You regret the others have just verbalized what you also had in mind but did not dare to say. Sharpening – leveling: people from the former category give emphasis to differences between objects, the latter prefer to evoke similar elements [13]. Example: In a discussion: a. You are more interested in differences, you like to underline contradictions.
b. You are satisfied when you find what you have thought yourself, because you feel protected. 2. In order to investigate learning strategies, a self-report questionnaire has been used, devised by the authors of the article - Multidimensional e-Learning Questionnaire (MeLQ) – comprising 17 multiple-choice close questions (Q1 – Q17), and organized on dimensions: a) Learning strategies which regard: group work (Q4, Q6, Q12, and Q15), organization of the content to be learned, preferred methods (Q5, Q7, Q8, Q11, Q14, and Q16), and preferred assessment (Q13, Q17). b) Perception of the advantages and disadvantages in computer-mediated communication (Q9, Q10). c) The factual data, collected in the items Q1-Q3 and they focused on age, gender, school level. The questionnaire was not formally validated. One item is presented as an example: Q…. Which of the following best suits your learning habits? (Please select only one!) a. starting from the first chapter and progressively going through the next chapters b. reading only the chapter that I want to learn and leave the others for later c. trying to understand the end of a chapter, the examples and questions, never reading the rest d. looking for keywords (by using the search engine of the site or the index of a book) and then studying the results. 3. In order to identify personality factors, classic psychological tests have been used: STAI-Y for anxiety (Spielgerberg), self efficacy (Bandura), locus of control (Rotter), extraversion-introversion (Eysenck) and B53 for intelligence. C. Sample All instruments have been applied on a sample of 176 respondents (139 boys and 37 girls); 60.4 % of the boys and 51.4 % of the girls are under 20 years of age, while 39.6 % of the boys and 48.6 % of the girls are over 20. They are first (68.1%) and second year (32.8%) students in the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computers.
3. FINDINGS The presentation of the findings for the entire sample represents the guiding point starting from which statistically significant differences were mentioned, in point of gender, age, other variables etc. A. Dimensions of the Multidimensional Inventory of Learning Styles The analysis of the correlation coefficients between the six dimensions of the inventory for determining the profile of the learners indicates the lack of any connection between the dimensions „visual – vs. auditory” and „field dependence – field independence” and the other four. The relationships identified between the other four dimensions of the learning styles allow us to trace profiles which differ through the preferred behaviors in learning
According to the scores, the respondents have been grouped in three classes: A class, where the scores for independence, sharpening, production and impulsivity are higher than m+1σ (a profile we call Multi-Independent), the opposite C class, where the scores are less than m-1σ (a profile we call Multi-Dependent) and a B class, placed around the mean (m+1σ). The percentages for each of the three classes approximate a normal distribution: 13% class C, 66% class B and 21% class A. Tab. 1 Correlation coefficient in learning styles Dimensions of learning styles Dimensions 1 2 3 4 of learning styles and traits 1.Dependence r* -0.255 –Independence p>** 0.001 of the psychoaffective context 2. Production r 0.228 0.273 – Consumpp> 0.003 0.001 tion 3. Impulsivity r 0.228 0.189 – Reflection p> 0.003 0.016 4. Sharpening r -0.255 0.273 0.189 – Leveling p> 0.001 0.001 0.016 5. Extravertion r 0.199 – Intraversion p> 0.011 6. Anxiety r 0.203 0.197 p> 0.009 0.012 7. Self effir -0.161 0.521 0.219 0.329 cacy p> 0.041 0.001 0.005 0.001 *r – correlation coefficient **p – significance level The A category (Multi-Independent profile) comprises students more independent of the psycho-affective context (i.e. they are more sensitive to information than to the way information is conveyed, they have school results that do not vary from one teacher to another); the more sharpening they are, in other words, they tend to underline what is different in objects which are similar. They are active learners, invest a lot of energy in their work, have numerous personal projects (productive), are impulsive, react quickly to problems, and are quick to suggest an answer which can be sometimes wrong, inhibit analytical, deliberate reflection. The students from the A group are more extrovert than the ones from the C group (t=3.72, p=0.000), have a higher feeling of self-efficacy (t=5.33, p=0.000) and are slightly more anxious (t=2.000, p
