Some children require quiet while concentrating on difficult information.

Others literally learn better with sound than silence.

For the latter group, words without lyrics provide a more conducive-to-concentrating atmosphere than melodies with words, and baroque music appears to cause better responsiveness than rock.

Similarly, although many people concentrate better in brightly illuminated rooms, others — particularly young children — think better in soft light than in bright light.

Note however that fluorescent lighting often over stimulates certain learners and causes hyperactivity
and restlessness.

DETAILS THAT TEACHERS NEED TO KNOW

Differences in temperature affect certain children. Some achieve better in warmth and others in cool.

Similar differences are evidenced with varied seating arrangements.

Some prefer studying in a wooden, plastic, or steel chair, but many others become so uncomfortable
in conventional classroom seats that they are prevented from learning.

The reason for this is that few educators are aware that, when a person is seated in a hard chair, fully 75 percent of the total body weight is supported by four square inches of bone.

The resulting stress on the tissues of the buttocks causes fatigue, discomfort, and frequent postural change — for which many youngsters are scolded on a daily basis. Only people who, by nature, happen to be sufficiently well-padded exactly where they need to be, can tolerate conventional seating.

Everywhere that teachers teach, they testify to the fact that boys tend to be more hyperactive and restless than girls, and seating arrangements contribute to this phenomenon. However, when students were permitted to learn and/or take tests in seating that responded to their learning style preferences for either a formal or an informal design, they achieved significantly higher test scores when matched, than when mismatched, with their preferences.

It is highly suggested for teachers to redesign conventional classrooms with cardboard boxes and other usable items placed perpendicular to the walls to permit quiet, well-lit areas and, simultaneously, sections for controlled interaction and soft lighting. Permit students to work in chairs, on carpeting, bean bags, or cushions, and/or seated against the walls as long as they pay attention and perform better than they have previously.

Turn the lights off and read in natural daylight with underachievers or whenever the class becomes restless. Establish rules for classroom decorum as you feel comfortable, e.g., no feet on desks, no shoes on chairs, and do not distract anyone else from learning. You also may require better test grades than ever before.

SOCIOLOGICAL PREFERENCES

In a research on cooperative learning (Slavin, 1983; 1988; Johnsons, 1982), it was found that there appears to be discrepant outcomes where no clear small-group strategy produced better results than another, due to intervening variables inherent in the research designs, settings, subject areas, and evaluation measures.

Cooperative learning did not expose students to a variety of sociological experiences so that they then can determine whether, indeed, all children perform best in cooperative small groups. Their designs do not permit analysis of how well individuals achieve when permitted a variety of treatments and whether those same children consistently perform best in one condition or another.

Another concern is that they do not address initial teaching to determine how effectively children can teach themselves, versus learning with peers, versus learning with adults, versus whether they learn best in the same way consistently when learning new and difficult information for the first time through their learning style strengths.

In the researches (Cholakis, 1986; DeBello, 1985; Giannitti, 1988; Perrin, 1984; Miles, 1987) done using the learning styles method, it was found that when students’ sociological preferences were identified and the youngsters then were exposed to multiple treatments both congruent and incongruent with their identified learning styles, each achieved significantly higher test scores in matched conditions and significantly lower test scores when mismatched.

In the three studies where attitudes were included as a dependent variable, those also were significantly higher as an outcome of matched conditions. In the one investigation where an interaction effect did not occur (Cholakis, 1986), the population had been comprised of students who had attended a parochial school for their entire education.

The researcher suggested that the history of strong authority orientation of those youngsters may have skewed the results. However, those students learned equally well in both conditions.

It was found that students learn more and like learning better when they are taught through their identified learning styles. We have to teach students to teach themselves by capitalizing on their learning style strengths — of which sociological preference is only one variable.

For teachers, assignments can be done with specific objectives and/or tasks, telling the class that this can be done alone, in a pair, or a team of three, or with the teacher, wherever comfortable in the room and can’t be of nuisance or bother from classmates.

We strongly recommend however, that Team Learning and Circle of Knowledge — specific small-group strategies to teach and to reinforce difficult information — should become an integral part of the class’ repertoire prior to permitting sociological choices. These strategies enable students to work efficiently either alone or in a small group for a lengthy period of time. They, thus, allow teachers sufficient time to teach the smaller group without interruption.