An Investigation Into Learning Styles And Its Implications For English Teaching

Learning styles are the habitual ways which individuals prefer in learning. Some people learn primarily with their eyes or with the ears; some people prefer to learn by experiences and/or by "hands-on" tasks; some people learn better when they work alone while others prefer to learn in groups. The theory of learning styles makes it possible for teachers to be aware of the differences in style preferences of the students to maximize classroom teaching. Meanwhile, it may help students know their own preferred styles and learn foreign language autonomously and effectively.The thesis investigates the perceptual learning styles of 81 students in Zaozhuang College, who are randomly chosen as the subjects. The main purpose is to find out whether there are differences in the perceptual learning styles between students from rural areas and those from urban areas, between male students and female ones, between English majors and non-English majors; and to what extent they are different; what learning styles are most preferred and least preferred by each group of students respectively. The results from the investigation provide rationale for English teaching program in our college and facilitate the matching between teaching styles and learning styles.This thesis includes five chapters. Chapter one presents the literature review, which begins with definitions of learning styles and other key terms related, and then comes the categories and the representative theories of learning styles, followed by the theoretical framework applied in this investigation. Chapter two concerns the research methodology. The objectives, subjects and the instrument employed are introduced as well as the procedure of the investigation. The data obtained from the investigation is put into the computer, grouped and analyzed with the aids of SPSS according to major, gender, and education environments ofstudents. PLSP (Perceptual Learning Style Preference Questionnaire) is administered in the investigation to collect data and to measure the responses from subjects. In chapter three, results from the investigation are analyzed and discussed. In an effort to understand the general distributive tendencies of the data involved, descriptive analyses are used to discover how learning styles such as visual, auditory, tactile, kinesthetic, group and individual learning are distributed generally among subjects. Independent Sample Test is made to compare the means of every two groups of subjects and examine how significant they are. The major findings of the investigation are as follow: the subjects in general prefer visual learning most, and group learning least; the students from rural areas prefer visual learning most while the students from urban areas demonstrate a balanced profile; male students prefer individual learning while their female counterparts prefer group learning; no big difference is found between English majors and non-English majors. Chapter four is concerned with the implications of the investigation for classroom teaching which include: discovering students' strengths and weakness in learning styles; training them to be autonomous and strategic for effective learning; raising instructors' awareness of individual differences and their own approaches to language learning and teaching; meeting and diversifying students' style preferences. Chapter five deals with the conclusions and limitations of the investigation.