Self-Knowledge Series 02: How Do You Learn?

11/06/17 • 5 min

I remember clearly being in school and being taught about learning styles. The teacher went through the model taught to her, which boiled down to auditory, visual or kinaesthetic.

Auditory being people who learn best by hearing something,
Visual best by seeing or reading something,
Kinaesthetic best by doing something.

It made sense to me that I must be a Visual learner, given that I was the designated class cartoonist, at least when there was a Rugrats character to draw.

Later, I learned that this was just one of many (supposedly there are around 70) models to describe our preferred learning style.

It's also possible - in fact very likely- you have a mixture of styles. Some may be best used in certain circumstances. For example, learning how to put an Ikea wardrobe together requires different processing than learning a language.

Plus, you can develop or change your preferences over time: in fact 1 did this through listening to podcasts. Now, I process audio - with or without accompanying images - way better than I did at school.

I still think it's useful to explore learning styles, and not just the ones you think you have a preference over. It's useful not just to help you learn stuff more effectively, but to communicate better with others,

When you know what style someone else prefers, you can accommodate them. It's something I try to take into account in my online courses, as well as when I'm coaching someone or consulting with a client.

If I pickup that they're a visual/spatial learner, I scribble down images to represent my ideas, or use visual analogies to give from to my sometimes vague and floaty concepts.

Or if they're kinaesthetic I try to slow my speech a bit. This is another weird factoid: apparently kinaesthetic types speak slower.

There are 7 styles that I like to take into account now, which gives a slightly more detailed range of preferences than I was taught at school.

Visual - with pictures
Auditory - prefer using sound
Verbal - with speech & writing
Kinaesthetic - doing with your body, touch
Mathematic - using logic, numbers, systems
Social - in groups
Solitary - alone

I dig deeper into these learning styles in today's episode, and what knowing your learning style might mean for you.

I remember clearly being in school and being taught about learning styles. The teacher went through the model taught to her, which boiled down to auditory, visual or kinaesthetic.

Auditory being people who learn best by hearing something,
Visual best by seeing or reading something,
Kinaesthetic best by doing something.

It made sense to me that I must be a Visual learner, given that I was the designated class cartoonist, at least when there was a Rugrats character to draw.

Later, I learned that this was just one of many (supposedly there are around 70) models to describe our preferred learning style.

If I pickup that they're a visual/spatial learner, I scribble down images to represent my ideas, or use visual analogies to give from to my sometimes vague and floaty concepts.

Or if they're kinaesthetic I try to slow my speech a bit. This is another weird factoid: apparently kinaesthetic types speak slower.

There are 7 styles that I like to take into account now, which gives a slightly more detailed range of preferences than I was taught at school.

Visual - with pictures
Auditory - prefer using sound
Verbal - with speech & writing
Kinaesthetic - doing with your body, touch
Mathematic - using logic, numbers, systems
Social - in groups
Solitary - alone

I dig deeper into these learning styles in today's episode, and what knowing your learning style might mean for you.

Previous Episode

Self-Knowledge Series 01: Your Past

The point of this mini-series is, quite simply to help you discover more about... you.

Self-knowledge is arguably the most critical catalyst in personal development : how you manage your energy, how you interact with others, where your strengths lie... Not to mention a key player in business success.

When you know yourself, you can make decisions more effectively, have greater clarity on where you want to go, what you want to be doing, and how you do it best: when you're at your most creative.

Ok, so if you're not sold just yet, what if I told you I could make this self knowledge super simple: breaking every aspect of the journey down into easy to digest podcast episodes?

Well, hopefully that's enough to convince you: it's happening anyway.

I'm pushing pause on interviews for a wee bit while I run this Self Knowledge for Creative Introverts mini-series and over the next 10 weeks I'll be guiding you through the ultimate self-knowledge series.

We'll tackle:

Your past - what has made you, you
Your learning style - how you take in and absorb information
The way you experience the world & process information (N/S, HSS, HSP)
Your love language - how do you receive and give love
What inspires you - what fuels your creative fire
The way you make decisions
The environment you thrive in
The way you get stuff done
Your 'shadow' self
Your dreams - what you (really) want

Find the workbook mentioned here: http://wp.me/p5bc9S-29k

Next Episode

Self-Knowledge Series 03: How Do You Experience The World?

Already I know this is going to me one of my favourite episodes in this self-knowledge series.

The way we experiences the world is... kind of everything. From the moment we’re pushed or pulled out of our mum’s baby-maker, we’re dealing with sensory information and how we respond to that is amazingly individual.

Even from those early years, we start exhibiting clear signs that some of us are experiencing the world in very different ways. This depends on both how we’re wired neurologically and biochemically, as well as what particular environment we’re being raised in.

More on determining factors later, but for now I want to talk about the different categories psychologists and smart people in lab coats have given us to describe how we might experience the world around us.

In every case, I’m willing to bet there is a sliding scale, just like introversion and extroversion, someone can be at the very end of the scale, or somewhere closer to the middle.

Links mentioned:

Are you an Intuitive or a Sensing Type?

Myers Briggs Type Indicator

Are you a HSP?

Are you a HSS?

Can you be a HSP AND a HSS?