By Christine Ciarmello-Richard

Why do some students learn and others don't?

That question has stumped many teachers and counselors. Lois Breur Krause became interested in the answer when her son's teachers categorized him as a slow learner.

"I could not convince his school that he needed to learn differently than the other kids," she says. "I was only a parent, after all. What did I know [about teaching and learning]?"

Krause decided to research learning on her own. Moving into full-time teaching in 1992, she quickly recognized that students process information differently.

Krause's book, How We Learn and Why We Don't, is written for students. Before beginning, readers take the cognitive profile inventory, which consists of 60 pairs of words. The results from the inventory let you know what your learning style is, or how you best learn. Krause has named four learning styles, or quadrants.

"If we put this information in the students' hands, each student can take responsibility for their own learning, without depending on their teachers to change the way they teach," Krause says.

"Kids are caught in the middle. Whenever I counsel students about this, their faces light up [and they say] 'you mean it's OK for me to be like that?' They've been hiding their study habits from their guidance counselors, who tell them they're not supposed to study that way."

Q: What is the most common learning style? And to what learning style do our schools cater?

A: Most of the adult population is either SF (sensor feeler) or ST (sensor thinker) dominant, or some combination of the two. Of these, SF tends to occur a little more frequently, I believe, based on observations but not real research. By this, I mean that more people are concrete learners and tend to make decisions based on emotional reasons more often than on analysis of data and information.

And although teachers, at the elementary level in particular, tend to be overwhelmingly SF, schools cater to ST learners. They build from details to the concept, part-to-whole learning. They require and test on and reward rote memorization of details (names, dates, places) rather than the understanding of concepts. And for the most part, they demand that students sit in straight chairs, in straight rows, work quietly and follow detailed instructions precisely in order to do it "right."

This is very characteristically ST. Anyone who doesn't fit this has something "wrong" with them and runs the risk of being at least scolded. SFs talk too much. NTs (intuitive thinkers) don't do all their homework. And NFs (intuitive feelers) daydream and lack organizational skills, or worse, are classified as learning disabled.

Q: Do you think teachers who are one type themselves are guilty of teaching in that style? Or do many teachers just ascribe to the popular ST mode of teaching without any awareness of how they are teaching?

A: Sometimes. More often, we teach as we were taught. Most don't even consider that the way they teach fits some students and not others. That's why I feel that what I'm doing is so important. If teachers first realize that there are differences in how individual children learn and then tailor their teaching to fit the variety of children's needs, many more children would be succeeding in schools.

Q: How do we develop our learning styles? Are we born with them? Are they shaped by the people around us? Or is it our first teachers that push us into a style of learning?

A: Good question. I think it's got to be a combination. It's tough to test for. I have frequently seen twins and other brothers and sisters whose profiles do not match. Parents are very aware that siblings don't do things alike.

However, a tendency to a particular profile certainly can run in families. In my family, my grandfather, father, brother, myself and my son and daughter are all in very NT dominant career paths. My brother and I and my son also show strong NF creative traits, which [come] from my mother's profile. Lots of families have lines of doctors, attorneys, teachers, etc., partly because it's expected but also because of natural talents.

Our teachers encourage us to develop skills in the ST quadrant in particular. Some students, depending on the strength of their desire to please, will spend energy to develop these skills. Little girls, with their innate desire to please the teacher, tend to develop more ST skills than boys. Boys develop ST skills a little later, in sports.

Q: Is there any evidence to suggest that certain learning styles dominate in students with learning disorders or in students with exceptional learning abilities?

A: [Psychologist Carl] Jung associated certain problems with certain quadrants. In each case, it's a dominance to an extreme, almost to the exclusion of the other quadrants in the profile.

Jung said that extreme STs tend to be obsessive compulsive, extreme SFs neurotic...extreme NTs paranoid...and NFs tend to lose touch with reality. In the case of the classroom, whatever doesn't fit with the ST behavior pattern can tend to get [a student] in trouble, and extreme cases are labeled as learning disabilities.

Q: In what grade do you recommend that students first become acquainted with their style? What about educators -- do you think they should know theirs?

A: I think kids [who know about the learning styles] can appreciate others' abilities when they work in groups. They get to know pretty young that some kids play better with others (SF), some prefer to play quietly alone (ST or NT), some kids are really good at planning out complex buildings and roadways with little cars or building sets (NT), etc. I think the terminology is premature before about fourth or fifth grade.

Educators need to learn their own so they can appreciate the differences among their students. What I teach teachers is to recognize the behaviors typical of each quadrant, to figure out their kids and to plan lessons that reach all types of learners.

Q: Is there a strong link between learning styles and majors and careers?

A: Very strong link. For some professions, it's a better than 99 percent significance level. Engineering majors are overwhelmingly NTs. Education majors are overwhelmingly SF. Business majors, on the other hand, are all over the place, perhaps because some are going into marketing or advertising (NF) and some into accounting (ST).

Q: I also was curious about the title of your book: How We Learn and Why We Don't. I wasn't sure I was clear on the answer to the second question about why we don't learn. Is it because schools are teaching in only one style? Or is it because we're comfortable in one quadrant and don't expand our skills?

A: When we don't learn, it is usually because we're trying to beat a square peg into a round hole, as in ST details into an NT brain. With time and work, we can develop those coping skills to work with teachers or professors or bosses who force us do things that aren't a perfect fit.

But for young kids, it's really tough. Far too many children who are not ST learners begin to think that because they can't memorize long lists of details easily, there is something wrong with them. They believe that their classmates who can recite details easily are smarter.

No one bothers to show them how to figure out the multiplication products. They are told to just memorize the table. And that's hard [for certain styles of learners].

The creative kids' desks and cubbies are messy, and they are scolded for daydreaming. They are made to believe they are dumb and they drop out of schools in record numbers. NFs are at the greatest risk for non-completion of the educational process, and among them are many of our greatest geniuses.

Even as older students and adults, if we believe we are supposed to study or work in a certain way, and that doesn't work for us, odds are we're not going to be happy or successful.

Knowing how our brain wants to learn and giving ourselves permission to read the end of the chapter first, or give up worrying about keeping the desk organized, or using the daydreaming to find creative solutions to problems -- all can make a major difference.

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