An Analysis on the Relation of Elementary Students' VARK Styles and Scientific Communication Skills

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to confirm correlation between elementary school students` VARK Learning styles test and Scientific Communication Skills through VARK questionnaire (version 7.3) for Youngers and Scientific Communication Skills Test. The subjects were 99 in 6th grade students of an elementary school located in Gyeonggi-do, Korea. The results of this study were as follows: 64% of the students had multiple learning styles, but only 36% of the students preferred a single mode of information presentation. Among students had a single mode preference, the aural ("A") was the highest unimodal preference. Among "V(visual)" mode, "A" mode, "R(read/write)" mode, and "K(kinesthetic)" mode, "A" mode was the commonest learning mode which students had. In Scientific Communication Skills Test, students` overall average was 26.19p [scientific explanation type (11.85p), scientific insistence type (14.34p)]. Girls` scores were higher than boys in scientific explanation type, but not in scientific insistence type. The scores by communication forms were Text (5.67p), Number (6.87p), Table (6.15p), and Picture (7.49p). Girls` scores were higher than boys in Text and Picture forms but not in Number and Table forms. In result of correlation analysis (Spearman`s rho) between VARK Learning Styles and the types & forms of Scientific Communication Skills, there were common correlation in "Read/write (R) learning style-Scientific insistence type", "Read/write (R) learning style-Grounds of Scientific insistence", "Read/write (R) learning style-Description of Scientific explanation", and "R learning style-Text form".