VARK Questionnaire: Learning Styles

VARK Questionnaire: Learning Styles

VARK Questionnaire: Learning Styles

Many decisions that influence the success of a course take place before the first day of the class. Planning is very important to provide focus and expectations related to the course. Whether designing a new course or adopting a standardized curriculum, planning must begin early highlighting what is expected of the students by the end of the course (Romiszowski, 2016). It might be better to consult with colleagues who have taught a similar course to learn from their strategies as well as the general impression of students who normally take such courses. The teacher must identify course segments such as objectives, goals, content, and teaching methods among others as early as possible to improve efficiency. This paper presents a 4-hour Leadership Strategies course design which includes objectives, course content, learning activities, and strategies to assess learning.

Learning Objectives

Objectives are very important content of course design. The learning objectives clarify what student is intended to learn and accomplish. Having the objectives in mind, the teacher can make proper decisions regarding appropriate content to include as well as the best teaching methods to use (Spruell & Le Blanc, 2020). The flowing is learning objectives each student is expected to achieve at the end of the 4-hour Leadership Strategies course:

• Students will be able to describe the different roles and responsibilities of a nurse leader.
• Students will be able to create various ways of attaining support to achieve the long term goal of a strategic initiative.
• Students will illustrate different factors that influence the success and failure of strategic management in healthcare settings.
• Students will be able to evaluate various strategies applied to avoid errors when transitioning from one level of responsibility to another.
• Learners will be able to outline various systematic ways and strategies for planning changes in healthcare settings.
• Students will be able to summarize several strengths and shortcomings associated with personal leadership styles in healthcare facilities.
• Students will be able to describe effective approaches for framing decisions in hospital settings.

Course Content

Course content is also important because it shows all the agendas that will be covered during the lessons. Good course content must align with the learning objectives to keep the teacher and the students on the track (Smardon, Reiter, & Humphreys, 2018). Contents for the course include the following:

• Roles and responsibilities of a nurse leader.
• Designing and implementing long-term and short term organizational goals.
• Strategic management in a healthcare organization.
• Successful transition from one level of organization to another.
• Strategies for planning changes in a healthcare setting.
• Personal leadership styles in healthcare facilities.
• Effective decision making in a healthcare facility

These are topics that students must cover during the entire four-hour learning. The topics may be too many but each one of them must be short enough to ensure that they are all covered. Students will greatly benefit from the topics at the end of the four-hour session (Smardon et al., 2018).

Learning Activities

Learning activities are tasks designed or deployed by the educator to create an effective condition for learning. There are several learning activities that can be applicable to this lesson plan to improve the session (Romiszowski, 2016). This lesson plan includes the following learning activities.

Concept Mapping

It is not only an important tool for academic lecturers but also undergraduate or postgraduate students as well as collaborative and individual work. Concept mapping will help the students to connect the links and relationships between the concepts they are learning (Romiszowski, 2016). It can also make the student realize their point of weakness as well as strengths, hence, sometimes used as an assessment tool.

Free Writing

Free writing is another important leaning activity that makes the students think and write. The teacher can encourage students to write in class, at the beginning of class, or at the end of class. Some lectures encourage writing only at specific points during a discussion (Romiszowski, 2016).

 

Case Studies

This is a great opportunity for students to work on a practical application of some theoretical or abstract course materials. For instance, the teacher can provide students with a real-world case study or have the students find their own scenarios to examine. Normally, students are instructed to analyze the case either in small groups or individually using the framework and guidelines provided by the instructor (Romiszowski, 2016). The students may then present their analysis or the groups can return their written answers. For example, learners may be asked to prepare the pros and cons of two possible solutions or options for a case.

Think Aloud

The instructor presents an idea, an issue, or an idea to the students and asks them to think about the issue or the question for one minute. The students think about the question with the goal of coming up with at least three answers, questions, or comments. Students then come together each with his/her leaves lists and come up with three things together (Spruell & Le Blanc, 2020). Again the pairs come together with another pair and try to find three things they agree on. They repeat for as many iterations as desired. The instructor eventually brings the class together as a group together to identify what they have found as the three tissues relevant to the topic being discussed.

Strategies to Assess Learning

Because the students are working professionals, a grading assessment is not appropriate for them. Therefore, a non-grading class assessment will be used to evaluate the learning process. The ultimate goal of the four-hour teaching is understanding, hence, the assessment process (Spruell, & Le Blanc, 2020). Two strategies will be used to assess learning such as asking questions and four corners.

Asking Questions in Class

The instructor will be asking students questions in a random manner regarding the topic being taught. This happens in the middle of the lesson to keep students focus and ensure that they are paying maximum attention. Also, this strategy enables the teacher to realize the efficiency of the teaching/learning activities (Smardon et al., 2018).

Four Corners

Are normally effective in engaging students in learning while assessing their understanding. It is a quick and easy snapshot of students’ understanding. The four corners offer the students an opportunity for movement and interaction while enabling the instructor to assess understanding (Smardon et al., 2018). For instance, the teacher poses a statement or a question. The students move to the appropriate corner for them. Each corner represents choices or specific answers for a question such as No, Yes, I agree, I am not sure, I disagree, and so forth.

Conclusion

Planning is very important to provide focus and expectations related to the course. The learning objectives are meant to clarify what the student is intended to learn and accomplish. This course/lesson plan provides objectives for each student that they must achieve at the end. It also provides course content, learning activities as well as learning assessment strategies.

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References

Romiszowski, A. J. (2016). Designing instructional systems: Decision making in course planning and curriculum design. London: Routledge.

Spruell, J. A., & Le Blanc, L. A. (2020). A course planning method to incorporate collaborative learning in information systems courses. Journal of Information Systems Education, 4(2), 2.

Smardon, R. C., Reiter, M. A., & Humphreys, M. L. (2018). Course design: Examples of graduate courses. In Education for Sustainable Human and Environmental Systems (pp. 150-163). London: Routledge.