Implementing a case-base e-learning environment in a lecture-oriented anesthesiology class: Do learning styles matter in complex problem solving over time?

Choi, Ikseon, Sand Joon Lee, and Jeongwan Kang. “Implementing a Case-Based E-Learning Environment in a Lecture - Oriented Anesthesiology Class: Do Learning Styles Matter in Complex Problem Solving Over Time?” British Journal of Educational Technology 40.5 (2009): 933-47.

Choi, I., Lee, S. J., Kang, J. (2009). Implementing a case-based e-learning environment in a lecture-oriented anesthesiology class: Do learning styles matter in complex problem solving over time. British Journal of Educational Technology, 40(5), 933-947.

Abstract
This study explores how students’ learning styles influence their learning while solving complex problems when a case-based e-learning environment is implemented in a conventional lecture-oriented classroom. Seventy students from an anesthesiology class at a dental school participated in this study over a 3-week period. Five learning-outcome tests and two course-satisfaction surveys were implemented during the case-based instruction using a blended approach (online and face-to-face). The results of one-way ANOVAs with sensing-intuitive, visual-verbal, sequential-global) did not influence students’ learning experience and learning outcomes during the implementation of case-based e-learning. However, the pattern of the students’ performance graph and further analysis with a liberal approach implied that the active-reflective learning style may influence learning outcomes slightly at an earlier time during the case-based learning implantation; however, as time passed, this learning style no longer influenced their learning at all. Thus, learning styles may be considered important or may be considered only during the early stages of instructional implementation in order to facilitate the students’ transition to the new case-based learning environment. It is more efficient to encourage students to adapt to different learning environments than to design adaptive systems in order to embrace diverse learning styles.

Summary
Various researchers have said a person’s learning style is stable, in that it doesn’t change over time; where as other researchers argue that a learning style can change with different events over time. This study uses Curry’s (1983) three layer model to describe learning styles and is working with the second layer. The second layer is the layer that process information and is somewhat stable because it can change.

This study uses Felder’s (Felder 2002; Felder & Silverman, 1988; Felder & Soloman, 1991/1994b) way to identify the learning styles which “proposes four dimensions related to how students perceive process and organize information (sensing or intuitive, visual or verbal, active or reflective and sequential or global.” (936)

This study was performed at a dental school in South Korea. These students all had high SAT scores, which may have impacted the results. These students would be “skillful learners who were able to adjust themselves effectively in order to be successful in the new learning environment” so these results may not apply to students in the lower SAT range (945).

This study was done through a course broken up into two parts. The first part of the course was done in a traditional face to face classroom setting. The second half of the course, the course continued with the face to face time, but added an online component.

“The current study suggests that the influence of learning styles on learning experience and learning outcomes is negligible. The learning styles may interact with students’ learning experience and learning outcomes only at the very early stage (a few hours) of implementing a new instruction innovation. Therefore, aligning with Loo’s (2004) suggestion, we believe that is more efficient to find ways that encourage students to adapt to different learning environments than to design adaptive systems in order to embrace diverse learning styles.” (945).