As every one of us has been a language learner at one point in our lives we can maybe all remember those students in language classes that always knew the answer more quickly than oneself and seemed to remember easily all that vocabulary that hadn’t even passed our passive knowledge yet. Schools generally promote one style of teaching that is believed to reach a majority of students; however, those students that don’t respond to the predominant way of teaching will not have the maximum learning experience.

As a one to one teacher, I believe that my first responsibility is to recognize each student’s different learning style and adapt the lessons accordingly. I mostly inquire about my student’s hobbies and preferences. This can give you a great insight into what type of learning style they best respond to. If a student for instance, plays an instrument, he is most likely to have a good memory of sound and would respond well to pronunciation tasks, recordings and music in the lessons. If another student is interested in art and paintings, his learning might be improved by using visuals such as photos, diagrams and graphics.  Yet another student might have a kinesthetic learning style and would like to “feel” and “experience” the language through active tasks that involve touching and motion. However, the majority of students have a mix of preferences, but in other cases one type of learning style might dominate. Teachers should therefore always offer a variety of activities that cover more than one learning style to ensure a stimulating learning environment in which the student learns to its maximum.