Shifu: When you focus on kung fu, when you concentrate... you stink. But perhaps that is my fault. I cannot train you the way I have trained the Five. I now see that the way to get through to you, is with this. [reveals a bowl of dumplings]
Po: Oh great, 'cause I'm hungry!
Shifu: [moves bowl out of Po's reach] Good. When you have been trained, you may eat.
Po: Oh great, 'cause I'm hungry!
Shifu: [moves bowl out of Po's reach] Good. When you have been trained, you may eat.
Teaching is more complicated than some people give it credit for; while sometimes a student might struggle to learn things because of a lack of effort or dedication, other times a person finds it difficult to learn something because of how it is taught. The reason why a certain method might not work for someone can include the student having a mental disability, the teacher being incompetent at their job, or the teacher using flawed methods. In these cases, one way to get around it is to teach the student in a way that suits them.
There are multiple scenarios in which a student learns better in one way than another. If a student has some kind of condition, such as a mental disorder or a physical disability, then the student will likely learn either by putting them in a special education class or program or by getting them special tutoring. If the method of teaching is flawed, then the student will learn better either by getting a different teacher who can teach them effectively or by having their current teacher adjust their methods. If an otherwise effective method is shown to not be work for someone, the teacher might adjust or tweak the method rather than use an entirely new one. Another variant is to teach a subject in a way that's related to someone's interests or hobbies, such as teaching math to someone who enjoys cooking by presenting math problems in the form of cooking recipes.
The trope can apply to schoolwork or to learning skills in general. The former case sometimes appears in stories about special education, to show that people with certain disabilities are capable of learning things if taught in the right way. In stories that criticize the idea of a "one size fits all" learning method, this trope might be used to counter the idea that people who can't learn in standardized ways are simply lazy or unteachable. This can be Played for Drama, especially if the protagonist is a teacher themselves. In such cases, it's often pointed out that offering students an alternate teaching method can work, but if the teacher is trying to teach a large class of 20 to 30 students it just isn't feasible to give each student the attention they need (especially if the class in question is rowdy and they have to spend much of their time keeping the students under control). In addition, even these alternate teaching methods can fail if the student in question has to sit for a rigid, tightly controlled exam.
Very common in Save Our Students plots. Someone who's a victim of Limiting the Potential might benefit from this if their old teacher is a Sabotutor. Could involve Autopilot Artistry if someone learns better when doing it subconsciously. Could also be an example of Wax On, Wax Off, if the alternate method involves apparent drudgery. See also Non-Standard Skill Learning, the video game trope for abilities gained through unconventional means.
Examples:
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Anime & Manga
- Animal Signal: Chapter 6 is about Kokone and Tsubasa studying for their midterm exams. Tsubasa has trouble remembering anything other than animal trivia, so Kokone suggests he associate other facts with it. For example, Japan's Formulary of Adjudications was made in 1232, which is also the birth weight of a zoo's goat in grams. Unfortunately, Tsubasa's mnemonics end up distracting Kokone during her test, so she scores below average while he scores above average.
- Delicious in Dungeon: Although Laios failed to learn any magic from his sister Falin, Marcille easily teaches him the basics in the middle of a Dungeon Crawl. It's a difference of Technician Versus Performer; Marcille's magical style is built from precise, explicit instructions, whereas Falin has a much more intuitive style that's hard to communicate.
- My Hero Academia: After All Might gives Deku One For All, he tries to train him in understanding his power. But the thing is, since the Quirk is passed down to each user, they had different methods of learning to control it and All Might is teaching Deku how he himself learned to use it. This results in Deku struggling at first because the Quirk is so powerful it ends up hurting him with each use. Eventually, when Deku goes to intern under Gran Torino, All Might's former mentor, Gran recognizes that All Might's methods were poorly suited to train him and he proceeds to show Deku a better way to use his One for All, namely start focusing on his kicks and a better visualization of how to output his power that doesn't require him to go all out with it. After this, Deku starts getting better control over his power going forward.
- With the Light: Because Hikaru is autistic, this results in him having a harder time learning things in standard ways.
- When it comes to learning practical skills like using money, Hikaru generally struggles to learn if it's taught in an abstract way such as with play money, but learns better if taught in more concrete ways such as actually spending money at the store.
- Hikaru, alongside a number of other students, is in a special education program at school, though the quality of his education can vary, with some of his teachers, like Gunji-Sensei being effective teachers when they take the time to understand him, and others, like Akamatsu-Sensei, being incompetent because they don't try to understand autistic people.
Fan Works
- The Archmage's Last Bow: In contrast to Twilight Sparkle, who teaches the students of her school by the book as seen in the show, Nova Shine educates his students very differently, usually personally tailored to them.
- His apprentice Bright Gleam comes from Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns, and while she's very talented, she struggles with certain concepts like enchanting until he shows her both the shortcomings of the way she was taught and an overall better way to look at magic as a whole, which radically changes her perception of how magic works.
- Nova encounters a filly named Aurora struggling to learn how to learn magic from Abacus Cinch, and he figures out that her issue is that she's barely putting any effort into getting a spell to work, so his approach is to shove her around until she stands up to him and demands that he stop. He then tells her to channel this feeling into her magic, asking her to fling a ball at his face. Aurora gets it to work moments later.
- Flashy Universe: The first breakthrough in Luffy learning to control his Devil Fruit comes when Buggy uses meat as the target which Luffy has to aim for without getting up from where he is sitting. Luffy quickly learns how to stretch his arm while aiming for the food so that he can reel it back in and chomp down on it.
- Metal Gear: Green: Part of the reason why Ocelot is a better teacher than Aizawa is that while Aizawa simply expects students to figure things out themselves and expels them for not meeting his standards despite offering no advice, Ocelot actually instructs the students and gives them advice. One of the results is that Ocelot's instructions reduced the amount of self-inflicted injuries amongst the students.
- Push Comes to Shove
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- Jiraiya in this story is portrayed as a lazy teacher whose method of "instructing" his students involves simply giving them complex materials to read while he goes out peeping on women, drinking, and hooking up with prostitutes. While this "teaching method" worked for Minato, it was only because Minato was an extremely talented prodigy who could learn on his own. When Jiraiya tries to teach Naruto in the same way, it fails, with Jiraiya blaming Naruto for being a poor student, which is proven wrong when Naruto goes to the Toads, who actually put in the work to train him, which results in Naruto becoming one of the greatest ninja in the world.
- Another aspect of Jiraiya's poor teaching is that he doesn't take into account that Naruto has extremely large amounts of chakra, and assumes that he can simply use methods designed for ninja with genin level reserves, something both Naruto and Tsunade chew him out on and the Toads actually took into account.
- One of the flaws of Konoha's Ninja Academy is their "one size fits all" approach to teaching; despite the fact that Naruto produces more chakra than most people, the teachers would simply tell Naruto to "try harder" or "pay attention" whenever he struggled to learn jutsu. After becoming Hokage, one of the reforms Naruto makes to Konoha's educational system is ensuring that students who have similar conditions be accommodated, threatening to fire and imprison any teacher who just tells the students to "try harder" without helping them on the grounds of sabotaging a potential future ninja.
- Jiraiya in this story is portrayed as a lazy teacher whose method of "instructing" his students involves simply giving them complex materials to read while he goes out peeping on women, drinking, and hooking up with prostitutes. While this "teaching method" worked for Minato, it was only because Minato was an extremely talented prodigy who could learn on his own. When Jiraiya tries to teach Naruto in the same way, it fails, with Jiraiya blaming Naruto for being a poor student, which is proven wrong when Naruto goes to the Toads, who actually put in the work to train him, which results in Naruto becoming one of the greatest ninja in the world.
Films — Animation
- Kung Fu Panda: Master Shifu is initially at a complete loss as to how to turn Po into the Dragon Warrior, as his usual training methods don't seem to be working on him. Only when he sees Po doing a perfect 180 split to try and reach a cupboard full of food, without even realising what he's doing, does Shifu realise that he can take advantage of Po's gluttony by using food to motivate him during training.
- Sing 2: Johnny struggles in Klaus' dance class, first from simply falling behind the routine and then from being constantly humiliated and berated. He can't take to Klaus's strict, quick-paced, and formal teaching style and, after a panic attack, ends up seeing Street Performer Nooshy dance for a crowd. He recruits her for extra teaching, and she teaches him to put passion before perfectionism, encouraging Johnny to just simply enjoy it and not stress over getting it right. Her support and teaching style end up turning him into a much better dancer practically overnight — attracting Klaus's spite in the process, as he loathes the fact that Johnny learned better from "riffraff" than from him.
- Soul (2020): In the Great Before, new souls are supposed to try out a bunch of activities to find what they like doing best and get their Earth Pass so they can go to Earth. 22 is an old soul who has been stuck in the Great Before because none of the activities have ever worked for her. She ends up in Joe's body on Earth and experiences new sensations, like eating pizza and stealing random objects. This is what helps her get an Earth Pass.
Films — Live-Action
- Dangerous Minds: Johnson is able to get the students to pay attention in English class by teaching them about coded drug references in Bob Dylan lyrics, something the person whose memoirs the film is based on scoffed at as she used the much more relevant contemporary lyrics of Tupac Shakur.
- Dead Poets Society: John Keating (played by Robin Williams) uses quite unorthodox methods to teach his students the importance of thinking for themselves, developing their critical thinking skills and more generally being free. This includes tearing out an entire chapter from their textbook, standing onto the teacher's desk to see the classroom from a different perspective, or walking to observe the rhythm of their steps.
- Sands of Iwo Jima: Early in the film, one of Sgt. Stryker's newbie Marines, Private Choynski, is having a terrible time learning bayonet moves the conventional way. One day they're talking about it in camp while a nearby marine (offscreen) plays a popular dance tune on a record player. The music gives Stryker an idea, and he sets about teaching Choynski the bayonet moves by making them dance moves, timed to the music. The scene is Character Development for Stryker, demonstrating that despite his gruffness and harsh "do it my way or go to hell" attitude, he actually is an effective leader.
Literature
- American Girls: Kirsten: In Kirsten Learns a Lesson, Kirsten struggles to learn English at her new school, and has difficulty memorizing a short poem about two doves. She has a heart-to-heart with her teacher Miss Winston, and tells her about her experience on the ship that took her to America. Miss Winston gives her a different poem about being on a ship, which she feels more connected to. She is able to recite it easily.
- Dirty Bertie: In one book, the Burnses' dog Whiffer has to pass obedience school or they will have to give him away. Bertie tries to train Whiffer for his schoolwork but he doesn't really get very far, until Donna trains Whiffer by having him copy her.
- Harry Potter:
- Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix has an example where the initial, faulty teaching was done on purpose; both Cornelius Fudge and Dolores Umbridge believe that Dumbledore is planning to take over the Ministry of Magic by creating an army out of his students. In order to sabotage Dumbledore's "plot" Fudge has Umbridge assigned as the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, where she only teaches by having the students read books and refuses to demonstrate or allow the students to practice magic. Harry and his friends, wanting to actually learn, decide to make a secret club called Dumbledore's Army that actually allows students to practice magic. Unfortunately, after Umbridge becomes the headmistress of Hogwarts, she effectively bans the club by forbidding any student groups, though they continue practicing secretly.
- Harry struggles to learn Potions from Professor Snape, because of Snape's Sadist Teacher attitude towards him. His learning of Potions vastly improves in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, when Professor Slughorn is teaching the subject instead, and with the help of mysterious handwritten notes in his ancient textbook, claiming to be written by "The Half-Blood Prince". The irony is that these were written by Snape when he was a student.
Harry: I've learned far more from the Half-Blood Prince than Snape or Slughorn have ever taught me.
- Heavenly Tyrant: To teach Zetian some of the more advanced techniques of qì manipulation, Qin Zheng revives an old practice of entering a shared Mental World through a spirit-metal link.
- King Matt the First by Yanusz Korczak has Klu Klu teach village children to read by comparing the letters to different insects. The mothers remark that she did more with that approach in a day than the village teacher with his beating managed in a year.
- The Legend of the Condor Heroes: For the first ten years of his training, Guo Jing initially struggles to master martial arts techniques from the Six Freaks of the South, taking ages to learn even a single technique and appearing to regress under pressure. However, after Ma Yu of the Quanzhen Taoist sect sneaks north to secretly teach him foundational neigong inner strength and lightness kung fu under the guise of "breathing exercises" to help him sleep, Guo Jing's kung fu skills start improving quickly in months.
It was strange, he had to admit. The Taoist had not taught him even one martial arts move, but he was noticeably quicker and lighter during his daily practices. Six months on, he was performing moves with a skill and agility that had previously eluded him. "He has finally matured," the Six Freaks could only exclaim.
- Mage Errant: This is a big theme of the series' first novel, Into The Labyrinth. Main characters Hugh, Sabae, and Talia are students at Skyhold Magic Academy, and each has a serious Magically Inflicted Disability that interferes with their spell casting. Their teachers all turned out to be Anti-Mentors who decided the three of them just couldn't be taught and wrote them off as failures. Then they were chosen as apprentices by Alustin Haber, one of Skyhold's Librarians Errant, who developed his own lesson plans to work around their disabilities and even use them. When his new apprentices got skeptical that he would be able to make anything of them, he had quite a lot to say on the subject:
Alustin: None of you are useless. None of you have failed as mages. The Academy has failed all of you. You were expected to simply conform to the same curriculum as everyone else, but magic isn't that rigid...Skyhold has begun to treat students as though they were interchangeable, as though there was only a single way to teach magic. They keep increasing class sizes and expecting everyone to learn identical spells from a book. Magic doesn't work like that. There are countless paths of magic, and when the Academy runs across one that deviates too far from their norm? They've become entirely unable to handle it.
- Uprooted: Sarkan is a terrible magic teacher to Agnieszka at first because her magic is intuitive and improvisational, whereas his is highly technical and rules-based, and he has no patience for things that don't follow his rules. Things finally click with Agnieszka when she finds a Spell Book from a wizard with a similar style to hers, and she and Sarkan soon become a potent Technician/Performer Team-Up.
- The Wheel of Time: Although Moiraine tries to teach The Chosen One Rand about the One Power in her Mentor Archetype role, the Power's gender-segregated nature makes her lessons all but useless. He has better luck learning from a male channeler in the fifth book, even though that man is a captive villain who's only doing it under duress.
Live-Action TV
- Boston Public: Charlie Bixby is a slimy investment banker serving his court-ordered community service in Winslow High School, teaching math. Instead of going by the textbook, he engages his students with "pimp mathematics", tossing at them exaggerated inner-city problems as tasks to be cracked with math. He quickly gets the attention of the rowdy teens and they rapidly improve with more traditional math when seeing practical application for what they are being taught... except this is also raising moral concerns from the rest of the teachers, given how vulgar the lessons get as a result.
- Dog with a Blog: In one of the latter seasons, a story arc involves Tyler wanting to graduate high school early so he can join a team of professional BMX bikers. To do this, he needs to both qualify for and pass the school's gifted program. He asks Avery for her help, and she invokes this trope by basing a study session around one of Tyler's favorite game shows (an Expy of Wipeout (2008)). Deconstructed in that Tyler trying to focus on the game means he's too stressed to answer Avery's questions. Avery realizes her mistake fairly quickly and instead teaches Tyler how to actually study. Using traditional study methods works, and Tyler passes the test to qualify for the program.
- Drake & Josh: In "Smart Girl", Drake joins an academic competition to impress a very smart girl he has a crush on, and needs Josh's help to study. Josh quickly finds out that Drake isn't able to concentrate normally, as he starts talking on the phone and blowing spitballs. Drake eventually calls Josh out for being a bad teacher because he can't make the subject relatable and interesting for him; this gives Josh a "Eureka!" Moment, where he realizes that the way to get through to Drake is through his guitar. He compares atoms and molecules to notes and chords, and Drake is able to learn the basics of chemistry.
- Kickin' It: In one episode, Jerry complains that he's failing his Spanish class... which makes no sense because he speaks Spanish constantly at home. Milton figures out that it's not so much the language (as he comes from a Hispanic household and is already fluent) but the fact that the act of taking a test stresses him out too much. He tells Jerry to instead pretend he's having a conversation with a piece of paper. Jerry passes his makeup test with a B, bringing his grade up instantly.
- Played for Laughs in the Modern Family episode "Slow Down Your Neighbors", Jay is having trouble teaching his wife Gloria how to ride a bike. Her step-grandson Luke then teaches her by shooting her with a Water Gun while she's on the bike so that she could escape. In The Stinger, he does the same thing to his older sister Haley to help her answer a question their dad asked her. Best part in both instances, it works.
Luke: Teacher of the year.
- Star Trek: Voyager: Tuvok is tasked with teaching former Maquis to function as Starfleet officers because he used to teach at the academy. He tries his usual Drill Sergeant Nasty routine, and is dumbfounded when it fails spectacularly. Neelix ends up having to explain to Tuvok that the Maquis aren't Starfleet cadets and he can't treat them the same way. This leads Tuvok to try being more friendly and casual with them, which fails even more spectacularly. Fortunately an opportunity to save the life of one of the trainees presents itself, which gets them to warm up to him a little.
- The Wire: Roland Pryzbylewski's arc as a new teacher in Season 4 sees him realize what does and doesn't stick with his students when trying to teach math, with him finding success in teaching probability using dice games, to the point that the kids ask him, "Can we practice probabilities now?"
Video Games
- Atelier Resleriana: The Red Alchemist & the White Guardian: Initially, Resna's attempt at teaching Rias alchemy simply consists of giving a lengthy lecture on the subject, which almost makes her student fall asleep. In a later scene, Rias tries to teach her again, this time with a more hands-on approach that Rias finds much easier to follow.
- Umamusume: Pretty Derby: In Haru Urara's Career mode, the player trainer initially has difficulty getting the ditzy Urara to focus on training. Eventually, while seeing her helping out at the local market under the pretence of "playing a game", they realise they can reframe her training exercises in the same way, and is successfully able to get her to focus.
Web Animation
- Refreshing Stories: Principal thinks memorizing textbooks is the best, so I decided to change the school: Kaneo is both a principal and a businessman who sells textbooks and products that he claims help with memorization, insisting that the best way for students to learn is to memorize books. Hiroshi, a new teacher, disproves this idea by showing that memorizing facts doesn't help students understand them. Hiroshi teaches history by presenting it as a story and giving students feedback on what they need to work on. While the other teachers approve because it produces higher scores and results in the school becoming more popular, Kaneo doesn't because his products aren't selling as well. Kaneo tries to take credit for Hiroshi's results and punishes the teachers by giving them a small bonus for not teaching via textbook only. Fortunately, Hiroshi is a shareholder at Kaneo's company and has him fired for his incompetence as well as the fact that he was pocketing some of the money from his sales.
Western Animation
- Angelina Ballerina: In one "The Next Steps" episode, the eponymous girl tries to teach the five ballet poses to her little sister Polly, but Polly keeps making mistakes and getting frustrated and bored. Angelina decides to make the lessons more fun, the way her own teacher does.
- Arthur:
- In "Brain's Biggest Blunder", Brain tutors Buster in math when they're paired as part of a competition. Brain's tutoring methods are very intense and stressful, and don't even end up helping Buster. He gets better advice from Binky, who suggests that he visualize the numbers in a way related to something he likes (for Binky it's ballet dancers, and for Buster it's layers of cake), making them easier to work with. With this help, Buster is able to successfully win the competition.
- Ironically Binky likewise learns this lesson in one episode where he's teaching his fellow Rough Customers ballet. They don't get it at first because Binky explaining it to them in too strict a manner. It isn't until one of them says they can't remember all his words that Binky realizes they need visual aid and he needs to loosen up on his approach, so he starts showing by example. They pick up on it much better and start being able to learn their routines.
- Beverly Hills Teens: In the episode "Radley Wipes Out", Radley has trouble studying for a history test, so the rest of the gang puts him through a clue-chasing game requiring the knowledge.
- The Casagrandes: In "Stress Test", Bobby is taking an academic test, but keeps flunking due to stress. His family tries various ways of helping him study and the one that works is having him pretend he's at work (as a bodega clerk) since his job eases his anxiety.
- Dexter's Laboratory: A Gave Up Too Soon example. Dexter's father is trying to teach him sports so he at least has something to fall back on going into college. Dexter fails each attempt at sports miserably, and eventually his father gives up and goes to sulk. Not long after he does, Deedee reveals she unleased a monster from Dexter's lab which goes on the attack. Immediately, Dexter displays his hidden athletics in trying to fight it. Alas, since his father doesn't know about his lab, he doesn't see this, otherwise he could've appealed to this to train Dexter better.
- Fish Hooks: In one episode, Milo has trouble with his memory in regards to studying, but when he turns out to remember dangerous things well, Bea and Oscar teach him by giving him the facts needed for school while putting him in danger.
- In The Great North episode "You've Got Math Adventure", Moon is failing math and thinks he's bad at it, but after spending time with his sister-in-law Honeybee, they discover that he actually understands the concepts but just doesn't do well in a traditional testing setting, but rather by applying the concepts to his knowledge of outdoors life. His teacher allows him to take a makeup exam where he demonstrates his knowledge using outdoor scenarios, to which she then changes his grade from failing to barely passing.
- In the Hey Arnold! episode "Tutoring Torvald", Arnold is tasked with helping 13 year-old fourth grader Torvald with his math. Arnold at first struggles to teach him, until he realizes he can do math whenever he extorts lunch money from the other students. Arnold then reworks the lesson plan for Torvald by giving him math problems centered around bullying and he passes his math test.
- Little Princess: In "I Want My Horace", the adults keep trying and failing to train the Princess’s new pony Horace. The Princess eventually trains him by saying please.
- The Loud House: In "Driving Miss Hazy", Leni, being a Dumb Blonde, keeps failing at her driving tests. Her younger siblings, chiefly her brother Lincoln, try to teach her to drive by "speaking Leni", I.e. dumbing down their terminology and using fashion-related analogies. They almost succeed, but then her big sister Lori, in a fit of jealousy, spoils it by giving Leni bad info in her sleep.
- My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic: In order to join the Wonderbolts, Rainbow Dash needs to study for a written test in "Testing Testing 1, 2, 3". When Twilight Sparkle finds that Rainbow Dash reading history books won't help, several of her friends try various alternate methods: Fluttershy puts on a play with Angel and the other pets, Pinkie tries rapping, and Rarity puts on a fashion show featuring historic Wonderbolt uniforms. After none of those work, Twilight takes note of how Rainbow Dash observes what happens on the ground as she flies. So in order to get Rainbow to study the history of the Wonderbolts, Twilight has the other ponies reenact moments from history so that Rainbow Dash can study what she needs to know for the test.
- This is the entire reason why Schoolhouse Rock! exists. David McCall noticed that his son was having trouble remembering the multiplication tables, but could remember pop song lyrics. Would it work if he put the multiplication tables to music? So he hired Bob Dorough to write the first song, and McCall's colleague Tom Yohe animated it. Then they sold the short to Michael Eisner as a pilot for a new series. And the rest is history.
- The Simpsons: In "The Joy of Sect", all of the Movementarians' normal methods of brainwashing fail to work on Homer because his attention span is too short to listen to them. After having a "Eureka!" Moment, the head brainwasher realizes he needs to stoop down to Homer's level and starts singing the theme song to Batman (1966) but replacing the word "Batman" with "Leader", which somehow works.
- SpongeBob SquarePants: Downplayed in "Mrs. Puff You're Fired", where Mrs. Puff is fired as a boating teacher because SpongeBob has failed to get his driver's license over one million times. Despite the fact that SpongeBob is the only student who failed her class, Mr. Fitz, the superintendent, insists that she's an incompetent teacher and replaces her with Sergeant Roderick. One of Roderick's methods involves teaching SpongeBob to drive through an obstacle course blindfolded, which teaches SpongeBob to drive...but only while blindfolded. When he tries to drive normally, he ends up driving like crazy like he usually does, proving that Mrs. Puff was at least partially correct about him being "unteachable."
- Transformers: Animated: Optimus Prime initially tries to lead his team like a military unit, and expresses his frustration to Ratchet that Bumblebee, Bulkhead, and Prowl just aren't gelling as a team. Ratchet points out that Optimus is trying to lead them like they're military cadets, when barring himself and Optimus, the rest of the team are civilians. Optimus gets the point and stops trying to force the team to work together, instead allowing bonds to form naturally as the team gets to know each other. By the end of the series, whereas a single Decepticon once took the whole team to bring down, it was now possible for Bash Brothers like Bumblebee and Bulkhead to take one on without aid.
- The Wild Thornberrys: Marianne struggles with home schooling Debbie on history since she can't seem to get invested enough to remember anything. When Marianne sees how knowledgeable she is on a rock band, Marianne switches to teaching her history in rap form which works favorably.
Real Life
- In education, conventional wisdom and training state that students generally fall under four learning types: Visual, Auditory, Read/Write, and Kinaesthetic. Generally, a student who has difficulty learning with one style may find themselves much more successful with another. To summarize:
- Visual learners find visual media like charts, pictures and diagrams most useful. When taking notes, they find it more helpful to highlight notes using different colours, or using symbols in place of words.
- Auditory learners find it most helpful to be able to relisten to information, and being able to discuss things with others. Study groups where it is possible to discuss information, or recording lectures and lessons to review at their own leisure can help.
- Read/ Write learners, as the name suggests, are at their best when they can read something and then rewrite (either as is or in their own words) information. It's recommended for such learners to try writing out an explanation to see if they can provide one; if they can't then that means their understanding is still lacking.
- Kinaesthetic learners learn by doing, especially making use of the five senses. Experiments and hands-on experience work best for them, and presenting information in the form of their real-life experiences is useful.
- The VARK model was actually debunked by recent studies. As explained in Veritasium's video essay "The Biggest Myth in Education", that while people may have preferences for how they like to receive information (e.g., enjoying diagrams or lectures), there is no robust scientific evidence that matching instruction to these supposed styles leads to better learning or academic performance. The VARK model, developed by Neil Fleming in the 1980s–1990s based on classroom observations rather than controlled experiments, assumes learners fall into categories where one modality dominates. However, rigorous reviews — such as a 2009 analysis by psychologists Harold Pashler, Mark McDaniel, Doug Rohrer, and Robert Bjork — found "virtually no evidence" that adapting teaching to self-reported learning styles enhances outcomes. They described the contrast between the theory's popularity and the lack of supporting data as "striking and disturbing."
- The concept of live fire exercises (i.e. training that takes place under real-life conditions) is linked to this concept. In the military, firefighting, police work and similar careers, recruits not only have book learning to do but must also take part in live fire exercises that simulates real world conditions. For example, firefighter recruits may be tasked with navigating a smoke-filled area, or soldiers will train with real ammunition. While the primary idea is for recruits and trainees to apply what they've learned to real life, another reason is that some of them may be better at absorbing information and training through real-world application.