How to Tailor Your Online Course to These 4 Types of Learners

5 minute read

We all learn and absorb information in different ways: some people might learn new concepts more quickly when watching a video, looking at visuals and graphics, reading a block of text or performing an activity.

If you look back to your school years, you might remember learning in a specific way that might have been different from some of your classmates.

But why does this matter now?

If you are an online course creator and want to sell learning materials, it is important to understand the different learning styles and how they can affect your students and their experience with your online course.

By understanding that different people learn in different ways, you can create an online course that is suited for all types of learners and incorporate tactics that speak to everyone.

If you still aren't convinced, think about the importance of crafting the best possible learning experience for your students: not only will your students enjoy the course and find it helpful, but this will cause them to leave positive reviews, refer new customers to you, keep purchasing other products you are selling and become lifelong loyal customers.

In today's article, we will uncover what the four main types of learners are and how you can cater to them by tailoring your online course content for each of them.

There are four main types of learners:

Visual
Auditory
Reading and writing
Kinesthetic

Let's see what defines each learner type and how you can customize your online course content to cater to all of your students' needs.

#1: Visual Learning Style

Most people are visual learners: studies show that around 65% of people are visual learners, meaning that they respond better to visual content such as images, graphs, charts, etc...

Visual learners prefer to observe and take notes and they learn well through images, pictures, graphics, and other visual aids that helps them to retain new information more efficiently.

This doesn't mean that visual learners are able to learn solely through visual means: instead, they are looking to create a connection between a new piece of information and visual content. So a visual learner will associate an image, animation, chart or doodle with a new piece of information and will be able to recall it in an easier way.

How to tailor your online course for visual learners

Just because visual learners prefer images over text, it doesn't mean that you should eliminate text or other formats completely from your online course. Instead, try to break up long chunks of texts with images, create infographics or graphs, and add animation, gifs, or drawing to your lessons to make them more engaging.

#2: Auditory Learning Style

Auditory learners are those who learn in a better way when listening to an audio lesson or piece of content. These kinds of learners prefer to listen to lectures, or read text out loud, and they tend to participate in discussions and debates.

Unlike visual learners, auditory learners prefer to listen, and they might not need to take notes or write down new concepts in order to memorize them.

How to tailor your online course for auditory learners

Auditory learners learn better when listening to new information, so consider adding audio files to your online course.

Videos are a great option that suits all kinds of learners: auditory learners get to listen to the audio, and visual learners can focus on the images and scenes in the video (plus, this type of content works well with reading and kinesthetic learners as well as we will see later in this article).

Another thing that auditory learners love to do is to talk and repeat the new concepts out loud, so as an online course creator, you could host live calls for your students to discuss the topics in your program and create a community where people can share ideas and build connections.

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#3: Reading and Writing Learning Style

These learners (also referred to as "Linguistic Learners") depend largely on reading and writing information, and they learn better with written words as opposed to auditory learners.

These learners prefer writing assignments and reading new information as they focus primarily on text.

How to tailor your online course for reading & writing learners

Reading & writing learners learn well by studying at their own pace; therefore, online courses are a great fit for this type of student. Make sure your online course lessons include some text, or your online course videos have subtitles! Refer to additional resources such as eBooks, blog posts, and articles that linguistic learners can consume in their free time.

Reading & writing learners also process information through writing notes, so you could include written assignments in your online course or ask written questions to your students.

#4: Kinesthetic Learning Style

The last learning style is kinesthetic: these kinds of learners process information through experiences and activities rather than simply reading, observing or listening.

Kinesthetic learners learn best by engaging in some sort of practical activity or experiment: they learn by doing.

These kinds of learners generally have a hard time focusing for a long period of time and enjoy talking breaks between learning, getting more active and switching between tasks.

How to tailor your online course for kinesthetic learners

Kinesthetic learners thrive through experiences and practical tasks, so it is a good idea to add a project to your online course.

Projects are a feature unique to Heights Platform, and they are a fantastic way to ensure a high level of engagement in your course. A project can be a practical task or activity your students complete, generally to showcase their progress and what they achieved thanks to your online course.

This approach can be much extremely helpful to kinesthetic learners as they get to put their knowledge into practice and carry on practical tasks for learning.

Other ways to engage kinesthetic learners are building an online community, applying gamification techniques to your online course and asking your students to complete a task for each lesson in your course.

Conclusion

Not everyone learns in the same way. As we have seen in this article, there are four main types of learners: visual learners absorb information through images and graphics, auditory learners prefer listening and talking, linguistic learners learn better with writing and reading text, and kinesthetic learners love learning through experiencing and carrying out practical tasks.

You can make sure that your online course is tailored to every one of these learning styles by adapting your structure and lesson formats to incorporate aspects that the different learning styles prefer.

For example, add images and illustrations for visual learners, record videos and build a community space for auditory learners, write text and create assignments for reading & writing learners and set up a practical project for kinesthetic learners.

But how can you do this in real life?

You need an online course platform that lets you implement all of the actions listed above: Heights Platform is the all-in-one online course software any instructor can use to create online courses that would resonate with all types of learning styles.

Include videos, audios, text, attachments, presentations, projects and assignments in your online course. Build a community to connect with your students on a deeper level. Apply gamification tools to foster engagement. And so much more!

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Post Topics: How We Learn