Children's Learning Styles as Correlates to Academic Performance in Science of Elementary School Pupils

Abstract

INTRODUCTION

The present Science curriculum puts emphasis on the use of the science processes and concepts as contents. In teaching Science as a process,the principle of "learning by doing” is a rule. It is activity-oriented and provides for maximum involvement of pupils. In this regard, the researcher determined the relationship of learning styles of the pupils to their academic performance in Science as well as the learning styles of the Grade VI pupils.

METHODS

This study used descriptive analysis method. This method involves description, recording, and interpretation of the Learning Style Inventory and academic performance of Grade VI pupils. There were four schools used in this study with a combined enrolment of 335 Grade VI pupils. Fifty percent were involved in the systematic sampling technique. Data analysis used different statistical treatment. To determine the learning styles and academic performance of the Grade VI pupils in participating schools, the researcher used weighted means and standard deviations; to determine the relationship of the learning styles and academic performance, the chi-square was applied.

RESULTS

The gathered data showed that most of the respondents or the pupils frequently used visual and auditory styles in their studies and occasionally used tactile and kinesthetic learning styles. Likewise, the data revealed that the academic performance of the pupils was fair which means they are heterogeneous. With regards to the relationship of the learning styles of the pupils to their academic performance, the results also showed that the learning styles of the pupils had a significant effect to their academic performance, especially those with the visual and auditory learning styles.

DISCUSSIONS

Generally, the study shows that pupils learn best according to their learning styles. Pupils had the fun of having visual and auditory materials that could encourage them to be attentive and were motivated to learn better. However, pupils should also be exposed to hands-on activities to make learning more meaningful. With these results, teachers should focus on identifying the learning style of the pupils and fit their teaching styles to the needs of the pupils. Likewise, they should also use instructional materials that fit the styles of learning. In this regard, schools should strengthen partnership with stakeholders for providing resources that would help in the teaching-learning process. They should also sustain regular reporting of pupils' progress and status with parents.