Conquering My Learning Style by Samantha

Conquering My Learning Style by Samantha - February 2017 Scholarship Essay

School isn’t always easy for me, and I never fully understood why I did well in some classes and struggled in others. It wasn’t until junior year that I realized the way the material is presented and how I study impact my success.

I’ve always heard people talk about learning styles. I know that everyone learns differently, and that there isn’t one right way, but I never applied this to myself until my junior year when I took Precalculus. Despite extra help, extra worksheets and hours of studying the guides the teacher prepared, I struggled the first term. I thought I was doing everything I needed to do to understand the material and do well on the tests, but this wasn’t the case. It never occurred to me that I needed to study differently.

After a difficult first term, I began my second term with a new outlook: I was going to try something different. I started watching YouTube videos of the material we were learning in class and it began to click. The videos showed the problem before it started, allowing me to write it down, try it on my own and then watch the video to see if I had done it correctly or where I had gone wrong. Being able to pause the videos to try a problem was extremely helpful. This hands-on, interactive approach was what I was missing in the classroom. While my teacher demonstrated these problems on the board, we never had a chance to try it ourselves in class. By trying it on my own and then rolling the video, I was able to follow along and compare what I did with what the video was doing. This helped me see where I was going wrong and make the appropriate changes. I’m proud to say that I got an A second term.

Looking back, I regret that I didn’t understand my learning style earlier. As a middle school student I remember being uncomfortable if a teacher tried to help me during class because I didn’t want my classmates to think I was dumb. I disregarded good-intentioned teachers because I didn’t want to stand out. Identifying and accepting my learning style younger would have given me more time to understand and apply my unique learning style so I would ultimately be less self-conscious about it. The way I see it, if I had always studied differently, it would have become second nature to me rather than something I struggled with on a daily basis. I also would have recognized success at a younger age. Today I fully understand the importance of accepting your learning style and working with it. By doing so, you can avoid feeling not good enough and continually build upon your unique learning needs.