Education Shortform
Misconceptions and Myths in Education
A quick primer
There are a number of widespread ideas about learning that have no supporting evidence despite their popularity.
These include the idea that students can be categorised according to three main ’learning styles’, for example as visual learners (or, more extremely, that everyone has their own learning style). In fact, there is simply no evidence for the idea that being taught (or studying) in a way that fits with your preferred style leads to better outcomes.
And then, there is a broader issue concerning a lack of understanding of the learning process both among students and their teachers. Many learners fail to distribute their study and practice, for example, and fall into the trap of assuming that a single intensive learning session is enough to ensure that something has been learned (see this blog post for more on the difference between performance and learning).
A trend for the future may be for a more evidence-informed approach to education to tackle such misconceptions. Read on here:
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This is one of a series of shortform education articles. You can download a simplified summary of my ‘A–Z of Educational concepts’ here.
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