|dc.description.abstract||This study examined variability in perceptual learning style preferences among secondary school pupils in Bondo District, Kenya. Perceptual, rather than personality or instructional learning styles, was selected because it represents the primary means of receiving stimuli through one's senses before interpretation. Participants were 200 male and 175 female Form Three (N=375) pupils attending 8 public secondary schools in Bondo District. It was hypothesized that there would be variability in learners' tendency to be Visual, Auditory or Kinesthetic oriented, and that a relationship existed among learning style preferences (LSPs), academic performance, age, gender and school residential status of pupil. It was further hypothesized that variability would remain significant after considering home background random effects. This was a correlation study. The dependent variable was normalized test scores in internal and external examinations. Perceptual Learning Style Questionnaire (structured) was administered to identify learning preferences, whereas preferences on teaching modality were identified using Teaching Styles Questionnaire. Structured and unstructured in-depth interviews (10) and one focus group discussion provided complementary data. Chi-square tests, Correlation coefficients, One-Way ANOVA, Independent samples t-test, and Multiple Square Correlation (alpha=0.05) were used to analyze data with the help of Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) versions
10.0 and 11.0. Findings revealed significant variability in perceptual learning style preferences (Visual; mean=10.14, SD=2.2, Auditory; mean= 5.13, SD=1.8, Kinesthetic, mean=4.67, SD=1.8) of the pupils (N=372). A significant relationship (p<0.01) was found between LSPs and age; younger students tended to be more kinesthetic and auditory-oriented while older learners were more visual-oriented. Relationships among LSPs, sex of the pupil (1=male, 2=female) and academic achievement were generally negative although not significant at p=0.05. There was a strong negative relationship (r= -0.31, p<0.01) between sex and academic achievement of the pupil. In studying the combined effect of LSPs and school residential status on academic achievement, the study found a significant main effect of residential status on achievement in Languages. Boarding pupils did better in English and Kiswahili than their day-schooling counterparts. These findings confirm that individual learners are different and are consistent in the way they internalize, process and remember information. Learners should be helped to identify these differences so that they can learn new and difficult material in ways concordant with their preferences, for more effective learning. Parents, teachers and policy-makers can benefit from this finding in diagnosing learning weaknesses in order to create a more conducive learning environment and provide compatible learning experiences that accommodate learners' identified perceptual strengths, and be wary of decisions and actions that hamper the learners' educational progress.
(Key words: learning style, learner, learning achievement)||en_US