how do you learn?

I have been thinking a lot lately about learning styles.  It's funny to think that for the most part, once you get to college it is a sink or swim, run with the big dogs kind of attitude.  In my experience high school didn't give me much preparation for how to approach the rigors of college academics, how to maximize studying time, or how to fit everything into a packed schedule.  I of course went to an arts high school, so perhaps that can help explain a bit why I wasn't very prepared.  The academic portion of those last two years of high school seemed like mere background noise to the more pressing experience of my dance training.  In retrospect, looking at my academic trajectory since graduating, it would have probably served me better to have been in a traditional school setting.  Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't go back and change it if I could.  I learned an incredible amount while at Perpich, and am fortunate to have many amazing friendships and memories from my time there, it's just interesting to think how things might have been different.  Back to my original thought on learning styles though, I don't think I knew how I learned best.  When I was an undergrad, I made up my own style of learning basically based on nothing much.  I can't really recall why I studied the way I did, but if pressed I think it would have been loosely based on how my classmates worked.  I took notes in class, made note cards, took practice exams, read from the textbook...etc.  I just kind of did what I could with what I had.  I think that as I progressed through school (eight loooong years of school), I picked some methods that seemed to work better for me and left those that didn't.  Organic chemistry was really an eye opening experience, in that I found out how beneficial discussion and groups can be for me.  Without someone to talk through mechanisms with, and describe how I interpreted things, I am not sure how I would have fared!  All of that is to say that recently I came across a post about how crucial it is to know your learning style prior to entering a PA program.  I kind of thought it was silly at first, because how could you have gotten through so many rigorous courses without knowing how to study?  When I thought about it more, I realized that maybe I wasn't working as efficiently as I could!  I had just grasped onto note cards and memorization because they were mainstream and seemed to be mostly effective for the things I had to learn.  What if I was doing just fine with those methods but could be doing much better with other modes of learning?  That's when I found out about the VARK questionnaire.  It is an easy questionnaire to fill out with only a handful of questions depicting different scenarios that don't necessarily relate to studying.  It looks at different situations (for example giving some one directions), and you choose how you would handle it (maybe drawing a map for them or writing out turn by turn directions for them).  I know it's healthy to approach these sorts of things with a certain amount of skepticism, but I think this was very helpful to me!  My scores showed that I am an aural (hearing) learner and a kinesthetic (doing) learner, and I totally AM!   The page goes on to give different ideas for how to approach learning using these two modalities, and they really made sense to me.  One example was to record lectures so that you can listen to them outside of class.  Another example is to try to incorporate as many examples into your notes as possible, or to explain you notes out loud to someone else.  I know you might be thinking that these are very simple techniques, and perhaps you even use some of them yourself already and they don't seem very revolutionary.  I think the point is just that many people just do things without really considering why.  For me in my learning it is going to be extremely important that I know what I am doing and why so that I can make the absolute most out of my studying time.  I don't want to just try to blunder on through using strategies that sometimes work and sometimes don't, I want to be as prepared as possible.   Haaa, now you can truly see the dork in me shining through, can't you?  If you want to check out your style you can do it here.  Who knows, you might just learn something new, or at the very least, you can give yourself a pat on the back if you have been doing in right all along!