Learning style variations in a culturally diverse class: A case study

Abstract

Internationalisation of educational services creates cross-cultural challenges for universities because any education system is deeply rooted in a local cultural context, thus, reflecting a cultural dictate (Powell and Andersen, 1995; Porter and Samovar, 1994). To cope with the process of internationalisation, universities need to closely look at the area of teaching and learning (Taylor, 1997; Cadman, 2000). One of the issues to address is how to deal with the variety of learning style preferences present in a culturally diverse classroom, and more importantly, to systematically consider these styles when developing and delivering educational curriculum. This paper presents a case study of teaching in a multicultural environment where the student body consisted of five ethnic groups with four distinctly different learning style preferences. Suggestions are made to empirically test propositions put forward in this paper. Strategies and techniques for reconciling cultural differences in learning styles are recommended.