The Academic Effects of VAK Learning Styles on EFL (English as a Foreign Language) Students to learn English Vocabulary

Abstract

The main purposes of the study are to investigate about how the linguistic levels of the students and their attitudes towards English language learning process influence their vocabulary learning styles through the practice of visual, auditory or kinesthetic (VAK) learning styles and to find out if the preferred VAK learning styles affect the students’ abilities to increase the amount of the new vocabulary. Also the researcher aims to find out if the gender affects the selection of the VAK learning styles for learning vocabulary and exploring the correlation between EFL instruction and the preferred vocabulary learning styles so as to come up with teaching techniques that can support the quality of teaching and learning English as a foreign language. In particular the study tries to answer the following questions:

1) What is the most common learning style of visual, auditory or kinesthetic (VAK)?

2) Do the students have awareness about these learning styles which are visual, auditory or kinesthetic?

3) Do the teachers take into their considerations their students’ learning styles when they decide the best teaching method that they should apply in the classroom? 

4) Do the cultural background, age, and gender factors affect VAK learning styles preferences by EL students?

The researcher tries to explore certain hypotheses which are formulated in this situation such as that male and female students of English department have different preferred learning styles since they have great individual differences among them. In addition, their Kurdish cultural background and the teaching methods may have important roles in their learning styles preference selection particularly in learning English language vocabulary.