USING COOPERATIVE LEARNING TO ACCOMMODATE THE VAK MODEL IN CLASSROOMS

In a constructivist classroom the role of the teacher is not to disseminate information, but to become a facilitator to help students actively construct their own knowledge. Individual differences among students have highlighted the fact that each of us has different learning styles. There are three learning modalities or learning styles: Visual, Auditory and Kinaesthetic. This is also known as the VAK model. Researches have indicated the importance of utilising different instructional or teaching strategies to accommodate different learning styles and promote students' academic achievement. Cooperative learning is the instructional use of small groups so that students work together to maximize their own and each other's learning. The present paper attempts to show how the three learning styles can be accommodated using examples of Cooperative Learning teaching strategies as classroom activities. These activities encourage learners become active during the teaching learning process, which is the core feature of constructivism