Learning styles and learning preferences of higher diploma students

Background The student diversity in the Vocational Training Council (VTC) has been increasing in recent years. With most students coming from the Post 90s Generation, they share characteristics of the Net Generation, who are ‘associated with new forms of sociality’[1]. It is therefore important to update teachers to the learning styles and learning preferences of their students. Learning style is defined as ‘the manner in which an individual perceives and processes information in learning situations’, and the VARK model is adopted to analyze learning style. Learning preference is ‘the choice of one learning situation or condition over another’[2] and concerns students’ choices in learning such as preferred mobile learning activities, learning tools, communication media and video clips. To collect updated data for reference, this research aims to study whether there is any significant difference among Higher Diploma students of the seven disciplines in terms of learning styles and learning preferences.