Using Learning Styles to Enhance Learning Management Systems

Abstract

Learning management systems (LMSs) are becoming increasingly popular at many educational institutions such as universities. However, they provide same content for all learners in a given course. Educational theory suggests that learners have different styles of learning. Ideally, the content must be arranged to match each learner’s learning style. In this study, we propose a framework for adaptive LMSs that can tailor course content to the individual learner’s learning style. We estimate the learning style of the student using two methods: a questionnaire and a rule-based method that utilizes the learner’s activity within the LMS. The Felder–Silverman learning style model served as the basis for our system implementation. We explain the operational aspects of our framework and present the findings in applying the framework to a course conducted in Moodle LMS.