Are You Global?

A very nice student named Anna recently wrote in about a problem she had in the classroom. She said that she always freezes up when the teacher calls on her to answer a question. “I get straight A’s on my homework and all my tests,” she explained. “I just can’t answer questions in class.”

Anna seemed to me to be a perfect example of a global learner. Global learning students process information in a way that makes it nearly impossible to answer questions on the spur of the moment. These students take in information in enormous chunks, and then they need to take awhile to absorb it all and sort it out. Once they do, they usually come up with great answers.

In contrast to global learners are analytic learners. These students can process information bit by bit, and they can respond quickly when asked a question. The down side for analytic learners is that they can get caught up in one bit that they don’t understand and can’t get beyond that point. They can sometimes miss some of the pieces of the puzzle for this reason.

It’s well worthwhile for students to read about global and analytic learning. When you don’t understand what’s really happening in the learning process, you might feel something is wrong when it's perfectly normal!