Translate Learning Power into Earning Power
Discover how tapping into your unique learning style will benefit your art career and business
As the parent of two energetic, school-age boys, I have been researching a lot about “learning styles”. Research about learning styles proves that by mastering our individual learning style we can absorb, process, and recall most of everything we are taught—that’s pretty powerful stuff!
Did you know that sixty-five percent of the population are visual learners? And of that group most are visual artists and female.
“So how does this apply to me?” you ask. The answer, you are an artist (or in the art business) which likely means you are a visual learner (so am I). We are always learning and everyday we are presented with opportunities to learn new techniques, skills and knowledge about our industry. We are the generation of the internet and therefore we have an unlimited supply of knowledge at our finger-tips 24/7. By honing in on our unique method of learning—that matches our learning style—we will be able to translate our learned knowledge into profit for our art business and career overall.
Once you discover how you best learn and process information you WILL benefit professionally and financially. Your art business will benefit because you will be able to:
• manage your projects (and time) more effectively
• improve your persuasive and sales skills
• stay up-to-date with emerging technology
• absorb, understand and apply new creative (and technical) skills
• increase your self confidence
• learn how to take advantage of your “natural” skills and inclinations
Not sure if you are a visual learner? Here is short summary of the three main types of learning styles, verbal, experimental and visual learners.
Verbal learners: who constitute about 30% of the general population, learn by hearing. They benefit from class lectures and from discussion of class materials in study groups or in oral presentations.
Experiential learners: about 5% of the population – learn by doing and touching, and clinical work, role-playing exercises.
Visual learners: the remaining 65% of the population – are those among us with powerful gifts of the right hemisphere. They are our artists, inventors, builders, creators, musicians, computer gurus, visionaries and healers. They are empathic and often very spiritually aware. They learn best when they are allowed to wallow in the right hemisphere, the source of creative thinking, humor, and imagery. They think and learn in multi-dimensional images.
Some of their primary characteristics include:
• Love books, magazines and other reading materials
• Relate best to written information, notes, diagrams, maps, graphs, flashcards, highlighters
• Like to have pen and paper handy
• Enjoy learning through visually appealing materials
• Feel frustrated and restless when unable to take notes
• May have exceptional “photographic memories”
• Can remember where information was located on a page
• Need a quiet place to study
• Benefit from recopying or making their own notes, even from printed information
• Have trouble following long lectures
• Tend to be good at spelling
• Benefit from field trips where observation skills can be used
• Tend to be detail oriented
• Are usually organized and tidy
• Often ask for verbal instructions to be repeated
• Benefit from previewing reading material
• Skilled at making graphs, charts or other visual displays
• Write down directions or draw a map
• Need to see the instructor’s facial expressions and body language
• Concentrate better with clear line of sight to blackboard or visual aids
• Remember how people looked and dressed in the past
• Prefer written instructions to oral ones
• Don’t remember names easily
Still not sure if you are a Visual Learner?
So you ARE a visual learner—now what?
Here are some great learning style tips that will help you process and apply new information, skills and techniques. Put these to work and see your art business flourish!
• Write things down
• Jot down key points on post-it notes and display around the house
• Copy what’s on the board, from the instruction manual, or from the text online
• Write down key words, phrases, diagrams to remind you about a key idea or event
• At a seminar: Sit near the front of the classroom to see instructor clearly
• At home: Set a time and quiet place for your learning, free from distractions, music, or TV
• Create visual reminders of auditory info
• Use mind maps to summarize large tracts of information (What is a “mind map”?)
• Take notes. Keep a professional journal, workbook, binder documenting all your projects
• Use highlighters, underlining, etc.
• Make lists, add to journal
• Watch videos. “can’t understand the manual”, search YouTube for a video, you’ll be surprised at what’s in their library.
• Use flashcards for studying or making presentations in public
• Ask business partners to follow-up with requests in email
• Record lengthy business telephone calls, so that you can take notes later
• Carry a camera or use your phone to record ideas or to remind yourself of details
Even if you didn’t know you were a visual learner, you have likely built some tools of your own to help you with your career and art business, we hope you will share them with us by commenting.
Come back and let me know how this information helps you on your next project or manage your art business—we want to hear from you!
Best of luck,
Karen
YouTube video’s would be an excellent way of learning.