Match or Mismatch of EFL Students' Learning Styles and Writing Assignments

Along with the ever-increasing attention to the learners and learning in ESL/EFL classrooms, language learning styles have been considered as the cornerstone of learners' successful achievements. Referent to this assumption, researchers often agree that accommodating teaching styles to students' learning styles and taking into account their individual differences in language classes can lead to the improved learning. Therefore, this study intended to investigate the effects of accommodating writing assignments to the learning styles of the EFL learners on their writing improvement. More specifically, the present research aimed at investigating the effect of visual style on improving EFL undergraduate students' writing. Accordingly, 22 EFL learners whose major learning styles were visual were selected as the participants of this study. To start with, a pretest was taken. Through the analysis of pretest scores, researchers commenced the instruction in about 10 sessions. During these sessions, one of the researchers instructed the participants, worked on their writings, and gave assignments and topics which matched their style. At the end of the course, a posttest was administered and two raters, familiar with writing assessment, independently scored the writings, and then the means of pre and posttests were subjected to a match West. Results (t= 2.379, sig. = 0.04, p<0.05) showed that giving writing tasks to the visual students based on their style improved their writing. In conclusion, if teachers take individual differences into account, especially in writing classes, more promotion in EFL undergraduate students' writing can be achieved.