Page 4 - Describing Learners

2) Good learner characteristics
Neil Naiman and his colleagues describe that a good learner has: a tolerance of

ambiguity; positive task orientation; ego involvement; high aspirations; goal orientation and
perseverance. Joan Rubin and Irene Thompson listed 14 learner characteristics such as:

students who can find their own way, who are creative, who make intelligent guesses, who
make their opportunity for practice, who make errors work for them not against them, and

who use contextual clues.

3) Learner styles

Tony Wright describes four different learner styles within a group:

a) The ‘enthusiast’ looks at the teacher as a point of reference and is concerned with
the goals of the learning group.

b) The ‘oracular’ also focuses on the teacher, but is more oriented towards the
satisfaction of personal goals.

c) The ‘participator’ tends to concentrate on group goals and group solidarity.
d) The ‘rebel’ is mainly concentrated with the satisfaction of his or her own goals.

Keith Willing suggested four learner categories:
a) Converges

 Prefer solitary than groups

 Independent
 Confident in their own abilities

 Analytic

 Cool and pragmatic
b) Conformist

 Prefer to emphasise learning ‘about language ‘over learning to use it.

 Dependent
 Perfectly happy to work in non-communicative classrooms

 Prefers to see well-organized teachers

c) Concrete learners
 Enjoy the social aspects of learning