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VARK Test

Running a VARK session in 60 to 90 minutes

A session plan that turns the grid into a group conversation about ways of working and learning materials, with what to say and what is better avoided.

This plan works from the group grid: you open a session, everyone answers from the same link, and the grid updates as answers come in.

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What VARK is, and what it is not

VARK comes from Neil Fleming and Colleen Mills (1992): four preferred ways of taking in information, visual, aural, through reading and writing, and kinesthetic, meaning through practice. The model is widespread in teaching and training, but its most common use, teaching each person in their preferred channel, lacks solid support: this is the so-called meshing hypothesis, and the review by Pashler and colleagues (2008) found no study that supported it convincingly. This test is an independent test inspired by the model, not the official VARK questionnaire, and it is neither a diagnostic tool nor a measure of ability.

In a workshop, these four words can serve as a shared vocabulary to talk about learning materials: the ones each person says they look for, and the ones they avoid. The answers describe preferences stated today, not an ability to learn through a channel nor the method that would help most, and one result can mix several close channels. It supports a discussion, it does not measure the person. This questionnaire has no reference group, and we have run no study of how stable the results are (test-retest).

What this questionnaire does not allow

  • saying how a person or the group will succeed, or through which channel someone learns best;
  • forming work groups, or assigning materials or roles by profile;
  • comparing two people on the same axis: answers are forced-choice with a fixed total, so each person's four scores are read against each other, never against someone else's;
  • assessing, hiring or justifying a decision about someone;
  • tailoring a lesson or revision to each person's preferred channel: preferring a channel does not mean learning better through it, and the few well-designed studies that tested this matching did not confirm it (Pashler and colleagues, 2008).

The session plan

  1. Minutes 0 to 10, the frame.

    State the goal: talk about the materials that help the group, not sort people. Say that the result describes a stated preference, not an ability, that everyone can learn in several ways, that a first name is optional and that nobody will have to announce their profile. Share the link or the QR code.

  2. Minutes 10 to 25, taking the test and reading alone.

    Everyone answers on their own, then reads their result page in silence and notes one sentence that fits them and one that does not.

  3. Minutes 25 to 40, the grid.

    Show the grid and first ask what people see in it, before any interpretation. Then read the make-up as questions about the group's materials: a frequent channel, a channel that is rare in the split, a missing channel. Each reading is a hypothesis the group confirms or sets aside. The grid keeps only each person's top channel: someone whose two channels are close or tied lands in a single box, and an empty box only means nobody has it first. A very common channel may say as much about the materials the group is used to as about what it prefers, and a uniform grid may partly come from how the group was formed. No box says how to adapt the lesson.

  4. Minutes 40 to 55, the discussion.

    Do the "where this profile got me wrong" exercise below, then ask this question: "Which recent material, in class, in training or elsewhere, helped you understand, and which one got in your way?"

  5. Minutes 55 to 60, the commitment.

    The group picks a single concrete action for the next session, based on what was said, not on the channels: for example putting the same idea across through one more format (a diagram, a time for spoken discussion, a hands-on exercise), for everyone, then asking the group what helped (a felt impression, not a measure of what was learned). It is a trial to observe, not a promised effect, and never a format kept for one person because of their profile. Whoever carries it volunteers: the grid points at nobody.

  6. 90-minute variant.

    Between minute 40 and minute 70, work in sub-groups of three or four on a recent lesson or training session: through which different channels could it be offered to everyone, and what would we watch to know whether it helps? The point is not to tailor the lesson to each preference in the room. Each sub-group reports back in one sentence, then keep twenty minutes for the commitment.

The "where this profile got me wrong" exercise

Everyone rereads their description and picks out two sentences: the one that describes them least well, and the one that could describe almost anybody. Pool the second ones, without saying which profile they come from.

This is the Barnum effect, described by Bertram Forer in 1949: a general enough description feels personal to most people. Spotting it together is a reminder that the result is a starting point, and makes it legitimate not to recognise oneself in it.

Why start from a real, recent case

A meta-analysis of debriefs (Tannenbaum and Cerasoli, 2013) links going back together over a specific work episode with better performance afterwards, mostly in simulation studies (medical and military). It does not cover VARK, the choice of learning materials or any profile tool: the question asked during the discussion borrows its idea (start from a real, recent case) without being a debrief in the study's sense, and this plan promises no effect on the group or on anyone's results.

To avoid during the session

  • guessing or announcing out loud the profile of a participant who has not shared it, or locking someone into theirs ("you are kinesthetic, so you take nothing in from a lecture");
  • reading out to the group the first names from the facilitator-only list;
  • commenting on a pair of named people, or comparing two participants on the same channel;
  • splitting people, tasks or materials by preferred channel, or keeping a format for someone because of their profile: an extra format is offered to the whole group;
  • drawing from the grid a judgement on what the group is worth or will achieve, or explaining a difficulty by a channel.

Did this help? If you keep a resource page for your students, trainees or colleagues, you are welcome to mention Profilia (profilia.app) there. That is all: nothing to sign up for, nothing in return.