Understanding one’s teaching style can serve as a foundation for the improvement of instruction and serves not only learners but also the educator. NEW DIRECTIONS FOR ADULT AND CONTINUING EDUCATION, no. 93, Spring 2002 © Wiley Periodicals, Inc. 17 2 Teaching Style: Where Are We Now? Joe E. Heimlich, Emmalou Norland Teaching style is a phrase sometimes used to describe different things. Although some authors use it as if it is synonymous with teaching method or technique, most researchers who have defined teaching style refer to style as a predilection toward teaching behavior and the congruence between an edu- cator’s teaching behaviors and teaching beliefs (Heimlich and Norland, 1994), a pervasive quality in the educational activities of an educator that persists even when content changes (Fisher and Fisher, 1979), the distinct qualities a teacher displays that are persistent (Conti, 1998), or the characteristic ways each individual collects, organizes, and transforms information into useful knowledge (Cross, 1979). Consistent in the definitions offered by Solomon and Miller (1961), Gauld (1982), Dunn and Dunn (1979), Draves (1997), Zinn (1998), and others is the same quality of constancy of behaviors of the educator regardless of the setting or the content. Style is not method but something larger that relates to the entire teaching-learning exchange. In any educational event, several elements are constant: there is an edu- cator who conveys or facilitates the content to each learner and the group of learners within a situation that is both physical and the affective reaction to the physical environment. These five elements—teacher, learner, group, con- tent, and environment—comprise a model of the teaching-learning exchange. All elements are present in every teaching-learning event or exchange, but the relationships and the importance of each component vary. Part of the variance depends on the situation and, more important, the way in which the educator operationalizes personal beliefs regarding the relationship and importance of each component. The study of teaching style focuses on the beliefs, values, and behaviors of educators as they relate to the way the ele- ments of the exchange function.