If you have a few minutes spare, you should watch this video of richard feynman, who talks about how he thinks "thinking" happens in people, and how communication is very lossy : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cj4y0EUlU-Y

i think the fact that you thought a certain way of learning is more appropriate is actually correct - some people learn one way better than another, and that's because in their brain, they model the world in a different way to other people (who also find a different way of learning better). It just so happens that sometimes a person's model happens to suit the sort of teaching method being used in a school, and he ends up looking like a genius.