Unit 1 Adult Learning Theory and Perspectives
Overview
Welcome to Leadership 627! In this first unit you will explore reflective practice and teaching perspectives, critical and transformative learning, and roles and factors impacting adult educators.
It’s important for educators to be reflective about their practice and to keep the learning outcomes about the students. This is what is referred to as student-centered learning. Always remember that you are teaching people - not x, y, z subject. If you keep this focus, you will be more attracted to choosing methods that will facilitate critical thinking and this will potentially lead to transformations in the perspectives and lives of your learners. Adult educators are impacted by various societal factors because adult education happens in the world! The key is helping participants analyze their experience critically and figure out how what they are learning “fits” or challenges their lived experience.
We begin Unit 1 with readings and discussions on adult learning theory and perspectives. While most of the course focuses on practice, it is important to understand some foundational theory so that when you are making choices about resources and strategies, you are able to do so with some reasoned rationale.
In this first unit, you are asked to read two articles and a section of our main text by Melvin L. Silberman. The first article by Collins provides some background on the Teachers’ Perspectives Inventory that you will be completing. The second article discusses theories of adult learning and adult development.
The Silberman pages introduce the practice of active training, which is a powerful method of adult learning we will explore during the course. In this methodology, participants are actively engaged in acquiring knowledge and skill while the educator is a skilled facilitator of learning. We will also discuss the rationale for active engagement techniques and will gain more specific information about individual techniques throughout the course. As you go through the learning activities for this unit, you may find it helpful to take a look at the Reading Response questions posted in Unit 2 so you can read with these in mind, and, possibly answer the questions concurrently as you read. This unit also involves viewing several videos about the Teachers’ Perspectives Inventory. These will help you critically reflect on your own results. Therefore, it is important to complete the survey prior to viewing the videos.
One more note I’d like to emphasize is to please follow the suggested “due dates.” The due dates in this course are meant to “chunk” the course into manageable parts so that you are successful. Feel free to ‘go ahead’ but please don’t get behind. Sometimes life throws us “curve balls” so to speak and we might need to take a day away from the course, but please do your best to catch up the very next day. In an asynchronous environment it behooves us all to manage our time so that posts are up on time and ready to be responded to. This will avoid frustration for everyone!
Learning Cafe
Before you continue with this first unit, take a couple minutes to connect with other learners in the Learning Cafe. This is a space for you to chat with your classmates about course topics or other topics of interest. For this first post, please share a bit about yourself (e.g., hometown, interests, future plans, etc.). Feel free to include a picture - of yourself or your pet!
Topics
Unit 1 is divided into 3 topics:
- Reflective Practice and Teaching Perspectives
- Critical and Transformative Learning
- Roles and Factors Impacting Adult Educators
Learning Outcomes
When you have completed this unit you should be able to:
- Express the key features found in the theory of adult education.
- Assess the active and engaged training method.
- Describe what it means to be a facilitator of learning.
Activity Checklist
Here is a checklist of learning activities you will benefit from in completing this unit. You may find it useful for planning your work.
Learning Activities
- Take the Teaching Perspectives Inventory.
- Watch the TPI videos and complete Part A of your discussion post.
- Read the Cahalan, Collin and Sandlin articles.
- Complete Part B of your discussion post.
- Start thinking about your Adult Learning Design Project
Assessment
- Complete the discussion questions for this unit (Parts A and B). Respond substantively to at least two other classmates’ posts.
1.1 Reflective Practice and Teaching perspectives
We begin this topic by taking a look at your ideas about teaching and learning and how these relate to the role of the teacher and learner in adult education. Think about your experience as a student. What helped you be an engaged learner? What are the differences between teaching and learning adults and teaching and learning children or adolescents? An adult educator needs to assume that participants have prior knowledge and experience and that adults are very interested in the application of whatever they are learning. Keeping in mind these principles of andragogy (adult teaching and learning; as opposed to pedagogy, child and adolescent teaching and learning) will help you become a facilitator of learning.
Activity: Teaching Practices Inventory
Take the Teaching Practices Inventory. It has 45 questions and should take you about 10-15 minutes to complete.
Activity: Videos and Response
View the following videos that will help you interpret your TPI results.
Watch: TPI as a Conversational Tool
Watch: Orientation to a Profile
Watch: Deconstructing a Profile
Using the videos as a guide, interpret your own TPI results focusing on your dominant perspectives. Then answer the following questions in your discussion post (Part A):
- Does your profile match your self-perception or how others see you? Are there any discrepancies?
- With respect to teaching adults, what are your next steps?
1.2 Critical and Transformative Learning
What kind of focus will you have as an educator? What techniques will you use to ensure your students have a meaningful learning experience? If you keep a learner-centered focus you will be more attracted to choosing methods that will facilitate critical thinking and this will potentially lead to transformations in the perspectives and lives of your learners. On Jan. 9, 2017, MA LEAD student Christel Davidson wrote the following post entitled “Designing Our Boxes” for another course. I quote it here, with her permission.
“Critical transformational learning is a holistic learning practice that helps people to crawl out of their boxes, experience the space outside the box and then reconstruct their next box which in turn they will crawl out of again and repeat over and over again. I say they will reconstruct their box each time because as human beings we need boundaries to our thought, actions and emotions, and without them, we become unsure of whether anything is concrete or valid, so to feel safe we have our boxes. This is perfectly alright as long as we don’t get stuck in the same box forever. The value of critical transformational learning is that there is a personal intentionality to the process. This can be guided by an educator or it can happen independently. Each time the learner temporarily exits the box to take a fresh view of life, it is not to throw the person into a state of chaos or abandonment of absolutes, but to give a moment where thoughts can be free to explore other possible points of view or to reflect on habits and unconscious actions that are rooted in their beliefs. Once challenged or left open for review, a critical analysis can be made, conclusions drawn and a shifted belief or value stabilized, by restating or redesigning their box. There are endless ways that this can be accomplished, so long as the process evokes the emotions, stimulates the soul and matures the mind.”
Critical thinking is an essential component of leadership because there is an intelligence to practice. This practical wisdom or phronesis is an intellectual virtue incorporating discernment and judgment and is enhanced through practice. How does one learn through practice? According to Cahalan (2016) there are eight Ways of Knowing essential to wise practice:
- Situated awareness
- Embodied realizing
- Conceptual understanding
- Critical thinking
- Emotional attunement
- Creative insight
- Spiritual discernment
- Practical reasoning
Experiential learning can lead to wisdom if experience is accompanied by critical thinking and intentionally grounded in values and beliefs about what is good. This wisdom is transformational both personally and professionally.
Activity: Readings
Read the following articles. Note that only certain pages are assigned, and that the Collin and Sandlin articles can be accessed through the TWU library.
- Cahalan, K. (2016). Integrative Learning for Practical Wisdom in Reflective Practice: Formation and Supervision in Ministry Vol 36.
- Collins, J. B., and D. D. Pratt (2011). The teaching perspectives inventory at 10 Years and 100,000 respondents: Reliability and validity of a teacher self-report inventory. Adult Education Quarterly 61: 358-360 and 371-374.
- Sandlin, J., Redmon Wright R., Clark C. (2013). Reexamining theoriesof adult learning and adult development through the lenses of public pedagogy. Adult Education Quarterly 63:3, 3-14.
- Silberman, M. L., & Biech, E. (2015). Active Training: A Handbook of Techniques, Designs, Case Examples, and Tips (4th ed.). Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons Part 1: pages 1-12; Chapters 18, 19.
1.3 Roles and Factors Impacting Adult Educators
Adult educators are impacted by various societal factors because adult education happens in the world! The key is helping participants analyze their experience critically, and figuring out how what they are learning “fits” or challenges their lived experience. Adult educators are encouraged to establish authentic relationships with students by building trust through caring for students, respecting them and showing interest in what is important to them. One of my favorite things to remember is that the teaching is not about me, it is about the students’ learning. In anything I do as a teacher, I should ask myself “How does this contribute to the students’ learning?” It is helpful to reflect on Brazilian philosopher, Rubem Alves (1979) comments that everything is interpretation:
“Language functions as a mediation tool between humans and their world. As humans, we don’t contemplate reality face to face. Since birth, things in our world don’t come to us in their naked form, but always dressed up in the names our community has given them. This community has already defined how and what the world is like and, therefore, already knows it (the world). This knowledge of the world is crystallized in our language. Language, therefore, is not a copy of objects and facts. Language is always interpretation” (cited in Goodson 2013, p. 47).
Eventually you will be able to help your students engage in the demanding tasks of reflection, critical analysis and academic thinking and writing with less effortful deliberation.
Activity: Start Thinking about your Adult Learning Design Project
First-Draft Thinking about your ALDA (Adult Learning Design Assignment)
For this post of about 200 words, do the following things:
- Read the entire Learning Design Assignment (including the peer review)
- Do some first-draft thinking about your project. What issue within your own context would you like to engage? If possible, think about what you have wanted to do for a long time but you really think you haven’t had time to engage it. See this as a chance to do something important within your context that is practical.
In other words, you will be considering the following (1) Institutional Context and (2) Problem Identification. Talk about what you think you would like to do, where you would like to do it, and with whom?
Make sure you respond to and offer suggestions to at least three of your colleagues.
These are separate discussions located in the Adult Learning Design Project tab.
Assessment
Unit 1 Discussion
Part A
Using the TPI videos as a guide, interpret your own TPI results focusing on your dominant perspectives. Then answer the following questions in your discussion post:
- Does your profile match your self-perception or how others see you? Are there any discrepancies?
- With respect to teaching adults, what are your next steps?
Part B
After reading the unit articles, answer the following in your discussion post:
Discuss how your own education has been impacted by racialization, transformative learning, critical theory, pedagogy and andragogy. Give specific examples.
After you have finished your post, be sure to respond substantively to at least two other classmates’ posts.
Substantive responses may include:
- Providing a new thought, idea, or perspective
- Citing an experience or example of what we are learning
- Adding a new twist on a perspective
- Critically thinking about an idea/concept
- Questioning or challenging a principle/perspective;
- Asking a question or making a comment that shows you are interested in what another person says or encourages another person to elaborate on something they have already said
- Sharing a resource (a reading, web link, video) not covered in the syllabus that adds new information or perspectives to our learning
- Making a comment that underscores the link between two people’s contributions and making this link explicit in your comment. Or, making a summary observation that takes into account several people’s contributions and that touches on a recurring theme in the discussion.
What Substantive Participation is NOT:
- Very basic comments such as “I agree” or “I disagree.”
- Restating what has been said (unless there is a direct purpose in doing so).
- Disrespectfully disagreeing.
- Pat answers that are not thought-provoking or do not move the dialogue forward.
- Greetings/conversation better suited for the Virtual Collegium.
Below are examples of how to stimulate your own and others’ thinking:
- What would happen if…
- Other times it may be helpful to…
- It is my understanding…what is your experience with this?
- You might approach this from…
- Is it possible that…
- Would you consider…
- Maybe…
- Possibly…
- Sometimes…
- I’m wondering if…
- Do you think…
Grading Criteria
The following rubric will be used to assess your discussion posts and responses in this unit. Note that you can save and/or print this pdf for your reference.
Discussion Rubric (Click to expand)
| Discussion Rubric | |
|---|---|
| 9 - 10 | Identifies information from the assigned reading and viewing that resonates or is |
| striking and clearly explains the reason for their choices. | |
| The responses show superior depth of knowledge on the topic, clear synthesis and | |
| analysis of the content, and provide depth, breath, or new insight to the topic. | |
| Demonstrates an accurate understanding of this chosen information. | |
| Uses information from the text to interpret chosen concepts or make connections to | |
| other situations or contexts logically through analysis, evaluation, inference, or | |
| comparison/contrast. | |
| Defines uncommon or challenging words and shows evidence of doing the intellectual | |
| work necessary to understand challenging text. | |
| Identifies points of view and implications in the text and critically analyses own | |
| response to these. | |
| No errors in grammar or composition. Word limit and format followed. Posted on | |
| time. | |
| 6 - 8 | Identifies information from the assigned reading and viewing that resonates or is |
| striking but the reason for their choices is not completely or clearly explained. | |
| The responses show adequate depth of knowledge on the topic, a good synthesis but | |
| may lack in evaluation of the content read, and providing new insight to the topic. | |
| Demonstrates a partial understanding of this chosen information in the text or | |
| viewing. | |
| Uses information from the text/viewing to interpret chosen concepts but does not | |
| make connections to other situations or contexts. | |
| Partially integrates interpretation of the text with text-based support. | |
| Does not define uncommon or challenging words necessary to understanding the text. | |
| Does not identify points of view and implications in the text or critically analyze their | |
| own response to these. | |
| Fewer than 3 errors in grammar or composition. Word limit and format not | |
| followed. Not posted on time. | |
| 3 - 5 | Demonstrates insufficient understanding of the chosen concepts. |
| Responses show inadequate depth of knowledge on the topic, a synthesis that misses | |
| key concepts, and is not a critical analysis. | |
| Uses information from the text to make simplistic interpretations of the text without | |
| using significant concepts or by making only limited connections to other situations or | |
| contexts. | |
| Does not integrate interpretation of the text with text-based support. | |
| Does not define uncommon or challenging words necessary to understanding the text. | |
| Does not identify points of view and implications in the text or critically analyze their | |
| own response to these. | |
| More than 3 errors in grammar or composition. Word limit and format followed. Not | |
| posted on time. | |
| 1 - 2 | Demonstrates little or no understanding of the text; may be inaccurate. |
| Responses are superficial and do not include critical analysis. | |
| Little or no interpretation of the text. | |
| Response is insufficient to show that criteria are met. | |
| More than 5 errors in grammar or composition. Word limit and format followed. Not | |
| posted on time. | |
| 0 | Response is absent or does not address the task. |
| Response is insufficient to show that criteria are met. |
Submission Instructions
All assessments, including discussions, reading responses and other assignments will be submitted here in Moodle. Please see the tabs at the top that corresponds with the assignment type.
Checking your Learning
Use the learning outcomes for this unit as a checklist of understanding before moving on to the next unit.
- Can you express the key features found in the theory of adult education?
- Can you assess the active and engaged training method?
- Can you describe what it means to be a facilitator of learning?
References
- Cahalan, K. (2016). Integrative Learning for Practical Wisdom in Reflective Practice: Formation and Supervision in Ministry Vol 36
- Collins, J. B. and D. D. Pratt (2011). The teaching perspectives inventory at 10 Years and 100,000 respondents: Reliability and validity of a teacher self-report inventory. Adult Education Quarterly 61:358-360 and 371-374.
- Goodson, P. (2013). Becoming an Academic Writer. Los Angeles: Sage.
- Sandlin, J., Redmon Wright R., Clark C. (2013). Reexamining theories of adult learning and adult development through the lenses of public pedagogy. Adult Education Quarterly 63:3, 3-14.
- Silberman, M. L., & Biech, E. (2015). Active Training: A Handbook of Techniques, Designs, Case Examples, and Tips (4th ed.). Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons *Part 1: pages 1-12; chapters 18, 19
- Wang, . C. X. (2017). Theory and Practice of Adult and Higher Education. Information Age Publishing Inc. Chapters 1-4