Adult Education and Lifelong Learning Journal
Introduction
There were several courses in the MEd program that enabled me to explore adult education learning theory, and how motivation, and cognitive, constructivist, and social learning theories apply to instructional design in distance education and online learning. MDDE 613 in particular, helped me to develop a 'personal theory of practice' and refine my position on the adult education theory continuum and whether it is the individual or social element that influences learning.
Key activities to help me accomplish this was writing and reflecting on learning theories that resonated with my beliefs and experiences about knowledge, learning and designing instruction. The journal or blog (see Learning Asset 1) where I wrote a sustained and reflective account of my learning experiences and insights during the course. This is where I explored themes such as the role of the individual learner or responsibility for learning, definitions of self-directed and social learning, and the implications of putting adult learning theory into practice. These themes were also analyzed in more depth in the other course assignments (see Learning Assets 2, 3 and 4).
My Starting Point
I did not have much background or context with adult education origins, philosophies and practices of self-directed learning prior to the MEd program. Emancipatory or transformative learning does not fit easily into corporate learning culture; if one wants to transform or practice critical reflection, it is typically done outside of working hours, i.e., informal learning.
When I first started designing training, I had to complete a mandatory instructional design workshop for a company I was working with to know how to design and develop instructional materials 'the right way.' Today, I understand there are many ways to design and develop instruction, but this workshop was based solely on Robert Gagne's 9 steps of instruction and John Keller's ARCS model of motivation (Driscoll, 2005). When I came to recognize their work again in MDDE 603 through Driscoll's quirky text, the Psychology of Learning for Instruction, I had more context and realized that were many other learning theories and research that can influence or be key ingredients into a recipe for designing instruction. However, still today, 'recall of prior learning', setting learning expectations, and gaining attention by using salience, surprise or humour, is present throughout much of my work. Clearly, these theories aimed to understand and sustain learning motivation and the conditions for learning, have influenced and endured in my approach to designing instruction.
In terms of a 'personal theory of practice', before completing MDDE 613, I had summarized my position as follows: "I would place one foot in a cognitive camp and the other in a constructivist camp. And then I would look to systems theory to get to the heart of the matter." Since then, my placement of where I stood in terms of leaning towards more individual or social dimensions of learning has not dramatically shifted. I recognize how learning theories provide well-grounded approaches to instruction but they do not truly define the conditions of learning, or the problems learners face. I am not sure why I saw systems theory being a tie-breaker. I can appreciate that designing learning requires a big picture view of many parts of the system, with input from the many stakeholders or subsystems. But from experience, this process of surveying and reconciling learning needs, can be 'messy' and ultimately, pin-pointing those needs depends on both the worldviews of the learner and views of the designer or facilitator or instruction. Today, I am not sure that systems theory is as effective as I might have thought.
In MDDE 603, I created a conceptual map of the learning theories that we studied in the Driscoll text and identified key themes that resonated for me. Structure; Motivation; Relevance; Reflection and Interaction were themes that emerged for me from the cognitive and constructive learning theories and formed a basis for my approach to designing instruction. It is included here as a frame of reference of how my views changed after completing MDDE 613, and further study into the philosophy and practices of self-directed learning.
Learning Asset 1: Reflective Journal
I started a blog at the start of the MEd program to write about my learning experiences. It was never a sustained or consistent activity to reflect on what I was learning until I took MDDE 622, Openness in Education, and LAK2012 (not part of the MEd). But when a journal about my learning experiences, was a course deliverable for MDDE 613, this sparked once again the practice of 'open' reflection.
I used the journal assignment to step away from academic syntax and rigor and reformulate ideas from the course readings in my own way, but also to simply explore and meander freely, much like doodling in a sketchbook. A link to my blog and entries associated with MDDE 613 can be found here: cognitiveoverdose on tumblr.
Learning Asset 2: Position Paper
Using the course readings and others readings of interest, I created a short position paper outlining the purpose of adult education and which adult education theorist my views aligned with. I centered my paper around the ideas and perspectives of Eduard Lindeman, who offered a 'humanistic' perspective reinforcing the goal of adult education to be 'life-centered.' I attributed the needs of the individual and personal development as a primary driver for adult education where learning is a process of discovery and experimentation, and the responsibility for learning is on the learner who is at the center of the experience. I also recognized this as a source of dissonance too, where self-directed learning could be viewed as not fully supporting societal or emancipatory goals of adult education.
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Download MDE 613 Short Position Paper.pdf
MDE 613 Short Position Paper.pdf Details
- Saturday, 30 May 2015 [138.3KB]
Learning Asset 3: Reflection Paper
In this assignment, using course readings and my previous position paper, I expanded on my thoughts of where I positioned myself on the adult education theory continuum (i.e., towards individual or social learning). I concluded that knowledge construction, learning and meaning making, cannot help but both be personal and social.
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Download MDE 613 Short Reflection Paper.pdf
MDE 613 Short Reflection Paper.pdf Details
- Sunday, 31 May 2015 [125.9KB]
Learning Asset 4: Cartoon
The objective of this collaborative assignment was to examine the purpose and goals of adult education in our interactions with learners outside the classroom. With artistic license to express our views, my group created a comic strip to explore critical pedagogy. This exercise helped me better appreciate social pedagogy theorists and the benefits of collaborative group work.
Competencies Applied
Problem Solving, Analysis, and Decision Making
- 1.6 Compare alternatives using critical analysis.
- 1.7 Make reasoned arguments using critical reflection, leading to rational solutions.
Instructional Design and Development
- 2.1 Critically analyze and discuss the implications of personal perspectives and epistemological orientations for the teaching-learning process.
- 2.3 Describe and appropriately apply a range of learning and motivational theories to instructional design situations in distance education.
Communication Technologies and Networking
- 3.1 Use a variety of communication and document sharing tools to create, reflect, and communicate with others.
Research
- 5.4 Critically review literature both broadly and in-depth.
- 5.6 Summarize and synthesize information with a view to pursuing deeper understanding.
Critical Reflection
Reflection involves making sense of our experiences and it is a process that takes time, deep thought, and honesty. I did my best to attend presently to the exercise of writing consistently for the course journal (see Learning Asset 1). Rather than using the reflection questions provided throughout the course units, I approached each journal entry like a mini-essay, and allowed a little more of a personal or experiential nature to surface while exploring lifelong learning topics and issues of interest (2.1 and 3.1). Revisiting the adult education journal, and the entire blog for that matter, also evokes the sense of play that I came to feel when I approached writing my journal entries. I was sad that the assignment (and the course!) came to an end but also content that I had a chance to capture being in the moment, and recognize that the personal sense-making journey is never really over.
In defining and expressing my thoughts on the principal guiding philosophies and purposes of adult education (see Learning Assets 2 and 3), I referred to the theorists and literature referred to in the course (for example, Cranton, Hiemstra, Lindeman, Reischmann, Wenger) as well as literature that I discovered on my own such as Brookfield, Fenwick, Jarvis, and Zepke & Leach to support my position on the adult education theory continuum (5.4). In both assignments, I concluded that learning is essentially an individual process but shaped by others which left me feeling conflicted. This is primarily because after reading Brookfield and other social and emancipatory learning theorists and writers who saw learning as dialogue with others and pathway to engaged social citizenship, my view of dialogue was more quiet, and internal. Ultimately, it is the way I view autonomy in learning as the individual's right to set and steer their learning journey and the notion of an evolving self that situates me in the humanist tradition of the adult education continuum (1.6, 1.7 and 2.1).
In my last assignment (see Learning Asset 4), I was part of a group who explored and interpreted social and critical pedagogy as a cartoon. My interest in this format was inspired by Daniel Pink's Johnny Bunko manga comic while reading the Driscoll text. Visuals of Vygotsky, Mager and Piaget at cafe drinking lattes and talking about situated cognition I thought might lend a new way of understanding common threads in educational psychology.
Through humour, and placement of our main adult education theorists into a common everyday situation, i.e., in a tavern drinking, our aim was to juxtapose contrasting viewpoints in accessible and non-academic language. This learning asset illustrates variety in reflection and communication (3.1). Our conclusion was that no one particular theory reigns supreme. This was illustrated as a mosh pit where our theorists who had previously fiercely engaged in asserting their points of view decided to either dance or listen to the band. The image that is selected for Learning Asset 4, is from a scene where Freire says 'Mezirow's education is imprisoned in his head' which for me, best encapsulated the debate between individual and social learning. Through engaging in this collaborative project, the other assignments, and discussion forums, I consistently experienced and expressed this theme of the push and pull of individual and social learning (5.6).
While the individual is responsible for their learning i.e., they control their ‘readiness to learn,’ your goal as the designer of instruction is to assess how to gain the learner’s attention, find out what motivates them, help them learn though self-reflection and present organized instruction so that meaningful learning can take place. To that end, in my design of self-paced learning for new hires, I have applied theories of motivation and self-directed learning explored during this course by offering a self-paced curriculum that includes opportunity for social learning through discussions in a new hire community of practice (2.3). To conclude, being self-directed does not mean learning in isolation; it means having ability to self-regulate and work towards one's learning goals but to also negotiate when and how to move towards and search out and integrate new ideas. We may 'we learn for ourselves' but not necessarily by ourselves.
Competencies applied are indicated in parentheses.
Lessons Learned
Two takeaways to highlight:
- Reflection, analyzing one's own thinking and critical examination of one's learning experience, and choice and the ability to self-organize my learning around interests, were key activities for me in this course. Discussion forums and the collaborative learning activity provided the social dimension. This is why as an adult learner, I view learning as primarily an internal cognitive process regulated and steered by the individual; yet shaped by other influences, whether that is an instructor, a group, or society. The individual establishes and maintains their own goals and interests and strives to make meaning of their experiences.
- When I first started the course, my personal experience of the variety of the participant and provider roles in adult education was limited. After the readings and course interactions, I came to realize that our singular experience cannot always be trusted as designers of instruction. This is why I think that the theoretical and practical path of how one designs instruction is not only in response to learning goals to be achieved, i.e, to develop learner autonomy or learner citizenship, but is also influenced by one's context, i.e., definitions, outlook or worldview.
What I gained from this learning was the opportunity to ... Have a better understanding of where I sit on the adult education theory continuum. My perspective is primarily, 'humanistic' but I also recognize that knowledge construction, learning and meaning making, is both personal and social.
My End Point
My initial views about adult learning theory remained fairly consistent as when I took MDDE 603, several years earlier. Motivation, structure, relevance, reflection and interaction are still required elements in learning design as they were then but, what I have come to realize today is that the strategies aligned with the learning theories you may select as a designer of instruction, or teacher, depend on a variety of factors, such as the learners, content, learning goals and context in which the learning occurs. Learning as an output is not equal; and it is highly variable.
Furthermore, motivation seems like the black box of learning; it is tied to one's sense of self and it is unique for all learners. If there was a main take-away from my journal reflections, I would highlight the role of self as being fragmented, and the havoc it can play with one's sense of agency or autonomy in adult learning, and the difficulty in designing and evaluating learning effectively with this in mind.
As adult learners, we are inherently connected with others but we are also inherently separate. It is not a binary either or argument; it is complicated, ambiguous, messy, and human. Educators make choices as to how to develop learner autonomy and citizenship - just as learners do - and the path one takes in designing instructions is very much rooted in one's preferences and context or outlook.