I would describe my experience as an adult learner to be substantially different as opposed to learning as a child. Malcolm Knowles argues that there are 6 principles of Andragogy, which include: an individual’s evolution from dependent personality to self-governed adult, a growing reservoir of experiences that becomes a rich source of knowledge, readiness to learn is based on development tasks required in social context, becoming problem-centered with immediate application, intrinsic drivers of motivation, and adults need to know the reasons for learning something (Unit 6 Notes, 2018).
Andragogy is vastly different than pedagogy because adults have a large reservoir of experience to draw on whereas children rely mostly on what the instructor teaches (Conaway & Zorn-Arnold, 2015). For example, with regards to this Masters program, students draw on their personal experience to apply the theories taught. A professor guides and facilitates understanding by posing questions that can be discussed and investigated by relating the concepts to past experiences, interpreting the information in a rich and meaningful way (Conaway et al. 2015). In contrast, a schoolteacher provides students with a store of knowledge that can be eventually drawn upon in the future.
Becoming a self-directed adult evolves with maturity as individuals are driven to make choices and decisions, and take responsibility for their actions. It is important to encourage children to make wise decisions so that they learn to predict and accept the consequences (positive or negative) of such decisions (Conaway et al. 2015). As children evolve into adults, they not only wish to have the ability to make decision but also want to be recognized for their autonomy and ability to do so (Conaway et al. 2015). In my recent experience while completing my undergrad, I found professors were incredibly frustrating when they did not treat students as adults. It was insulting when they were condescending and did not allow students the autonomy to make connections in unique and creative ways in order to facilitate learning.
In addition, adults need to know the reason for exerting effort and thereby learning something where there is immediate application because adults are problem-centered. Otherwise, their time and effort can be directed towards more meaningful tasks in which they believe have a better outcome. In addition, adults understand the value of knowledge and the key component it plays in pursuit of their goals. With Andragogy, the difference is that adults have a gap that they wish to fill in the present in order to achieve a specific goal in the future. For example, my goal is to become a management consultant; therefore, I must complete a Masters program in order to open up the doors necessary to achieve my goal. Therefore, I currently have a problem or gap that I need to fix in order to achieve my goal in the future.
Lastly, adult students must have a readiness to learn based on their developmental position and this must come from an intrinsic motivation. A developmental task inspires an adult learner to go back to school and finish a degree because they understand the value it will add to their career. Generally, adult learners return back to school to enhance their quality of life or that of their family’s situation (Conaway et al. 2015). These are both intrinsic motivations, whereas children have extrinsic motivations (reward or punishment) in order to learn. For example, I did not complete grade 12 Functions or Calculus while I was in high school; however, I found out that it was required in order to complete a marketing degree. As a result, I had the intrinsic motivation to self-teach myself both math subjects over the course of one summer.
What is an experience in your life where you lacked 1 or 2 of the 6 motivational principles for Andragogy and it resulted in a lack of motivation to complete the task?
Christina
References
Conaway, W. & Zorn-Arnold, B. (2015). The Keys to Online Learning For Adults: The Six Principles of Andragogy. Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/299540188_The_Keys_to_Online_Learning_for_Adults_The_Six_Principles_of_Andragogy
Unit 6 Notes (2018). Retreived on October 31, 2018, from https://create.twu.ca/ldrs500/unit-6/unit-6-notes/
Hi Christina,
Great blog post, I thought this post was well-thought out and engaging and I just wanted to respond to your question about lacking in the motivational principles of andragogy to complete a task. Rather than talk about completing a task, I’ll quickly summarize how lacking the last principle of andragogy for me made me regret not being able to maximize my educational experience from high school onwards.
As an adult learner, I can personally say that all the assumptions of adult learners in andragogy are true with me. I’ve come to love and appreciate the process of learning more so now then when I was in high school or in my early years of university. Back then, I was truly motivated to learn only from external motivators such as to find decent job prospects or to avoid disappointing my family. As a result, I only strived to earn what I felt was an acceptable grade which hindered my experience as a learner.
One of the things that really made me appreciative of the general learning process was when I started to notice how my profs were applying classroom theories to real-world problems. I felt that learning without knowing why I was learning had always been a challenge for me growing up. I can vividly remember struggling with sine, cosine, and tangents for geometry in my grade 12 math class and constantly asking myself: “Why am I learning these complicated equations? I’m never going to use this in the future. Normal, everyday people don’t solve these problems!” Ultimately, I never bothered exerting myself to learn the material, something I deeply regretted years later.
My disdain for math lasted until about my 3rd year of university when I watched and became fascinated with the movie “Imitation Game” which was about how a mathematician named Alan Turing helped end World War II through his invention of the early computer. This was one of the key moments that made me realize how powerful knowledge can be and sparked my appreciation for mathematics as I began to realize how it’s been practically used to explain everything in our physical world. Merriam & Bierma (2014) described it best when they stated “adults need to know the reason for learning something,” something I found relatable even before I reached adulthood (as cited by Penfold Navarro, 2018). I needed to see the big picture in learning these foundational materials before committing to learning them.
I’m sure many younger students share the same sentiment as I did growing up and placed learning on the back burner to pursue their passions like basketball, football, music, or video games. I think many of these students can come to appreciate the learning process just as I did if educators are able to connect the educational material to their personal interests at a deeper level and hopefully spark an interest in the material itself. For example, as a basketball player in high school I would’ve loved to know statistically which areas on court were the most valuable to shoot from or how to optimize shooting technique based on our individual biomechanics. Had I been able to connect my passions with my educational material back then, my educational experience and specializations would have likely been drastically different.
-Ruiz