Foundations of Adult Education

A Quick Overview
Defining an Adult & Adult
Education
– People should be considered as adults when they
perform adult roles and are essentially responsible
for their own life.
– Adult status implies a person who is largely
responsible for their own survival and success.
– Adult education is different from other levels of
education because of:
 The voluntary nature of the learning
 The commitment to growth
 The deliberate structuring of activities.
Adding Value
– Adult education involves taking a current
condition, analyzing it, and developing a strategy
for adding value to what already exists.
– The intent is to make it better in some way.
– This applies to working with people, programs,
legislation, delivery systems, social service
agencies, and others to promote individual and
societal well-being.
Goals of Adult Education
– Preparing people for the future
– Social change
– Empowerment of Individuals
– Lifelong Learning
– To Provide Education to all who want and need it.
Serve minorities, handicapped, older adults, and
more…
– Provides second-chance education
– Reducing cycles of poverty and socio-economic
disadvantage
– Citizenship, ESL, Literacy, GED, High School
Diploma, Family Literacy, Workforce Literacy and
more and more and more…
– Helping people reach their maximum potential
Purposes of Adult Education
– Provide access and incentives to reach the greater
population
– Opens doors which provide people with opportunity and
hope
– Allow people to become independent
– Makes people more marketable in the work force
– Brings a different type of learning to the education market
– Provides a better forum for adult learning
– Prepares people to use technology effectively
– More
Challenges for Adult Education
– Limited and declining funding
– How to increase participation and retention
particularly among those who are most in need
– Keeping pace with technology
– Teaching methods, assessment, accountability
– Sustainability
The Handbook (2000) What does it Say?

– For 70 years, seven prior Handbooks of Adult and

Continuing Education were a reference on
 Best Practices, programs and institutions in the field.
– Previous Handbooks attempted to describe
everything we knew at the time about adult
education theory & practice.
– The 2000 edition does NOT attempt to catalog
everything we know about the field.
 It uses a “critically reflective approach” to combine the
results of formal investigation with the wisdom of practical
experience.
– In the 2000 Handbook over 60 adult educators
share their diverse perspectives in a single
volume. They share selective perspectives not a
comprehensive perspective.
 They say this is a “time for adult educators to reconsider
the nature of their work & its place in society.”
 They view adult education as a social practice of
prudent and practical action. “In 2000 and beyond One
size does not fit all.”
The Crisis in Professional
Knowledge

 According to the 2000 Handbook:

– There are deep crevasses between how we think
professionals carry out their work and what
working conditions are really like.
– We need a skeptical reassessment of adult
education.
– We live in a society where things change so
rapidly that we cannot rely on old solutions to
solve new problems.
– Adult education must offer Hope for those who
need it the most.
– We must encourage more inclusive, collaborative,
and democratic forms of adult education.
– However, there are no fixed templates, no pat
answers, no right way to model, no guarantees or
sure fire results.
– The context within which adults are asked to learn
becomes an essential component.
Linking the Learner to the Context
– There are two dimensions to the contextual
approach to learning:
 The Interactive Dimension (Authentic, real-life situations.
 The Structural Dimension (Social and cultural factors
including race, class, gender, ethnicity, power, and
oppression).
– The last 10 years have seen a major growth in
interest in learning from experience.
– Adult education is a vehicle for self-development
and change.
 There is a definite shift from a top down to a
“bottom-up action-learning/action planning
approach to learning.”
 The promise of prior learning assessment has
only modestly been realized.
– Challenge Exams, Interview, Portfolios to validate
what adults already know.
– We must help adults find and use their own voices
not rely only on voices of unknown experts.
Andragogy: Present & Future
– Andragogy (Knowles) is a strategy for teaching
adults where:
 The teacher acts as a facilitator and provider of
resources.
 Students are self-motivated and have many experiences
that contribute to learning.
 The classroom is interactive
 Learning is student directed
– Andragogy does not work well for students who
do not have the confidence to be self-directing.
Adult Education vs. Higher
Education
– Higher Education policies and procedures do not
easily align with adult learning theory and
practices.
– Higher Education continues to recognize adult
learners in relation to policies, mission, research,
programming, and evaluation.
– Both scholars and practitioners must question the
assumptions upon which the mission of higher
education is based.
A Classic Book on Adult Education
– Axford, Roger W. (1980) Adult education: the
open door to lifelong learning. Indiana, PA: The
A. G. Halldin Publishing Company. ISBN: 0-
935648-01-1.
 Some definitions of Adult Education
 Why Adult Education? Social Change Self Improvement,
Citizenship, Literacy, Continuing Education for Women,
Training and Re-Training, Community Education.
 Aging
 The Background of the Adult Education Movement
 Some Adult Education Pioneers
 Who is an Adult Educator?
 Understanding the Adult Learner
 A Philosophy for Adult Education
 An “Ideal” Adult Education Teacher
 The Extension-Outreach Function
 Programming in Adult Education
 Promoting the Adult Education Program
 Funding Adult Education
 Counseling Adult Learners
 Evaluating Adult Education Programs
 Research in Adult Education
 Evaluative Criteria for Adult Education Programs
 Conducting a Needs Assessment