Presented by Kathy McCombs

Purposes of Adult Learning

1. Personal Growth and Development (Abraham Maslow, Carl Rogers, Malcolm Knowles, Leon McKenzie Purpose: individual self-actualization; Knowles says, it gives precedence to growth of people over the accomplishment of things Content: whatever promotes individual growth Instruction: focus on student needs, group interaction

Purpose: dual function of personal development and social progress; Lindeman says of learners, they will be as eager to improve their collective enterprises, their groups, as they are to improve themselves. Content: practical, drawn from life situations, emphasis on the individual within the social context. Instruction: problem solving with teachers and learners as partners

Purpose: programs designed to achieve organizational goals through human resource development Content: drawn from training needs of human capital for both individual and organization development Instruction: wide variety of instructional methods

Purpose: education, learning valued for its own sake; Patterson says purpose is to transmit knowledge that is educationally worthwhile and that is morally, socially, and politically neutral" Content: liberal studies Instruction: traditional teacher to learner

Purpose: cause radical social change through adult education which challenges the social system and transforms and liberates Content: drawn from the consciousness of the oppressed and disadvantaged Instruction: teacher is also learner in dialogical encounter that leads to reflective thought and action

Some Principles of Adult learning

1. Learning is an active process and adults prefer to participate actively. 2. Learning is goal-directed and adults are trying to achieve a goal or satisfy a need. 3. Group learning insofar as it creates a learning atmosphere of mutual support, may be more effective than individual learning.

4. Learning must be reinforced. 5. Learning new material is facilitated when it is related to what is already known. 6. Learning is facilitated when the learner is aware of his progress.

There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, ignorance. Socrates Learning without thought is labor lost; thought without learning is perilous. Confucius To learn is to change. Education is a process that changes the learner. George Leonard