Presented by Annmarie Dumont, Charles Burke, Ruth Ronan 5 min. Charles - Welcome and introductions Presented by Annmarie Dumont, Charles Burke, Ruth Ronan

Transformational Learning Is about change,dramatic,fundamental change in the way we see ourselves and the world in which we live. Merriam (2007)Think about some life changing events in your life. Charles

How does Transformational Learning occur? How we see the world and how we engage in the world. Transformational learning occurs when the learner is willing to change.

Lenses of Transformation Lenses allow us to see things and limit our view Individual Socio-Cultural Psycho-critical Socio-emancipatory Psychodevelopmental Cultural-spiritual Psychoanalytical Race-centric Planetary approaches

Transformation Charles Transforming our world, transformation through power. The driving force was to be the most powerful.

Transformational Learning The world has been transforming for a long time. We constantly challenge the way we think and conduct business. We then transform our behavior and modify our principles to become more product and humane. Charles

Transformation in Business Charles

Light the way to a new future Charles

Focus on a Theorist: Jack Mezirow (Another Old Guy) Charles

Who is Jack Mezirow Age 89 Emeritus Professor of Adult and Continuing Education at Teacher's College, Columbia University Former Chair,Dept of higher Ed and Director of Adult Ed, Columbia University Former Associate Dean, Statewide Programs University at the University of CA Extension Pioneered Doctorate Program in Transformational Learning, Columbia University Charles

Mezirow Definition of Transformational Learning "The process of using a prior interpretation to construe a new or revised interpretation of the meaning of one's experience in order to guide future action" (Mezirow, 1991) Charles

Focus on a Theorist: Mezirow Charles

Mezirow :Four Main Steps to Transformational Learning Four Main Steps: 1.Experience 2.Critical Reflection 3.Reflective Discourse 4.Action Charles

Experience Critically self- examine the assumptions and beliefs that have structured how experiences have been interpreted. Charles Until you walk in the shoe's of another

Critical Reflection Where do our meaning schemes and perspectives come from? How did I come up my my belief system? Charles

Experience Charles

Reflective Discourse Discourse is not a war or debate It is a conscious effort to find agreement to build a new understanding. Mezirow Charles

Action Delayed, Immediate or reaffirmation of existing pattern. Charles Delayed, Immediate or reaffirmation of existing pattern.

Transformational Learning Become more reflective and critical Become more open to perspectives of others Less defensive and accepting of new ideas Charles

Meaning Perspectives Meaning Schemes Perspectives Schemes (Habits of Mind) (Points of View)

Meaning Scheme Points of View Components which contain specific knowledge, values and beliefs about one's experience. Collective meaning schemes work together to create one's meaning perspective.

Meaning Perspective Habit of Mind Overall World ViewAcquired passively during childhood and are the target of the transformation that occurs through experience during adulthood. Natural change in response to life experience, induce powerful emotional responses in an individual. Life Changing Events.

Reflect upon this picture Charles

Charles

A Life Changing/Saving Event

Transformational Activity 30 min. Transformational Activity

Brazilian educator, philopher and theorist of critical pedagogy Ruth What can you tell me about Paulo Freire? Paulo Freire Born Paulo Regles Neves Freire - September 19, 1921 in Recife, Brazil and died in Sao Paulo, Brazil May 2, 1997 (age 75) He was born into a middle class family but came to know poverty during the Great Depression. Freire had great difficulty in school and was 4 years behind in his studies as a child. He believed that poverty and hunger affected his ability to learn. These life experiences influenced his decision to dedicate his life to improving the lives of the poor. His understanding of the relationship between social class and access to knowledge were key motivators in his work. He is considered one of the most influential radical education theorists of the 20th century. His impact on peace education, adult education, non-formal education, and critical literacy is incalculable. Paulo Freire 1921-1997

The People Freire Served Ruth Who did he work with?   Freire devoted his life to working with the poor and the oppressed. He had a lifelong commitment to education as means of human liberation. The success of his programs enabled thousands of rural campesinos, adult peasants, to learn how to read in a matter of weeks. Freire’s early career in Brazil was influenced by the political changes in Latin America and the Caribbean. Contributing to Freire’s early success where: The Cuban Revolution The Catholic Church’s commitment to the poor -- he belonged to the Catholic Action movement in college. The focused energy by leftist leaders to promote literacy in order to gain votes. His radical humanist pedagogy continued to gain prominence and he was appointed director of various literacy programs and campaigns. However, in 1964 a military coup stopped his work and he was exiled for 15 years. Ironically this gained international attention to his ideas. After a period in Chile and Harvard University, Freire joined the Department of Education at the World Council of Churches in Geneva and actively participated in projects in Latin America and Africa.

Freire's Seminal Work “Education either functions as an instrument which is used to facilitate integration of the younger generation into the logic of the present system and bring about conformity or it becomes the practice of freedom, the means by which men and women deal critically and creatively with reality and discover how to participate in the transformation of their world.” ― Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed Ruth (book on hand) He is best known for his work "Pedagogy of the Oppressed" first published in Portuguese in 1968. Has anyone heard of or read the book? What do you know about this book? As a result of this book, in 1969 Paulo Freire was offered a visiting professorship at Harvard University. And, in 1970 the book was published in English and Spanish reaching wider audiences. Freire authored or co-authored over a period of 30 years more than 20 books that significantly reshaped the way educators think about the purpose of teaching. CLICK Here's a quote from his book (Give them time to read) What are your thoughts after reading this quote?

Freire’s Terminology Praxis Generative Themes Easter Experience Dialogue Conscientization Codification Banking Ruth Freire uses terms that are difficult to understand. Here’s a short list of terms used frequently by Freire with definitions arrived at from different sources: PLEASE REFER TO HANDOUT - Allow them to read and ask if they need further explanation Praxis (Action/Reflection) - "reflection and action upon the world in order to transform it.” Informed action. •Generative Themes – a cultural or political topic of great concern or importance to learners that can easily generate discussions. Freire used pictures to draw out generative themes. •Easter Experience – educators must experience a profound rebirth that aligns them with the learners (educatees-educators) as educators-educatees, who learn along with their learners. •Dialogue – To enter into dialogue presupposes equality amongst participants. There must be trust and mutual respect. Through dialogue new understandings are created. It can not happen with those who have been denied the right to speak. •Conscientization - Developing consciousness or critical awareness of one’s social reality through reflection and action in order to promote transformative learning. •Codification – a way of gathering information in order to build up a picture (codify) around real situations and real people. Decodification is a process of identifying with aspects of the situation until you imagine yourself in the situation and can critically reflect upon it. •Banking concept of knowledge – the concept of education where students are empty vessels into which the teacher pours knowledge.

Key Concepts Ruth Freire uses terms that are difficult to understand. Here’s a short list of terms used frequently by Freire with definitions arrived at from different sources: PLEASE REFER TO HANDOUT - Allow them to read and ask if they need further explanation •Praxis (Action/Reflection) - "reflection and action upon the world in order to transform it.” Informed action. •Generative Themes – a cultural or political topic of great concern or importance to learners that can easily generate discussions. Freire used pictures to draw out generative themes. •Easter Experience – educators must experience a profound rebirth that aligns them with the learners (educatees-educators) as educators-educatees, who learn along with their learners. •Dialogue – To enter into dialogue presupposes equality amongst participants. There must be trust and mutual respect. Through dialogue new understandings are created. It can not happen with those who have been denied the right to speak. •Conscientization - Developing consciousness or critical awareness of one’s social reality through reflection and action in order to promote transformative learning. •Codification – a way of gathering information in order to build up a picture (codify) around real situations and real people. Decodification is a process of identifying with aspects of the situation until you imagine yourself in the situation and can critically reflect upon it. •Banking concept of knowledge – the concept of education where students are empty vessels into which the teacher pours knowledge.

Culture Circles Ruth (book on hand) Freire used culture circles as a first step to reading. Students discussed themes of importance to them. Then they were presented with related images which they would decode by identifying elements that were man made and elements that were provided by nature. This process formed critical consciousness which promoted the desire to become print literate to better understand the situations they find themselves in. Examples of drawings and situations appear in the appendix of Education for Critical Consciousness -------------- Culture circle. The concrete basis for Freire's dialogical system of education is the culture circle, in which students and coordinator together discuss generative themes that have significance within the context of students' lives. These themes, which are related to nature, culture, work, and relationships, are discovered through the cooperative research of educators and students. They express, in an open rather than propagandistic fashion, the principle contradictions that confront the students in their world. These themes are then represented in the form of codifications (usually visual representations) that are taken as the basis for dialogue within the circle. As students decode these representations, they recognize them as situations in which they themselves are involved as subjects. The process of critical consciousness formation is initiated when students learn to read the codifications in their situationality, rather than simply experiencing them, and this makes possible the intervention by students in society. As the culture circle comes to recognize the need for print literacy, the visual codifications are accompanied by words to which they correspond. Students learn to read these words in the process of reading the aspects of the world with which they are linked. Although this system of codifications has been very successful in promoting print literacy among adult students, Freire always emphasized that it should not be approached mechanically, but rather as a process of creation and awakening of consciousness. For Freire, it is a mistake to speak of reading as solely the decoding of text. Rather, reading is a process of apprehending power and causality in society and one's location in it. Awareness of the historicity of social life makes it possible for students to imagine its re-creation. Literacy is thus a "self-transformation producing a stance of intervention" (Freire 1988, p. 404). Literacy programs that appropriate parts of Freire's method while ignoring the essential politicization of the process of reading the world as a limit situation to be overcome distort and subvert the process of literacy education. For Freire, authentic education is always a "practice of freedom" rather than an alienating inculcation of skills. Read more: http://www.answers.com/topic/paulo-freire#ixzz2C3FrcQvB

Situations Activity Ruth WHOLE CLASS GROUP ACTIVITY - Reveal one at a time during activity This is an activity Freire developed for culture circles with Brazilian peasant students as a precursor to teaching them to read. I’d like you to pretend you are one of these students while I show you a series of drawings and ask you some “critical consciousness” building questions. Picture 1 (Unlettered Hunter) 1. What belongs to culture and what belongs to nature? Why? 2. Would you say this hunter is of our time? 3. Would you say this hunter belongs to a “lettered” or “unlettered culture?” 4. How is education transferred in an unlettered culture? 5. What conclusions might an illiterate peasant in this literacy program draw from this activity so far? CLICK Picture 2 (Lettered Hunter) 1. Again, what belongs to culture and what belongs to nature? 2. Is this hunter of our time? (our culture) 3. What is different about this hunter and the other? 4. Would you say this man has more opportunities than the other? Why? 5. How might education be different for this man? 6. What conclusion might the student draw now? Picture 3 (Cat Hunter) 1. What is similar and different about this picture in comparison to the others? 2. What makes men different from animals? 3. What conclusion might the student draw from this?

Ruth PLEASE REFER TO HANDOUT His language is difficult to understand and rather than talking about oppression on the basis of ethnicity, class and sexual orientation he retreats into mystical abstractions. Although, he does try to remedy this in later works. This is a good starting point but doesn’t take into consideration that a person can be the oppressed or the oppressor depending on the situation. His approach was more about how to create a classroom environment conducive to dialogue which is different from informal dialogue outside a classroom setting. Freirian education can involve smuggling in all sorts of ideas and values such as those of the dominant culture or Banking System under the pretences of problem-solving. The “autonomous model” is a term used by Brian Street. It indicates that the ability to read in and of itself will have effects on social and cognitive processes. It appears he borrowed a lot of ideas directly from other sources.   Smith, M. K. (2012, May 29). Paulo Freire and informal education, 1997, 2002. Retrieved from The Encyclopedia of Informal Education: http://www.infed.org/thinkers/et-freir.htm McLaren, P. (2000). Che Guevara, Paulo Freire, and the Pedagogy of Revolution. Lanham, Maryland: Rowan & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.

Relevance for Community Colleges “For apart from inquiry, apart from the praxis, individuals cannot be truly human. Knowledge emerges only through invention and reinvention, through the restless, impatient, continuing, hopeful inquiry human beings pursue in the world, with the world, and with each other.” ─ Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed Ruth I believe I'm not the only one here who works at a community college. Who else is familiar with community colleges? Who attends community colleges? Why? Who teaches at community colleges and why? Here’s a quote from Pedagogy of the Oppressed that I think is appropriate for the community college experience. (Give them time to read) --------------- Community colleges are making a great effort to promote Learner-Centered instruction in an effort to promote critical thinking skills. Freire’s philosophy is very learner-centered. He was very concerned with the traditional teacher’s role of domination whose students’ voices were kept silent. He called this “banking education.” Instead, he proposed the “problem-posing” education, which is what Learner-Centered instruction encourages too.

Transformation and Hope “Bit by bit, these groups begin to see themselves and their society from their own perspective; they become aware of their own potentialities. This is the point at which hopelessness begins to be replaced by hope… Society now reveals itself as something unfinished, not as something inexorably given; it has become a challenge rather than a hopeless limitation. This new critical optimism requires a sense of social responsibility and of engagement in the task of transforming society; it cannot mean simply letting things run on.” ─ Paulo Freire, Education for Critical Consciousness Ruth But, we have a long way to go -- Change is hard for faculty who face the challenges of teaching such a wide range of students and who have been teaching the same way for decades. CLICK Freire described the transformation we see in community colleges. (Give them time to read) Tell me what you're thinking after reading this quote. --------------- My job is to help faculty with Learner-Centered pedagogy. Inspired by Freire, I finally reached one teacher I have worked with since I started. About a week ago, I explained that we are natural creators and speech is an exercise in creation. Then I said, when students don’t have a voice they are not being fully human. Suddenly her face changed and I witnessed an “Aha!” moment. I believe and many experts would agree that it is imperative that students in community colleges find their voice to develop critical thinking skills, to fully understand their place in the world and the ways they can take action to promote change for the betterment of our society.

The Heart of Paulo Freire I'll finish with this tribute to Freire. (Play video) What is your big take away about Paulo Freire?

Focus on Theorist: Daloz Laurent Daloz known for a book he wrote on mentoring and the role mentors play in adult's returning to school. He focused on holistic and intuitive vs. rational and reflective. Larry Daloz His focus was about the journey of learning, not the end product. He focused on holistic and intuitive vs. rational and reflective. Finding meaning in our lives is a key factor to motivate adults to participate in formal learning experiences. Like other theorists Daloz relies on constructivist learning theory. His focus was about the journey of learning, not the end product. He felt transformational learning could occur through story telling.

Robert Boyd He believed if we study and analyze ourselves and learn to integrate our emotional and spiritual parts transformational learning will occur. Robert Boyd He focused on the psychoanalytic approach to transformational learning. By coming to terms with one’s inner psychic conflicts, one can achieve self-actualization. Dialog is important to the transformational learning process.

Stephan Brookfield The practice of critical reflection requires a community of peers to assist the learner in uncovering commonly held and possibly false assumptions. Stephan Brookfield Stephan Brookfield points out that critical reflection is not synonymous with transformative learning. Learning from experience is key to the transformational learning process. Brookfield is mentioned in the self-directed learning theory as well because he believes we bring our cultural and historical 'selves' with us to all learning experiences. Brookfield defines critical reflection as "reflecting on the assumptions underlying ours and other's ideas and actions, and contemplating alternative ways of thinking and living. This type of reflection requires being self-aware, making sense of experience, deconstructing and reconstructing meaning in life), critique of premises and ideologies, and principled thinking. This type of reflection is social action that includes imagining and exploring alternatives to current assumptions. Those who reflect critically are self-aware and often become more skeptical of the world around them. Reflection most often relies only on learning from experience and not an in-depth transformation process. Brookfield's phases for successful critical reflection include: Trigger event Appraisal of assumptions Exploration of alternatives to current assumptions Developing alternative perspectives Integration of new perspectives into daily life

Johnson-Bailey Highlights the role of race and suggests that struggle is part of the transformative learning process. This type of reflection is social action that includes imagining and exploring alternatives to current assumptions. Those who reflect critically are self-aware and often become more skeptical of the world around them. Reflection most often relies only on learning from experience and not an in-depth transformation process. Brookfield's phases for successful critical reflection include: Trigger event Appraisal of assumptions Exploration of alternatives to current assumptions Developing alternative perspectives Integration of new perspectives into daily life

Patricia Cranton "Fostering transformative learning involves helping bring the source, nature, and consequences of taken-for-granted assumptions into critical awareness so that appropriate action can be taken." Patricia Cranton John Dirkx & Patricia Cranton have researched "soulfulness" and the process of intuition and the unconscious on our meaning-making. Cranton one of the first to work with Mezirow's transformational theory. One of Cranton's critical findings is the similarity of individuation, or the separation of the individual from the collective, to the process of critical self-reflection, the core concept of transformative learning theory.

Resources Brookfield, S. (1987).Developing critical thinkers: Challenging adults to explore alternative ways of thinking and acting. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Journal of Extension February 2007 // Volume 45 // Number 1 // Feature Articles // 1FEA1 Copyright © by Extension Journal, Inc. ISSN 1077-5315 Adult Education Theories: Informing Cooperative Extension's Transformation Merriam, S.; Caffarella, R.; Baumgartner, L. (2007). Learning in Adulthood a comprehensive guide. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass Dirkx, J. (1998). Transformative Learning Theory in the Practice of Adult Education: An Overview. PAACE Journal of Lifelong Learning, Vol. 7, 1-14.

Resources Continued... Bartlett, L. (2008). Paulo Freire and Peace Education. Encyclopedia of Peace Education, Teachers College, Columbia University. Retrieved from Encyclopedia of Peach Education, Teachers College, Columbia University: http://www.tc.edu/centers/epe/entries.html Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the Oprressed. New York: Continuum. Freire, P. (1974). Education for Critical Consciousness. New York: Continuum. McLaren, P. (2000). Che Guevara, Paulo Freire, and the Pedagogy of Revolution. Lanham, Maryland: Rowan & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. Smith, M. K. (2012, May 29). Paulo Freire and informal education, 1997, 2002. Retrieved from The Encyclopedia of Informal Education: http://www.infed.org/thinkers/et-freir.htm University of Central Lancashire: Freire Institute. (2012, Nov 11). Concepts Used by Paulo Freire. Retrieved from Freire Institute: http://www.freire.org/paulo-freire/concepts-used- by-paulo-freire/