Design and Evaluation of Training Programs - Week 12 - Principles of Adult Learning
Introduction: Hello and welcome to Week 12 of the course Design and Evaluation of Teacher Training Programs and Workshops for the Master's in English Teaching at ULACIT Term IIIC 2023. Today we will do several activities to explore the topic of andragogy, or the teaching of adults, and discuss how we can incorporate andtragogic principles into the work we do with teachers.
Today's Goals:
- Explore the implications of Knowles' principles of andragogy for the design and facilitation of teacher training workshops.
- Participate in a brief workshop to learn how to add content to Canvas.
- Collaborate with your group members on your upcoming project.
- What are the characteristics of adult learners?
- How can the concept of andragogy influence my approach to teacher training?
- How can I add multimedia and text content to Canvas?
Warm Up: Abolition Day
Yesterday we celebreated the new national holiday Abolition of the Army Day for the second time. Constitutionally abolishing the army was an unprecedented action that defined the course of Costa Rican history in a positive way. To celebreate, we are going to discuss the question of what should be abolished in the field of English language teaching and the mainstream educational system as a whole.
- Group Link: CLICK HERE
Task 1: Sharing your PD Journal
Let's take a moment to share one of the entries you made in your PD Journal in Week 11. As you share your highlight, let's think about how this tip connects to how we as individual teachers can develop in our practice and how we as trainers can use these techniques to support teacher growth with teachers we work with.
- Create an Institutional Professional Development Culture
- Create a culture of teacher development
- Make the most of meetings
- Plan a workshop
- Start a suggestion box
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Task 2: Some Tips and Examples
In your reading this week from Richards (2017), the author suggests several tips for promoting a culture of professional development at your school. Here are a couple of real life examples you might want to consider.
PD Campaigns, Not One-Off Trainings
- Supporting Students in Low Levels: During the second half of the year, the team of coaches has been involved in the following PD campaign.
- Initial Webinar: A webinar was developed to introduce teachers to the issues the coaches observed in low level groups and provide a framework and some initial tips.
- Weekly Tip, Infographic, and Reading: The webinar was followed up by a weekly tip initiative consisting of a Whatsapp message, infographic, and link to a PDF designed by the coaches.
- Sample Tip 1: CLICK HERE
- Sample Infographic 1: CLICK HERE
- Sample Infographic 2: CLICK HERE
- Sample Tip 2: CLICK HERE
- Sample Infographic 3: CLICK HERE
- Follow Up Workshop: An in-person workshop was developed with a demonstration lesson and analysis task that had teachers identify how the principles and tips were applied and opportunities for improvement.
- Webinar Viewing Task: A video from our Teacher Development Video Library with relevant information was selected and Coaches used Edpuzzle to transform the video into an asynchronous task with questions and reflection prompts built into the video.
- Teacher Handbook: The Coaches plan to wrap up the campaign by compiling all their writings and infographics into an ebook that be shared with the teachers and added to a library of training and PD materials which they can use as a resource to address future coaching and training needs.
- Lunch and Learn Sessions: Another initiative that coordinators and coaches are launching to encourage a culture of professional development and cultivate a sense of community are lunch and learn sessions. These are "voluntary meetings, training sessions, or presentations that take place during lunch, and where food is provided by the employer" (Mind Tools, 2023). The important thing about these sessions is their voluntary informal nature and the fact that they combine socialization and learning. In this case, teachers bring their own lunch but snacks, dessert, and drings are provided by the company. In addition, teachers are highly involved in the knowledge sharing so it is an attempt to stimulate learning from peers rather than a strictly top-down training approach.
Task 3: Principles of Andragogy
Becoming a teacher trainer after gaining experience as a teacher can seem like a natural transition. After all, training is just a kind of teacher. However, the fact that teacher trainers work with adults instead of kids means that it is important to consider what the academic research says about how adults learn. Click your group link below to learn more about the concept of andragogy.
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- "As individuals mature, their need and capacity to be self-directing, to use their experience in learning, to identify their own readiness to learn, and to organize their learning around life problems increases steadily from infancy to preadolescence, and then increases rapidly during adolescence. This rate of natural maturation is represented as a decrease in dependency. Thus, pedagogical assumptions are realistic - and pedagogy is practiced appropriately - because of the high degree of dependency during the first year. Yet, the assumptions become decreasingly appropriate in the second, third, fourth, and subsequent years."
- "Seemingly, U.S. culture (home, school, religious institutions, youth agencies, governmental systems) assumes, an therefore permits, a growth rte that is much slower. Accordingly, pedagogy is practiced increasingly inappropriately. Teh problem is that the culture does not nurture the development of the abilities required for self-direction, while the increasing need for self-direction continues to develop organically. The result is a growing gap between the need and the ability to be self-directing, which produces tension, resistance, resentment, and often rebellion in the individual" (Knowles et. al, 2005, p. 62).
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- "Adults need to know why they need to learn something.
- Adults maintain the concept of responsibility for their own decisions and their own lives.
- Adults enter the educational activity with a greater volume and more varied experiences than do children.
- Adults have a readiness to learn those things that they need to know in order to cope effectively with real-life situations.
- Adults are life-centered in their orientation to learning.
- Adults are more responsive to internal motivators than external motivators" (Knowles et. al, 2005, p. 72).
- If we remember what Freeman (1989) said about KASA being the knowledge base from which teachers make descisions and his assertion that improving as a teacher requires a change in knowledge, attitudes, and skills driven by increasing awareness, then framing teacher training and development as an andragogic process helps clarify the active role that teachers need to play in their own learning.
Task 4: Introduction to Using Canvas
For your next project installment you will need to develop a training module in Canvas. In this activity you will learn how to complete the basic functions in a Canvas course as a teacher.
Task 5: Previewing your Workshop Template
For the development stage of your class project you will create the activities and materials needed for a section of one of your modules. Let's review the instructions for this assignment and check out the course template in Canvas that you will be using.
- Assignment Guidelines: CLICK HERE
References:
Freeman, D. (1989). Teacher Training, Development, and Decision Making: A Model of Teaching and Related Strategies for Language Teacher Education. TESOL Quarterly, 23(1), 27-45. https://doi.org/10.2307/3587506
Knowles, M., Holton, E., & Swanson, R. (2005). The Adult Learner: The Definitive Classic in Adult Education and Human Resource Development (6th ed.) Elsevier.
Richards, J. (2017). Jack C Richard's 50 Tips for Teacher Development. Cambridge University Press.
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