Becca Dawson
02.09.12
CAE 213 – Penland
TAL Ch. 6
PO BOX 585
6.1 Discuss the implications of dealing with the learning process first and then
content, versus dealing with content and then the learning process.
First and foremost, the content model is perceived as being pedagogical
because there is minimal preparation of learners, an authority oriented,
formal, and competitive environment, teacher-evaluated planning, diagnosis
of needs, and setting of objectives, a lesson design that only considers logic of
subject matter and content, and the approach that learning is a transmission
of techniques. On the other hand, the process model is seen as andragogical,
because much time is spent in preparing the learners, the environment is
relaxed, trusting, mutually respectful, informal, warm, collaborative,
supportive, open, and authentic; planning, diagnosis of needs, setting of
objectives, and evaluation are done by mutual assessment, lesson plans are
sequenced by readiness and problems, and learning is viewed as
experimental.
While both models focus on good aspects of learning, the implication is that if
you focus on the content and then the learning process, your class will be
structured more pedagogically. This is not necessarily bad; oftentimes
students come to class with preconceived notions of how the class will be,
and these preconceived notions are pedagogical. I suppose it can also be
helpful to take the content approach if there is a heavy amount of specific
content that must be learned to meet course objectives that have already
been set in place. However, most adult education situations have the freedom
to use the process model because for adults, learning is ultimately a process.
6.2 Report on a personal experience where the climate was not conducive to
learning. Cite ideas from the chapter that speak directly to your situation.
When I first went to Mission San Pablo, I had a very hard time feeling
motivated even to continue going. The whole environment, in my opinion,
made it very hard to be motivated to do anything. The ESL classes I teach
take place in a church building that was specifically designed to minister to
Hispanic immigrants who were living in several trailer parks just outside of
Cornelia. The building itself is sort of run-down, and the inside of it is a color
somewhere between beige and cardboard brown. It was eerily similar to the
place our authors described trying to teach.
Whenever we got there, I would always sort of just feel like I wanted to leave.
I’m a person for whom climate is EXTREMELY important. When I study or do
homework in my room, I do best with the soft light of lamps (or, at school, a
lamp and some Christmas lights I’ve hung over my section of the room). In
my room here at school, my walls are completely covered: a huge collage of
my favorite compelling cross-cultural pictures I’ve collected/taken, a full-size
reprint of “Le Chat Noir” by Rodolphe Salis (it’s a French cabaret painting of a
black cat, all simple lines and rich, “warm” tones of yellow and red), a collage
one of my best friends made for me. I organize my books by color, I have
bright handwoven rugs on my floor, I have a general theme of warm colors
that I find enhance my mood. And here I was, in a building that looked inside
and outside like a cardboard box… doing something I’d never done before
and was terrified to do, with students who seemed less motivated than me. It
was a hard semester.
Luckily now there are some posters on the walls of Mission San Pablo, and I
hardly notice the drab settings of the classes. As I’ve been applying the
principles of andragogy that I’ve already learned about to my class this
semester, the learners themselves have enhanced the climate.
6.3 Why is the idea of program/learning objectives so controversial?
Simply put, program/learning objectives are controversial because most of
the time, it is left to an authority figure to decide program/learning
objectives, and this stands in direct opposition to the principle of andragogy
that says that adults have a deep need to be self-directed learners.
6.4 Discuss the purpose and process of program evaluation and then comment
on the primary evidence that you think (1) would satisfy the learner, (2) the
facilitator, and (3) the agency financially underwriting the program.
There are four steps of a good program evaluation. The first step is a reaction
evaluation, in which information is gathered about how the participants are
responding to program- things such as their favorite and least favorite parts
of the program. The second step s a learning evaluation, where data is
obtained about the principles, facts, and techniques that were acquired by
the participants (NOTE: this should include pretests and posttests). The third
step is behavioral evaluation, which includes behavioral changes in the
learner before and after the course. The fourth step is a results evaluation, or
the results of factors found in routine records of organizations – the effects
on turnover, cost, efficiency, frequency of tardiness/absence, etc.
Given these four evaluations, a positive learning evaluation would likely
satisfy the learner; a mostly positive reaction evaluation, a good learning
evaluation, and a good behavioral evaluation would most satisfy me as a
facilitator; and a good learning evaluation and results evaluation would most
satisfy the agency.