“Learning from one’s experience involves not just reflection, but critical reflection.” (p 117)
Objective: What caught my attention?
I completely agreed with this statement from the moment I read it. Critical reflection is about all life, not just learning. The statement “old and wise” is based on the notion that someone who is old has lived a life of good and bad choices. They have learned from their mistakes had time to reflect and study their errors and are now wiser because of them. This statement does not just simply apply to our mistakes, but our whole life experiences. Reflection is very important not just for learning, but reconciling our past with our choices so we can move forward with our future, hopefully having learned from our reflections.
Reflective: What did I realize about teaching as a result of this quote?
After reading the section on Reflective Practices in the text and pondering this quote, I have come to realize that teaching is about more than just explaining facts and demonstrating techniques. Much has been written about how to engage the students, but to reach them on a personal life experience level that they can relate too is a powerful idea. If each student can connect personally to a concept or lesson then they will have a better chance of engaging in that concept.
Interpretive: The Aha moment and key insight
The Aha moment and Key insight came rather quickly with this quote. After reading the quote, and researching the text, I was stuck by the observation that not much had been said about negative reflections, bad experience with education.
“The connection between adult learning and life experiences is so basic that it is difficult to think of any learning that occurs isolated from experiences.” Merriam & Bierema (pg 115)
It’s true that the majority of adult students will have some form of higher education and have generally positive reflection or past learning, certainly in the PIDP program that seems to be the case. But what of the student being retrained after 20 years working at the same company? What if the adults experience about school has always been negative? What if they never finished school? They would give up easily, be discouraged easily, they might even resent being there and quit all together. I think it’s a fallacy to think that every adult learner has good experience with education. We must consider this when teaching a class, not ever one will feel confident about their ability to succeed.
Decisional: How has this quote influenced my notion of teaching?
This quote has influenced my notion of teaching because I think it will be important to learn not just the past experiences of the students, but also how they reflected on them. Teaching will have to be adjusted accordingly with those reflections in mind. The over achiever with great reflections on learning and school will need to be challenged; the underachiever who hated school will need to be encouraged, but not to the point they feel overwhelmed and past ghost begin to haunt them again.
Teaching will be a balancing act between motivation and understanding the students past reflections. It will be important to get the best combination of these two factors to get the best out of the student.
Sharan B. Merriam & Laura L Bierema (2014).
Adult Learning: Linking theory and Practice.
Jossey-Bass
Objective: What caught my attention?
I completely agreed with this statement from the moment I read it. Critical reflection is about all life, not just learning. The statement “old and wise” is based on the notion that someone who is old has lived a life of good and bad choices. They have learned from their mistakes had time to reflect and study their errors and are now wiser because of them. This statement does not just simply apply to our mistakes, but our whole life experiences. Reflection is very important not just for learning, but reconciling our past with our choices so we can move forward with our future, hopefully having learned from our reflections.
Reflective: What did I realize about teaching as a result of this quote?
After reading the section on Reflective Practices in the text and pondering this quote, I have come to realize that teaching is about more than just explaining facts and demonstrating techniques. Much has been written about how to engage the students, but to reach them on a personal life experience level that they can relate too is a powerful idea. If each student can connect personally to a concept or lesson then they will have a better chance of engaging in that concept.
Interpretive: The Aha moment and key insight
The Aha moment and Key insight came rather quickly with this quote. After reading the quote, and researching the text, I was stuck by the observation that not much had been said about negative reflections, bad experience with education.
“The connection between adult learning and life experiences is so basic that it is difficult to think of any learning that occurs isolated from experiences.” Merriam & Bierema (pg 115)
It’s true that the majority of adult students will have some form of higher education and have generally positive reflection or past learning, certainly in the PIDP program that seems to be the case. But what of the student being retrained after 20 years working at the same company? What if the adults experience about school has always been negative? What if they never finished school? They would give up easily, be discouraged easily, they might even resent being there and quit all together. I think it’s a fallacy to think that every adult learner has good experience with education. We must consider this when teaching a class, not ever one will feel confident about their ability to succeed.
Decisional: How has this quote influenced my notion of teaching?
This quote has influenced my notion of teaching because I think it will be important to learn not just the past experiences of the students, but also how they reflected on them. Teaching will have to be adjusted accordingly with those reflections in mind. The over achiever with great reflections on learning and school will need to be challenged; the underachiever who hated school will need to be encouraged, but not to the point they feel overwhelmed and past ghost begin to haunt them again.
Teaching will be a balancing act between motivation and understanding the students past reflections. It will be important to get the best combination of these two factors to get the best out of the student.
Sharan B. Merriam & Laura L Bierema (2014).
Adult Learning: Linking theory and Practice.
Jossey-Bass