Andragogy Vs Pedagogy Essay

Adult Education and the Online Approach

This assignment explores the term Andragogy and its origins, identifies the key people and their concepts on Andragogy and finally concurs in concluding the main themes in eLearning as applied to Andragogy today.

The term Andragogy is believed to be first authored by Alexander Kapp in 1833 (Nottingham Andragogy Group 1983:v), a German high school teacher. In the book on Plato's Educational Ideas he describes the lifelong necessity to learn. He began the book discussing his childhood and in the latter parts turned his attention to adulthood. Kapp argues that education, self-reflection and educating the character are the core values in human life.

Knowles in 1975 published his guidebook for learners and teachers on the topic of Self-directed Learning. Further he labels Pedagogy as "teacher-directed" learning and Andragogy as "self-directed" learning.

Malcolm Knowles (1980) states that Andragogy is based upon four assumptions about the qualities of adult learners that are unique in relation to the supposition about child learners on which traditional Pedagogy is based. A fifth was included later in 1984. Because of these things we can look at the assumptions that Knowles makes about adult learners.

1.Self-Concept: As indicated by Knowles, "a man develops his self-concept moves from one of being a dependant identity toward one of being a self-coordinated human being. The time when a man turns into adult, mentally, 'is that time when he sees himself to be entirely self-directed". (Knowles 1983:56) e.g. "Create learning experiences that offer minimum instruction and maximum autonomy".

2.Experience: "As a man develops, he collects a developing repository of experience that turns into an expanding asset for learning. The following step is the belief that adults take in more viably through experiential strategies of training, for example, discussion or critical thinking." (Knowles 1980:43) e.g. "include a wide range of instructional design models and theories to appeal to varied experience levels and backgrounds.

3.Preparation to learn: "As a man develops his preparation to learn gets to be arranged progressively to be formative part of his social task. As Tennant (1988:21-22) puts it, It is hard to perceive how this assumption has any suggestions at all for the procedure of learning, not to mention how this procedure ought to be differently connected to adults and children." e.g." Utilise social media and online collaboration tools to tie learning to social development.".

4.Introduction to learning: "As a man develops, his point of view changes from one of delayed use of learning to immediacy of utilization, following his orientation towards learning shifts from one of subject-centeredness to one of issue centeredness. This is not something that Knowles sees as natural yet rather it is adapted" (1984:11) e.g." Emphasis on how the subject matter is going to solve problems that an adult learner regularly encounters."

5.Inspiration to learn: "As a man develops the inspiration to learn internally (Knowles 1984:12), once more Knowles does not consider this to be something "natural" but rather as adapted-specifically through educating. This assumption sits with difficulty with the perspective that adults availability to learn is the need's consequence to perform social parts and that adults have issue centered way to deal with the learning." e.g " There must be a valid reason behind every eLearning course, module or educational activity.

Knowles, M.S.(1980).The Modern Practice Of Adult Education states the various differences between the two approaches that is Pedagogy and Andragogy as below: Pedagogy is described as the art and science of teaching children, the focus is on teaching, whereas Andragogy is described as the art and science of helping adult learn, the focus is on learning.

Pedagogy is the passive trends from transfer of information from teachers to students, Andragogy is about active information seeking by the learner. Pedagogy assumes that students comes into the classroom with no life experiences to build on. Andragogy assumes that students have prior experiences that they can apply to the learning process. In Pedagogy teaching structure is subject-oriented, In Andragogy learning is less instructed and more relevant, relevance to real life issues are usually more essential using Andragogy as compared to Pedagogy. Pedagogy assumes that students have few internal motivations to learn and must rely on rewards and punishments. Andragogy assumes students have more internal motivations to learn. In Pedagogy students are dependent on teachers, In Andragogy students are more independent and responsible for their own learning. Pedagogy is more authoritarian model and Andragogy is more collaboratively learning model. In summary Pedagogy is more suitable for children in most cases and Andragogy is more suitable for adults in most

cases.
However, Knowles further concludes that all learners in all situations are unique. The different approaches have important implications for the online classroom. Knowles describes adults as independent, self-directed and autonomous individuals. Students are free to pursue their educational interests, even within particular assignments. Course design can include elements of choice to allow for personal freedom, preferences and differing skill sets. However, in the online classroom invisibility can be a significant problem. Put another way, without collaboration, students can feel isolated. People are social creatures and they have inherent needs to engage with other people in similar situations. In the online classrooms opportunities must be created so that students engage with other students and the instructor. In the online classroom assignments should be problem, task or life oriented rather than involve regurgitation or memorisation of subject-oriented material. The online instructor should make an effort to appeal to various motivations. Furthermore, the actions of others can affect the motivational levels of students for good or bad.

Finally I concur with Knowles' four Adult Learning Theory Principles (1980) to eLearning namely:
1) "Adults must have a hand in the design and development of their learning experience."
2)“Experience should be at the root of all eLearning tasks and activities."
3)"Real life applications and benefits must be tied to the eLearning course.”
4)"Give adult learners the opportunity to absorb information rather than memorising it."
I look forward to the eLearning with pace and passion.