Autonomy And Autonomous Learning

1535 Words4 Pages

What is autonomy?
Autonomy is defined as the ability to make your own decisions without being influenced by anyone else. (Longman Dictionary, contemporary English)
Autonomy is an individual’s capacity for self-determination or self-governance. Another distinction that can be made is between autonomy as a bare capacity to make decisions and of autonomy as an ideal. When autonomy functions as an ideal, agents who do not meet certain criteria in having reached a decision are deemed non-autonomous with respect to that decision. (Dryden, J., 2010).
As we can see in these concepts, autonomy is the freedom, capacity and ability that a human being has, to make a decision. It is doing things by us, without asking for help.
In the school context, autonomy is the capacity of learning, working and practicing by yourself, in this way you would become an autonomous learner.

What is autonomous learning?
Autonomous learning, also called student–centered learning or flexible learning (Taylor, 2000) relates to the change in focus in the classroom from the teacher to the student (or from the teaching to the learning). This is based on a constructivist theory of learning (see How Students Learn 4) whereby each individual students constructs their own understanding based on their prior knowledge and current learning experiences (Kember, 1997).
Autonomous learning is the ability that someone shows in order to understand, learn or comprehend a topic, subject or anything else, by their own way. It doesn't matter if it's learning how to play an instrument or related to school. This method is used in order to make the student feel autonomous and responsible for his own learning. The teacher must provide activities, but the student is responsible...

... middle of paper ...

...chool, the community of teachers, the parents of the students and the students will have expectations about what roles a teacher is supposed to perform. These expectations may be very different from the teacher roles that facilitate learner responsibility, and if it’s the case, changing them will require much patience and caution.
(A Scharle - ‎2000)
The teacher's role had suffered many changes through time, as new models are implemented in schools, the requisites are always changing. In autonomous learning, the teacher had to provide material, but the student is the only one responsible of the advances in classes.
In this case, the teacher play the role of facilitator or counselor, which means he had to facilitate the material, but it is not responsible of all the work, the student can communicate his opinion, and the teacher must help, without doing all the work.

Open Document