Adult Learning Theory
Those in search of best practices for the teaching of adult learners would be hard pressed to ascertain them without also coming across Malcolm Knowles’ theory of andragogy. Introduced in the late 1960s, andragogy consists of instructional strategies designed specifically for adult learners based on certain key developmental distinctions between children and adults. According to Merriam et al. in their seminal text Learning in Adulthood, andragogy is “probably the best-known set of principles or assumptions to guide adult learning practice” (83), serving as “the primary model of adult learning for over forty years” (90). Indeed, in the decades since Knowles first introduced andragogy, it has continued to be cited among numerous scholars (Bash; Cross; Hashimoto; Sommer; Uehling), and its principles can be traced throughout later educators’ recommendations for teaching adult students (e.g., self-directed learning). For these reasons, any discussion of adult learning theory must begin, first and foremost, with andragogy.
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Because much of how Knowles defined andragogy derives from comparisons to pedagogy, it is worth noting that he identified pedagogy as being teacher-centered and content-focused, as opposed to andragogy, which he characterized as being student-centered and process-focused. This is not to say that pedagogical instruction is only teacher-centered and andragogical instruction is exclusively student-centered. Rather, these characterizations of pedagogy and andragogy reflect the original premises of either theory at the time of Knowles’ initial ruminations on adult learning. Naturally, these theories have evolved over time, and indeed, many pedagogues stress the importance of student-centered instructional strategies. However, these approaches would be considered andragogical rather than pedagogical within Knowles’ framework of adult learning. For the sake accurately representing Knowles’ theory of andragogy, therefore, the term pedagogy will be used to denote instruction that is teacher-centered and content-focused, and andragogy will be used to indicate instruction that is student-centered and process-focused.
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Andragogy
Knowles’ theory of andragogy begins with specific assumptions about adults grounded in their psychological development and corresponding social roles and time perspective. This psychological development refers to a continuum of maturity wherein an individual’s “self-concept moves from one of total dependency (as is the reality of the infant) to one of increasing self-directedness” (Knowles 55). Whereas children are predominantly dependent upon others to direct their lives and learning, adults’ independence and self-directedness enable them to assume responsibility in a variety of capacities and social roles, including their education.
These additional roles provide a greater abundance of experience from which adults continuously contextualize new experience and learning, and the demands of performing them are often what prompt adults to pursue education in the first place (Knowles 55-57; Knowles et al. 63-64; Bash 28). Consequently, their motivation for learning and readiness to learn are informed by a distinction in time perspective. While a “child’s time perspective toward learning is one of postponed application,” an adult “comes into an educational activity largely because [he/she/they] is experiencing some inadequacy in coping with current life problems” and therefore “wants to apply tomorrow what [he/she/they] learns today” (Knowles 58). For many adult learners, therefore, learning must be perceived as relevant and applicable to their own lives.
However, because adult learners often experience a break in their education, their “reduced academic fluency” often generates significant anxiety that, compounded with their prior, pedagogical learning experiences, may result in the adult learner regressing into state of teacher dependency (Bash 153-155; Knowles et al. 63-64). For a full overview of these assumptions as they pertain to learning, see Figure 1, which is based on Knowles’ theory of andragogy.
Figure 1. Comparison Between
"Traditional" and Adult Learners
Adult Learner
"Traditional" Learner
The Need to Know
Learners only need to know that they must learn what teacher teaches if they want to pass and get promoted.
Learners need to know why they need to learn something before undertaking to learn it.
The Learner
Dependent personality
Teacher is fully responsible for what, how, when, and whether.
Self-directed learning
Often anxious to learning
Demonstrate that they are taking responsibility
for themselves.
The Learner's Experience
Little valuable experience; relies on transmission
techniques - lectures, readings, and audiovisuals.
Experience assumes greater volume and
different quality (since adults perform different roles than younger people).
Readiness to Learn
Students become ready to learn what they are told they have to learn.
Students become ready when they experience a need to know something.
Orientation to Learning
Subject-centered; learning as a process of acquiring prescribed subject matter content.
Life-centered, task-centered, or problem-
centered orientation (curriculum should focus
on life situations rather than subject matter units).
Motivation to Learn
External: pressures come from parents or teachers.
Internal: self-esteem, recognition, better quality of life, greater self-confidence.
Source: Bash, Lee. "Appendix 2.1: Comparison Between Traditional Learners and Adult Learners." Adult Learners in the Academy, Anker Publishing Company, Inc., 2003.
Worth noting is that the “traditional” learner identified in Figure 1 refers to traditionally-aged students, the population that pedagogy was originally designed to serve. Indeed, the word pedagogy literally means the art and science of teaching children, and it derives from the teaching methods used on young boys of monastic and cathedral schools during seventh to twelfth century Europe (Knowles 27). Knowles accordingly distinguished these teaching methods – in their contemporary forms, of course – from those he developed for andragogy.
He conceptualized the andragogical model of instruction as a process model in contrast to pedagogy’s content model, the distinction being that the andragogical model provides instructors with “a set of procedures for involving” students in their own knowledge acquisition (Knowles 108). He characterized the pedagogical model, on the other hand, as instruction principally focused on the transmission of knowledge, or content, predetermined by the teacher (Knowles 108). Andragogy, therefore, presupposes that instruction adapt to the learner in order for learning to take place, whereas pedagogy requires that the learner adapt to instruction.
As for the sequence of procedures andragogy prescribes, they are as follows: “(1) preparing the learner; (2) establishing a climate conducive to learning; (3) creating a mechanism for mutual planning; (4) diagnosing the needs for learning; (5) formulating program objectives (which is content) that will satisfy these needs; (6) designing a pattern of learning experiences; (7) conducting these learning experiences with suitable techniques and materials; and (8) evaluating the learning outcomes and rediagnosing learning needs” (Knowles et al. 114). For a full comparison of pedagogical versus andragogical approaches to instruction as differentiated by these procedures, see Figure 2.
Figure 2. Process Elements of Andragogy
Element
Andragogical Approach
Pedagogical Approach
1. Preparing
Learners
Minimal
Provide information
Prepare for participation
Help develop realistic
expectations
Begin thinking about content
2. Climate
Authority-oriented
Formal
Competitive
Shared authority
Collaborative, supportive
Informal
3. Planning
By teacher
Mechanism for mutual
planning by learners and
facilitator
4. Diagnosis
of Needs
By teacher
By mutual assessment
5. Setting of Objectives
By teacher
By mutual negotiation
6. Designing Learning
Plans
Logic of subject matter
Content units
Sequenced by readiness
Problem units
7. Learning
Activities
Transmittal techniques
Experiential techniques
(active inquiry)
Utilizes learner experience
8. Evaluation
By teacher
Mutual re-diagnosis of needs
Mutual measurement of
program
Adapted from: Knowles, Malcolm, et al. The Adult Learner: the Definitive Classic in Adult Education and Human Resource Development, 7th ed., Elsevier, 2011.
As to be expected given its rather uncomplimentary portrayal of pedagogy, andragogy was (and still is) controversial. It is beyond the scope of this discussion to detail the numerous and varied critiques leveled against andragogy; however, many of them involve dissatisfaction at the lack of empirical evidence supporting andragogy’s assorted claims (Brookfield 98-99; Knowles et al. 231-232; Mancuso 166; Merriam et al. 86). More recently, critics have condemned andragogy’s blatant disregard for the context in which learning takes places, remarking that Knowles demonstrates “little or no awareness of the sociohistorical and cultural context of the times” and fails to acknowledge “that social institutions and structures may be defining the learning transaction irrespective of the individual participant” (Merriam et al. 88). Needless to say, therefore, andragogy cannot explain all of adult learning, just as no one theory can explain all of human learning in general.
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Still, Knowles himself labeled andragogy an “emergent theory,” and his conceptualization of it evolved over time (Knowles et al. 231). For example, while it may seem that Knowles believed pedagogy and andragogy to be adversarial, as was originally suggested in the first edition of his book The Modern Practice of Adult Education: Andragogy Versus Pedagogy, he eventually concluded that both approaches to instruction were beneficial, and that the appropriate application of either depended upon the specific learning situation and learner needs (Knowles et al. 67-69). Moreover, most of Knowles’ student-centered principles are reflected in the progressive pedagogical theory that many teachers and scholars have been pursuing for traditional students as well. As a result, the original disparity between pedagogy and andragogy has narrowed over time, with instruction reflecting a spectrum of both pedagogical and andragogical strategies rather than the dichotomous application of either.
