<![CDATA[Andragogy | Adult Teaching: How-To Teach ICT!?

It is a question which I get asked very often “Andragogy, Adult Teaching!? WHAT Is Different From Normal Student Teaching!?“. Well, first remember that adults and seniors are OUT of the <===> #SchoolCocoon <===> since long or very long, THEY are NOT used anymore for learning! That is a very important fact to consider first before YOU start teaching adults and seniors. ALSO, adults and seniors are NOW (as out of school) mostly more focused on the benefits THEY could have in their private life and are willing to learn stuff which fits to their needs in private life!

Another very important point to consider is that a lot of adults, seniors have a FEAR against schools and school-teaching, they made bad experiences with teachers AND still thinking on the stress with tests! AND they are used to an OLD outdated EDUcation System which told them that learning is finished once reached the degree (the diploma in the pockets)! BTW: a RETHINKING of EDUcation for <===> Life-Long Learning is a MUST! As well as how the diplomas are getting handled and valued: e.g. A diploma today doesn’t show any professional development made!!! My proposition is to create the diplomas as: first diploma after school is “A, B,C etc…”, then the professional development (followed courses) should get added such as e.g. A1-2015-1: first professional development made in 2015, one course. A1-2015-5 first professional development made in 2015, five courses, and so on…

This would make the diplomas more valuable as the workforce would recognize them much more than normal ones where they don’t see straight on if a person has followed courses after school or not…

THE factor time is ALSO very important, as said already above, adults and seniors need MORE time to learn as NOT used anymore for learning! Prepare YOUR courses by considering longer sessions!

And as (already) MOST of YOU know me, a music video, related to the TOPIC 😉

Chose ALSO a room who doesn’t look sterile (white color) as it would remind them school again! And of course DON’T give the courses in a school! Sounds strange!? Think on the psychological background of fear 😉 Make the learners feel comfortable!

And last but not least, DON’T teach adults, seniors with a normal pedagogy, as THEY won’t accept it to get treated as 12 year old persons!!! THEY ARE OUT OF SCHOOL and they want to get treated as adult, <===> mature persons<===>!

SO… How To Teach Adults, Seniors!?

First of all, I mentioned it already above, DON’T let them feel like being in school and that YOU are a teacher, educator! Tell them that YOU will be THEIR coach who is guiding them and NOT teaching them and that THEY have a certain autonomy in the “Learning Room” (NOT Classroom!) They are allowed to move around in the “Learning Room”, searching help among their peers by respecting the noise level, copying from each other <===> YES, copying is allowed, OH WHAT FUN <===> everything which was forbidden in the <===> #SchoolCocoon <===> is allowed here, hey that makes engaging them and they have fun as well 🙂

As THEIR coach YOU take care of an individual learning, YOU assist the persons in their learning, DON’T FORGET about the learning rhythm, one size doesn’t fit all! Some persons need more time…

YOU may use a beamer (or a digital whiteboard, depending on YOUR budget…) to introduce first about WHAT the learners will attend to learn where YOU show ALSO the <===> Learning Path <===> which YOU have prepared for them, so they will know up from the beginning where the destination goes with ALL the different “stations“, they will feel comfortable as they can visualize it, they will know as well WHAT skills they will acquire, less unknown stuff to think about…

The learners will learn about any station in the “Learning Path” AND ALSO know about WHAT skills they will acquire! Click the above image, please, to enlarge it.

Click the above image, please, to access the article.

Motivation for adults and seniors… NO excuses for NOT willing to learn 😉

Course participants may print the above images and keep it with them, so they remember how young their brain is <===> 18 years <===>!

As mentioned already, make sure that the room isn’t sterile, NOT white! Consider the psychology of colors as it works, my 9 years experience with adults and seniors (NOT teaching) coaching. I used a pastel yellow color in the “Learning Room“, why!?

Yellow adds optimism to your home, prompting feelings of happiness in all who enter. Yellow activates memory, stimulates the nervous system, promotes communication and sparks creativity. And THAT is WHAT WE want in learning, isn’t it 😉

Make ALSO sure that there is an extra room available, where the adults, seniors can jump in to drink a beverage and eventually have some chatting with other participants, make them feel relax…

SO… WHAT To Teach THEM And How!?

Flipchart-man-318584_1280-Public Domain-Andragogy

Click the above image, please, to enlarge it.

As mentioned already, adults and seniors learn differently and slower (consider the time fact); they want stuff which they can use in their private life! SO… WHAT could be those interests!? Did I say interests, YES, it is exactly this WHERE YOU need to focus when giving courses to adults and seniors! Before starting a course I do every time an introduction session where myself and others present themselves, after the introduction I ask everybody to come in front to me and writing with capital letters on a Flipchart their interests, they could use ALSO 4 different colors (red, green, blue, black).

WHY this!? First of all, there is a bit action as they have ALL to move from their places which is different from <===> #SchoolCocoon <===> and the color they chose is ALSO a sign of their character and mood… By the way: I ask them later also WHY they were choosing that color, just to open a discussion and to make them curios about next steps; they will be aware ALSO that I observe what is going around me and that I give THEM attention…

WE will have a look all together NOW on the Flipchart and to find out the common interests, thus meaning: there will be a lot of people probably (mostly) who have THE same interests (hobbies) and NOW everybody knows WHO has the same hobby. WE created already an interest community without knowing it as these people will later talk together and probably will make an exchange of experiences 😉 It is up from there WE will build up OUR course(s)!

YOU certainly will encounter these hobbies: cooking, traveling, festivals, photos, gardening, cinema, reading, swimming, different sports, wandering, cards playing, taking videos, music, motorcycles, cars and more… That are the most common ones by my experience over 9 years.

Some examples of blogs and curation about gardening (flowers), cooking, festivals:

NOW WE know much more about OUR course participants and WE have a starting base: as anybody mostly is proud about WHAT they are doing and easily willing to talk about it (mostly…) WE will show THEM on How-To they can do it through using ICT by explaining THEM that more people would see THEIR exploits and knowledge by using curation, blogging and Social Media. WE will explain them ALSO how it will work by examples, so that THEY can see it visually. And WHY NOT, for the creative ones, how to use “ThingLink“. By experience, women are MORE creative than men, just saying…

SO… How Can I Say That This (The PracTICE) Is Working!?

Well, I was a pioneer in my country Luxembourg (Europe) already in 2002 where I gave pedagogical courses about ICT to a wide range of the population as up from 12 years old (even younger when together with a parent) to 79 years old with different nationalities. ALSO there were two days in the week reserved (booked by planing inside the school) for the primary school where they could use OUR “ICT LEARNing room” by my coaching to learn the (at that time) NEW technologies. Schools didn’t have YET computers in the classes at that time and I was working very close together with the teachers and helped also to convince the responsible people from the commune about the necessity of computers in the classrooms, which worked 😉

SO… WHAT was that “ICT LEARNing Room“, called “Internetstuff“!? And WHY was my “Internetstuff” DIFFERENT from ALL the others in Luxembourg!?

A bit History and Story Telling: What is a “Internetstuff”? It was a project by the “European Commission” to bring the “ICT” to ALL the inhabitants in any commune in the European countries. They called it at that time “eEurope” and in Luxembourg it was a special task force, called “eLuxembourg” that was charged about it. SO, they decided to create special places where the population could learn through courses about “ICT”, which they called “Internetstuffen”.

The Government in Luxembourg was looking at the time to find competent people to give those courses about ICT and they were advertising in the newspapers, where I made my application. I was selected and had to follow a 4 months long education through special tailored courses about the How-To to give pedagogical courses with ICT, a bit hard at that time as I was 45 years old already, BUT I did it and I found my vocation!

I offered my services and skills to different communes and it was in ETTELBRUCK (North of the country and 30 km away from where I am living) that I found a new job and a new adventure as a pioneer. Apart from giving courses about and with ICT, NO ONE of the responsible persons had a clue about the How-To, so they told me “Do what You want, You should know what…“, OK, I was perplex and ALONE to do this job!

First I elaborated the opening hours, than I created a “brochure” which was sent to all the houses in that small city (8k inhabitants) to inform them about this new service offered by the commune. I created also a “member card” of a value of 25€ for a whole year who gave the participants the right to visit the place to use only the internet (very few had Internet in 2002) and/or to take part of courses. The place was open on a 5/8, 5 days from Monday to Saturday from 8h30 am to 11h30 am and from 13h30 to 17h30. Monday and Wednesday mornings were reserved for Primary School classes from 08h am to 11h30 am. Saturday and Sunday was closed.

There were also evening courses organized and I collected about 1k6 (1,600) hours of overtime work during 1 1/2 year (non payed hours)! I couldn’t do that job anymore alone, BUT I din’t get a co-worker allowed neither. NO budget for it! I decided NOT anymore giving evening courses and giving the courses on a different way: people (learners) could visit the place whenever they wanted during the opening hours (only in the day) and I would give them courses individually and on different disciplines (security, Office, Photo Editing, website building, email, Skype…).

The learners had more autonomy, I let them work by PracTICE after first having them explained about the How-To shown with a beamer and then also on their own PC (there were 10 PCs in the Learning Room). They could come WHEN they wanted and for how long they wanted. They were completely FREE, no MUST, NO STRESS… I explained them, showed them, observed them (studied their behavior…) and interacted only when needed, when I felt that they must get a bit help to continue. I encouraged them to try by error till they would have learned it and when learned I showed them some tricks by giving advice on How-To do BETTER. It was ME who adjusted and adapted to them, a win-win situation. They learned slowly but surely and once the basics understood (the most important) they learned the other stuff to learn much more quick as they felt more confident about ICT. I encouraged them to practice at home which they all did. I asked them where they still have problems when practicing at home and WE repeated it on another way when possible, otherwise same procedure…

I was also constantly updating my “Professional Development” by reading lots of books (insatiable…):

Autonomy, TEAM, self-directed, autodidact, coaching, guide, analyzing learners constantly, adapting constantly, FAQ’s, PLN, PKM, SKYPE, VOIP Telephony, image editing, eMail, collaboration,

Testimonials, Feedback From My LEARNers

This, below, is NOT bragging BUT my pride about the feedback (which is a MUST) from my “LEARNers” who visited my courses.

The above texts are in French, Luxembourgish, Italian, Portuguese, German: if YOU are NOT used to those languages please check this App with whom YOU can translate, actually very useful when visiting other countries then yours 😉

Click the image, please, to enlarge.

The above text is in French, if YOU are NOT used to the language of Molière please check this App with whom YOU can translate, actually very useful when visiting other countries then yours 😉

More about the history behind the above feedback, YES there is a special story behind, please check:

In 2015 Coaching-Mentoring Is Seen As An Education Difference-Maker

[START Text from On Educational Coaching, Mentoring & High-Impact Learning] Coaching is a difference-maker in education. Think of the mindset evident in high-performing athletic teams, chess teams, even actors and other entertainers. Content providers are valuable, but that is not what makes learning organizations distinct, especially not those that seek to reach and provide a high-quality education to a full spectrum of learners. The same thing is true as we continue to implement things like competency-based education models. Many celebrate the way CBE can reduce the cost of college degrees, increasing access and opportunity, and addressing critical workforce needs. However, if cost reduction happens at the expense of great coaching and mentoring, I am concerned that we will make little progress in the democratization of education. The “haves and have nots” of education depend largely upon the prerequisite skills needed to take advantage of newer and emerging learning environments ranging from CBE to MOOCs, self-directed learning to self-organized learning environments. [END Text from On Educational Coaching, Mentoring & High-Impact Learning]

Click the above image, please, to access the article.

Learn more about my Global Collaboration and coaching on my following blog posts:

Feedback, Reflecting A MUST-Adapting Constantly

As already mentioned above, I asked a lot about WHERE some could have problems to understand and encouraged the learners to tell me, even I asked them to write down on the Flipchart questions they would have eventually. WE collected them all and when they were fit enough on the keyboard I let them create themselves (with my little help) a FAQ’s list (Frequently Asked Questions) and a glossary, see example below please.

Click the above image, please, to access the glossary online.

Keywords: win-win situation… honesty, straight talking, dealing with mature people, provoking could be (I do…) welcome with a bit irony and humor, dealing with humans, different characters needs to get analyzed before action, a bit courage to go out of normal,

Necessary Material For The Courses

Apart from the computers with internet connection here below a list of necessary material:

Is My Proposed Way Of Coaching With ICT ONLY For Adult Learning!?

There is a lot of common from the above mentioned with youth coaching and could be applied as well for them! WHEN YOU make youth feeling being accepted as adults, they will give YOU more respect and it will be a GOOD atmosphere for BETTER learning also! I had teens visiting my “Learning Room [Internetstuff]” for the ONLY purpose to listen and to observe when I gave courses with coaching to the participants. They came in their FREE time when there wasn’t school and made their homework while observing also my “style of teaching, as they said”. I got told by some of them that they learned MORE in 2 hours about ICT than they learned in a month in school. And THAT is THE difference between theory and <===> PracTICE! <===>.

Useful Links

Preparation, keywords necessary for me to create this blog post: EPAL, Andragogy, Heutagogy, Flowchart, cooking, nature, flowers, gardening, traveling, interests, PracTICE, profit for private life, NO THEORY!, engagement, Social Media, sharing, communication, NO FEAR, which websites to trust, which FREE services to use, which FREEWARE to use, Kursus schmackhaft machen, spice in LEARNing, quote Gust, LEARNing2LEARN, Life-Long LEARNing, blogs creating, NO STRESS, NO TIME LIMITATION, NOT FORCING, LEARNing-By-Doing, selfish, pride of something (sports, traveling…), bragging through Social Media (negative transformed to positive)…, staying in touch with (abroad) family, Skype, Facebook, Picasa, PhotoScape, Photo Editing, ThingLink, Creativity, positive Psychology, TEAM or WHO is BETTER, individualists, Streber, Alpha person and/or TEAMLEADER, community THINKing OR selfish, Empathy, NO RELIGION and NO politics allowed in courses to respect each OTHER, tolerance, Win-Win thinking amplified for course participants, win-win situation between coach and learners,