You educate through example. You educate by your life...what you are.

Myles Horton Audio

Self-Knowledge

Right thinking comes with self-knowledge. Without understanding yourself, you have no basis for thought; without self-knowledge what you think is not true. You and the world are not two different entities with separate problems; you and the world are one. Your problem is the world's problem. You may be the result of certain tendencies, of environmental influences, but you are not different fundamentally from another. Inwardly we are very much alike; we are all driven by greed, ill will, fear, ambition, and so on. Our beliefs, hopes, aspirations have a common basis.

We are one; we are one humanity, though the artificial frontiers of economics and politics and prejudice divide us. If you kill another, you are destroying yourself. You are the center of the whole, and without understanding yourself you cannot understand reality. We have an intellectual knowledge of this unity but we keep knowledge and feeling in different compartments and hence we never experience the extraordinary unity of man.
-Krishnamurti

Characteristics of Adult Learning

Social Cognitive Theory

Social Cognitive Theory is the overarching theoretical framework of the self-efficacy construct (Bandura, 1986). Within this perspective, one's behavior is constantly under reciprocal influence from cognitive (and other personal factors such as motivation) and environmental influences. Bandura calls this three-way interaction of behavior, cognitive factors, and environmental situations the "triadic reciprocality." Applied to an instructional design perspective, students' academic performances (behavioral factors) are influenced by how learners themselves are affected (cognitive factors) by instructional strategies (environmental factors), which in turn builds on itself in cyclical fashion.

The methods for changing students' percepts of efficacy, according to Bandura (1977, 1986), are categorically subsumed under four sources of efficacy information that interact with human nature: (1) enactive attainment, (2) vicarious experience, (3) persuasory information, and (4) and physiological state.

Source: http://www.positivepractices.com/

Research Notes:The Seeking Process of Self-Directed Learning

Mathie (1993) active learning strategies:

1. Provide overview of goals
2. Set expectations
3. Empower student to make choices
4. Environment that stresses rapport

Can't Stop, Won't Stop...

Tread the path of persistence with a faithful heart and a patient spirit. Endure the tumultuous waves of adversity as the reed endures the tide of the tempest. All things are revealed in their due time. The nature of the struggle is to be embraced and the essence of the moment to be cherished. Do not surrender the pleasures of your art to anxiety and worry.
-Regi Adams

Excerpt from: Way of the E-lightened Mind, Book of Success

Emotion, Learning and the Online Learning Environment

"In spite of evidence that more and more students are engaging in online learning experiences (Alan & Seaman, 2006), clarity about the transition to a new learning environment is still at arm’s length (Cleveland-Innes, Garrison & Kinsel, 2006). In addition, the impact of the emotion created by dealing with this new environment on learning is virtually (pun intended) undiscovered. In this session, Dr. Marti Cleveland-Innes and Zehra Akyol will review theory and data regarding emotion in online environments, with opportunity for discussion of the effect of emotion on teaching, learning and instructional design. In addition, this presentation corresponds with the launch of a web-site to support continued discussion and research on emotion and online learning. The web-site will be introduced at the end of the session"(Canadian Institute of Distance Education Research,2008)

View Session Here

Knowledge to Wisdom Part I

The need to rethink educational strategies and pedagogy is perhaps at the most critical stage observed in U.S history. The record drop out rates in our school systems and the wide spread underdevelopment of our students are ominous signals of turbulent times ahead. The jewel of society rests squarely in the bosom of its intellectual institutions. The strength of a society's ideas and its passion for learning are foundations on which thriving and sustainable communities are built. To nurture the mind, in a desire to develop a deep understanding of the world around us, has often been relegated to an inferior status within the hierarchy of our society's considerations. It is rarely acknowledged that intellectual wherewithal is what makes all other considerations achievable goals.

I would like to illustrate this point with an analogy. The grand structure of a tree starts but from a modest seed, one would rarely see the logic in this were it not for the commonality of such an occurrence. The same principle can be seen in the existence of a bustling society, knowledge and learning are the seeds by which all else grows. The germination process occurs and the seed of knowledge sprouts roots which can be likened to wisdom. These roots act to stabilize that society in the midst of challenge, turmoil, etc. As is the case in nature, the life that the seed has introduced into the world must continually be nurtured in order for it to live and grow. Without the continual nurturance of the tree by the environment, the tree would surely perish no matter how magnificent the tree might be in stature.

It is my belief that life long learning and education are the means through which societies can maintain their vitality and heath. The underlining goal of education should be to transform the mere accumulation of facts, digits and data into meaningful understandings and enlightened perceptions. The contextualization of learned information into the larger perspective of the world and responsibility helps to nurture this process.

Sources of Self-Efficacy Information

Sources of Self-Efficacy Information;. People make judgments about their capabilities, accurate or not these estimations are based on enactive experience, vicarious experience (observation), persuasory information, and physiological states. In school, children gain knowledge and experiences through experiential activities. They also gain information based on seeing how peers they judge to be similar to themselves perform at various levels and under given circumstances. They also are told by teachers, peers, family and others about their expected capabilities. Children give themselves physiological feedback about their capabilities through symptoms such as soreness or sweating. These sources of efficacy information are not mutually exclusive, but interact in the overall process of self-evaluation.

Bandura, Adams, & Beyer (1977) advise that enactive experience is a highly influential source of efficacy information. Successful experiences raise self-efficacy with regard to the target performance while experiences with failure lower it. Another source of efficacy information is vicarious experience through observation. Observing peers, or peer models, especially those with perceived similar capabilities, perform target performances results in evaluative information about one's personal capabilities.

Verbal persuasion or convincing serves as another source of efficacy information. Teachers, for example, can raise or inhibit students' percepts of efficacy by suggesting whether or not they have the capabilities to succeed in a given task (Bouffard-Bouchard, 1989). Models can also be used to demonstrate to self-doubters that personal capabilities are more often a result of effort rather than innate capability. Students often have physical reactions to anticipated events. Many a public speaker testifies to sweaty palms and nervous vocal reactions when performing a speech. These physiological indicators are sources of self-efficacy information as well. Social cognitive theory postulates that the aforementioned sources of self-efficacy information are the most influential determinants of performance.

Source: Positive Practices.com

Freire on the Banking Concept of Education

In the banking concept of education, knowledge is a gift bestowed by those who consider themselves knowledgeable upon those whom they consider to know nothing. Projecting an absolute ignorance onto others, a characteristic of the ideology of oppression, negates education and knowledge as processes of inquiry. The teacher presents himself to his students as their necessary opposite; by considering their ignorance absolute, he justifies his own existence. The students, alienated like the slave in the Hegelian dialectic, accept their ignorance as justifying the teacher’s existence — but, unlike the slave, they never discover that they educate the teacher.

The raison d'etre of libertarian education, on the other hand, lies in its drive towards reconciliation. Education must begin with the solution of the teacher-student contradiction, by reconciling the poles of the contradiction so that both are simultaneously teachers and students.

Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed; Chapter 2