Adult Learning Theory*

The NYC Leadership Academy's essential beliefs about school leadership and adult learning inform the design and delivery of its programs for aspiring and early-career principals:

Essential Beliefs about Adult Learning

• Adults learn most deeply from experience and reflection. The Leadership Academy uses problem-based and action learning methodologies, inspired by the belief that adults learn best by doing which allows participants to experience, work through, and learn from real-life, job-relevant problems and experiences. Participants learn from observation, reading, writing, talking, and direct teaching; however, learning is most deeply integrated when it is gained through experience and deepened by reflection. There is a difference between “thinking” something and “knowing” it – the first associated with intellect, the second informed by intellect, but located in feeling and emotions in the body. "Learning-by-doing" allows adults to experience knowledge in their bodies as well as their minds and thus to own that knowledge in a different way. In addition, when paired with reflection, problem-based learning offers opportunities to identify tacit knowledge and the mental models that support them which then are available for further examination and change.
• Learning is a social process. The Leadership Academy emphasizes a team-based approach to learning. Knowledge is social; there is no such thing as knowledge separate from the feelings associated with the people and context in which it is learned. Even if physically alone reading a book, learners have complex emotional and social associations to the ideas contained within. Knowledge creation is social as well; even ideas seemingly generated by individuals build on the accumulated knowledge of others. The process of learning is in fact the collaborative construction of more insightful, more complex meaning than one could construct on one’s own, and as Vygotsky (1978) points out, can most meaningfully be assessed not based on individual performance, but instead on what one can learn in conversation and collaboration with others. Collective knowledge is always greater than what resides in an individual. Working with thought-partners and groups provides opportunities to increase individual and system-wide knowledge. In addition, adults are more likely to understand their own "meaning making" processes when asked to make them transparent by articulating them in the course of collaboration around a task.
• Adults have a high capacity to learn from the discomfort inherent in moving from the known to the unknown and in taking risks. The Leadership Academy’s belief is that adults learn most effectively when motivated by the discomfort of the unknown in practical, applied contexts. Learning is therefore embedded in a continuous process of moving from the known to the unknown, under a persistent dissatisfaction with the status quo. In order to learn within this framework, all parties involved must be willing to expose what they do not know, while building upon what they do; must embrace error, weakness, failure, and mistakes as opportunities for growth and learning; and must invest equally in their own learning, the learning of others and the learning of the organization as a whole. In traditional classrooms, drama is often suppressed. At the Leadership Academy, adults learn from drama, from the creative tensions, problems, ambiguities, and multiple realities that reflect the complexity of real life. The emotional dimension is not excluded; adults learn when they work with and engage their emotions, whether or not the emotion is positive. Adults have a high threshold for discomfort in the service of specific learning goals. With supports, such as feedback, tools for managing stress and reassurance that they are not expected to “get it right” the first time–that in fact “mistakes” and “failure” are expected and to be learned from–adults take risks and embrace discomfort, motivated by the knowledge that doing so will result in learning that contributes to their professional growth.
• Adults learn by creating and revising stories in order to make meaning. Through a largely unconscious process, human beings make meaning by experiencing and observing their environment, by selecting particular data from that environment, and by constructing a narrative or story that explains the relationship between otherwise disparate pieces of data. Adults view the world as material out of which to make meaning stories. They filter and select particular data, the building-blocks of their narratives, based on unique experiences, personalities, and evolving mental models of how the world works. Usually, adults perceive data and construct stories that confirm existing mental models. Individuals, groups, and organizations can learn from being asked to look at these stories from different angles and to imagine different stories that could have been made out of the same raw data. An adult’s learning is furthered and demonstrated by the capacity to see the stories of others as valid, or at least to understand the logic upon which they were constructed, and by the ability to revise one’s own stories in order both to craft and to represent one’s evolving relationship with and understanding of the world.
• Adults learn best in an environment of structured freedom. Adults learn when there are structures in place within which they feel supported, respected, and accountable, but not confined. They learn within structures that honor their commitment and intelligence and challenge them to work as autonomous, creative adults within their zones of proximal development (Vygotsky, 1978)**. An environment of structured freedom is created by thoughtful attention to a variety of factors, including space, time, questioning and assignments. Thoughtful attention to time boundaries, without rigidity or condescension, conveys respect for participants’ lives and work. Adults learn best from facilitators who are confident in their authority but not authoritarian. They learn from questions and activities that are structured enough to provide an edge against which to define ideas, but that capture the complexity of real life and are thus open to a multiplicity of answers and solutions. Adults do not learn best when a facilitator abdicates the responsibility to provide pointed and honest feedback or to lead participants in thinking critically in the service of targeted learning goals. “Freedom is not the absence of limits,” as Freire maintains. In fact, “it is not possible to have authority without freedom or vice-versa” (2000, p. 99)***. Adults learn best when an environment of structured freedom invites them to bring to bear the full range of their intelligence, experience, and capacity for self-determination.

*The essential beliefs about adult learning are informed by the works of: Donovan, M., Bransford, J.D., & Pelligrino, J. (1999). How people learn: Bridging research and practice. Washington, DC: National Academy Press; Drago-Severson, E. (2004). Becoming adult learners: Principles and practices for effective development. New York, NY: Teachers College Press; Fink, L.D. (1999, July 19). Active learning. Retrieved August 28, 2008, from http://honolulu.hawaii.edu/intranet/committees/FacDevCom/guidebk/teachti... [1] Freire, P. (2000). Pedagogy of freedom: Ethics, democracy, and civic courage. New York: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers; Lieb, S. (1991, Fall). Principles of adult learning. Vision. Retrieved August 28, 2008, from http://honolulu.hawaii.edu/intranet/committees/FacDevCom/guidebk/teachti... [2] Zemke, R., & Zemke, S. (1984). 30 things we know for sure about adult learning. Innovation Abstracts, 6(8). Retrieved August 28, 2008, from http://honolulu.hawaii.edu/intranet/committees/FacDevCom/guidebk/teachtip/adults-3.htm

**Vygotsky, L.S. (1978). Mind and society: The development of higher psychological processes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

***Freire, P. (2000). Pedagogy of freedom: Ethics, democracy, and civic courage. New York: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.