cognitiveoverdose-blog

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

do the needful for yourself (another yogamooc reflection)

ah, child's pose. balasana. it's not easily given out during my regular class but when offered, i dive in. and when an instructor says 'let's start out in child's pose,' i get to my happy place right away. even though there's persistent tightness in the right hip, and there's that luggage i carry in my front body, i find this is a very grounding and calming spot in which to breath and think or unthink. and if i hear the invitation to, 'stay in this position as long as you need then come into downward dog,’ i just might not do that second part, unless i'm feeling shamed by others in the class moving into downward dog. such a lazy bones i am.

the yogamooc yoga instructors are offering some great variations for some of the postures, and making good work of breaking down the poses. halfway lift is a tricky movement because it's so simple but core. there was a good explanation to keep 'tension between crown and hips'. that's how it feels to me, not just about 'booty' out but feeling the flex from the back of knees through hips to head, eyes forward, no straining neck, just strong focus, all these points connected. it's a readying pose for an interim, like a runner getting ready for the pistol start but there's no race. we're just lined up in our own micro moments, ready for the next movement, breath steady.

another pose i love is reverse warrior and most days i feel that i can really rock it. (i know but it's warrior and you need empowering language). your front knee can't be caving in, if anything it feels like you're rolling your booty under your hip, and the back leg must be strong as it is a foundation. then lift that front arm, even connect your thumb and index finger, and look upwards to the sky - “oooh, you're so strong.” but one thing that can undo me is when i hear 'oh that looks beautiful' by an instructor said to the person NEXT to me and not me, and then i am no longer rocking that pose. in fact, i crumple. and then i give the instructor a big up yours in my head and go back to an exalted position. who are you to say what is beautiful and not? now this hasn't happened to me in a class for a long time. in fact, i have a great instructor who does not call out anyone other than to remind us gently to tuck booty in or out, and keep other body parts in alignment, and that means i can keep rocking reverse warrior - at least in my mind.

i stayed away from yoga for while because i knew that i wasn't going to see a class full of bodies like mine. and it's true, i see different bodies, ages, and abilities. accommodations for yoga poses are so needed - because all our bodies are different, and they move differently and reflect so many stages of life. and while i try to keep an open mind about trying something new, if I can't safely get into a pose or hold it, that is, it starts to feels unstable or really hurts, i'll try a variation on the theme. most yoga instructors will give you options - and if not, there is always child's pose.

yes, some poses are uncomfortable like pigeon for those that have tight hips. and many of us do from years of sitting and staring into the computer screen. but you can psyche yourself out on that one too and get stuck in a pattern of 'oh, this is tight. i'm so inflexible. look at that person over there, they seem to glide to the floor and i'm stuck upright.' and so on, the movie and soundtrack goes. definitely, chuck that tape, stop the chatter, and let your body and mind melt into the posture. you go as far as you can. find some space and go deeper. i remember my first attempts at pigeon and the irritated, plucky yoga instructor who said, 'is that as far as you can go?' i've given up on feeling sorry i can't go deeper. it is what it is.

i'm not a fan of inversions either though legs overhead with a block to support the lower back is an oddly energizing and relaxing pose. and yeh, i'll do a happy baby every now and again and surprise myself. it looks silly but feels good to roll around and release some back pressure. i don't think anyone can rock that pose except of course, happy babies.

as for the face or 'belly down' poses, don't ask me to lie down and do locust happily. let's say, that takes some arranging as does frog but once there, both can and do work, and they feel just fine.

supine twist on the sad side though is as brutal as pigeon, once again, we do what we can do. i remember an old artist friend who had just celebrated turning 50 and while not the fittest guy on the planet, he wasn't a heavyweight either. but still, when someone asked how he felt about it all, he grabbed his belly for full effect and said proudly 'i got a right to this'. that is sometimes how i feel in my yoga practice, 'hey, this is my body, with all its experiences, and it moves how it moves.' i am not going to trick myself out, i'm not 20 anymore. so we just breathe and keep moving, and do what we need to do.  

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

aloha digital detox

Last week I 'awoke' to my digital consumption habits, knowing they were not healthy but unwilling to do much about them. But with the yogamooc course, and a welcome opportunity to unplug on a family vacation, I put my phone away. I took it out only to take family pictures, do some time checking and handle a few night-time texts to home to compare weather reports and say goodnight.

I have been conscious of my iphone use at night and during the day. I've read the reports about blue screen at night and staying awake longer, and adjusted settings, and also tried to get back into reading books at night instead. That only seems to last for a few days and then it's back to reading news online, looking at property, and weather and then over to Facebook. And then after a few minutes, we do a second round through the same resources until it's been way too long wasting time on the internet. How much CBC news can any one consume in one day?

So, last week was a chance to unplug. To do yoga. To meditate and sit and think, read, do nothing, write, look at the sky - and watch my son hurtle himself down a water slide over and over again. And on one meditative day for both us, he did that 70x (with over 70 steps each route!). He and I seemed to be stuck in a loop of up and down the stairs, say no to a drink, read a page in the book, slather on sunscreen, wave and nod after slide success, and repeat, all the while reggae tunes sang and sighed along with us.

Doing yoga on the grass every morning overlooking the ocean was amazing - except for the one time when we couldn't hold a class because some optometrists on convention took over the space for a luau. Nope, there would be no downward dog with the flies and the sweet stench of tequila shooters and limes. Instead a small group of us practiced on the rooftop where one young mom was accompanied by her four-year old. I get it. I do, it's hard to find me time and get to class but I was skeptical that junior would be able to handle hanging out with mom and her yoga cronies. And sure enough during savasana and the birds cooing, the kid awoke and took off. I didn't open my eyes, but you could ‘hear’ a great laurel and hardy movie unfolding judging by the frantic squeaks and thuds of flip flops, giggling and swearing that Mom was chasing junior around and then down the stairs.

In my regular class or at home, I don't recall a lot of talking or instruction in savasana. But these young women had a script to deliver and the words went something like this ... "now be a corpse, a corpse has nowhere to go, no one to impress, nothing to prove. you don't need to be anywhere. leave your doubts, judgment, confusion and depression behind."

These were interesting words but maybe a bit negative? I don't usually 'think' I 'think' in savasana, I try to stay blank, but sometimes a thought about how my body is feeling or a memory like my old faithful dog comes to me and licks me on the cheek and that's my savasana. But this was weird hearing all this stuff about being in a cloud. And then again, maybe I did have judgment? Because I did after all hear vocal fry and up speak which made my mind twitch a little during practice. I did feel a fly on my hand and face but I'm a corpse after all and I ignored it. And I hate doing yoga anywhere but the back of a room and there I was out in the open, doing my thing with everyone to see. Maybe these words were after all just the right kind of instruction to 'let go' and chill.

No one called the poses by their Sanskrit name or said Namaste at the end of class. No om's. Just a wish to take the peaceful easy feeling back home with us. I liked that simplicity. 

You get used to customs and then you wonder why it was a thing. So here's to letting go of the bank of rigidity. To dogs, pets or other people, who remind you if and when digital life gets in the way and you got stuck wasting time on the internet reading the news or catching up with the Joneses on Facebook. (Thank you dog for dropping a toy on my chest to remind me to be here now).

So just let go. I know I did the week before. I fell asleep during compassion meditation. I thought about my current dog - the one that needs compassion -  and feel asleep. I feel like I'm accomplishing the goals I set out during the first week of the course. More yoga, more reflection. New habits? We'll see.

I know being able to step aside last week was a marvel. And so was getting a chance to re-read Michael Stone's "Awake in the World" which meant so much to me when it was published and does more so now. I scribbled a few lines in my journal from his book that gave me pause: "We need to be present with each other and cultivate a mode of being that is living, wild, and direct. And unknowable until it occurs."

I thought about that as I walked the beach trail and encountered other people like me walking before the sun and heat took over. Some wore neon, some had jaunty pony-tails, some were plugged in whether it was earphones or into a conversation, and not many wanted to engage and say hello. I softened my face, relaxed my shoulders, and got ready to be. But out of the 45 people I passed only two exchanged a good morning greeting with me. Being present on your own is one thing. Being present with others is a hell of a task. Saying hello to the stray cats though was way easier, wild, and direct.

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

holding or letting go?

I accomplished my goal this week - 4 yoga practices in a week. 3 at home and one in person community-style yesterday.  

the first home session last monday night, not easy. listening to someone new, poses familiar but routine different from my usual. up dog, pigeon, double pigeon, not my thing. but we do and we learn new ways to move and enjoy. i've always liked the grounding feeling you get out of tree pose and the way it was tucked in there after eagle gave me a new appreciation for what a beautiful restful pose it is.

I seldom think about the history or mythology behind a yoga pose - but how i felt during tree - calm and steady made me want to dig a little. And reading the backstory gives you another perspective - who knew about tree, and Queen Sita, Rama and Ravana? Well I'm sure yoga scholars and enthusiasts knew. Now when I practice in a room full of others in tree, what a lovely thought to think of us all as a grove of trees, each with our different trunk shapes rooting into the earth in our own way.

The mini check-ins flipped in a few days from tone is tight, stiff and 'holding' to relaxed and rested. Savasana is a time I also to think about body tone. Here lying down is the perfect time when we can activate our 'body sense', and breathe into spaces where we may be hanging onto tension. and there i was friday night, wanting to melt completely into the floor but instead found myself hanging on to that last 10%. resisting the melt. melt mind said and body said no. well, at least i recognize when breath is blocked.

but it's ok. another practice is yet another time to find ease and get closer and quieter.

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

the trouble with practice

Yoga mooc. Why not? online learning, research, the joy of yoga, and it's accessible for everyone. mainstream even. right? (we'll come back to that one.)

i started doing yoga when I was 10 or let's say i discovered it when i was 10. because 'doing' implies i've been doing it solidly ever since.  and that's not the case.

it was my visiting ontario aunt, looking the picture of health, (and also always smelled of Noxzema and crisp clean tea towels) who took me aside one day and told me i should do yoga, and also eat tuna on brown toast and grapefruit whenever i could. i didn't know what yoga was. but i know what she was trying to tell me that i was a fat kid who needed to exercise and eat better. and if my parents weren't going to help me, i should do something about it myself.

one day, being home from school, i found yoga on tv. it was kareen's yoga. she had such a relaxing voice and kind eyes that made me think i could do any of the poses she challenged us tv viewers to do. i remember the show's vibe, an off-white shag carpet platform, macramé hanger and plants; it was all very homey. that day, i tried my first camel pose on my gold shag rug in my fuzzy pajamas and got hooked on the promise of peacefulness and less pudginess.

i didn't stay long with it though. i was 10 after all, living in a time where road hockey was the thing you did after school as was watching the beachcombers. yoga wasn't the thing.

yet when i was 15 and going through my 'worldly' existential phase, i started up a yoga practice once again. this time, i was guided by a book on yoga poses. i can't remember the title or which yoga master or style it featured. i remember an orange cover, and lots of pictures with a dour-looking man doing many poses i would never fathom ever being able to do. Reading simone de beauvoir and other gauloises-loving writers was so much easier and that became more my thing for awhile.

but 15 years later, looking to complement my fitness routine, i came across kathy smith's new yoga challenge. i loved that 'video'. the sets, moody lighting, and rod stryker's voice. it was easy to pull out a yoga mat and put on the tape at home for a few years. there weren't that many yoga studios in vancouver at the time and the ones that were way over on the west side. but we didn't last long kathy, rod and I, and once again, i lost yoga for awhile.

10 years later, yoga studios seemed to be blossoming everywhere. and that became a thing for me. i didn't want to be a part of a fad. yet somehow i ended up in a hot yoga/bikram's class. and i loved it. it was physical. and i craved how i felt afterwards - clean as a whistle. mind bright. but i had some concerns. i felt the teachers pushed some of the poses a bit too hard. i hated the smell of sweaty carpet and what lied beneath it. the amount of time to do it. 90 minutes plus time to get there and home. after a few years, i grew tired of its rituals, it all felt very military and for a-types who wanted a perfect body. i started looking for a hatha class where i could be myself. just to stretch and let go. and luckily i found a place where i can do that a few years ago.

i've given up on what an ideal practice looks like today. it looks like it looks. A great week used to mean 3-4 yoga classes a week. These days, i'm happy to have gone to one class a week with some additional ‘stretching’ and quiet meditation at home. however, as my son often says to me when i haven’t practiced in awhile 'mom, you're so much better on yoga.' i know i am too. so the goal is do it more where i can, and when it doesn’t happen, let it go.

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

Lately

Recently had the fun of updating PartnerWorld University with sales and marketing and technical roadmaps for business partners to learn more about the Watson platform. Created similar channels of content on Your Learning. Fun to get back to a bit of coding though some days, I felt I should have been wearing a bumper sticker of 'too old to do html'. Starting to play around with Adapt platform and maybe, just maybe, will dig into some data science courses or attend a few local ladies who UX and code events. We can try. :-)

Miss writing the papers - the reading and that deep thinking - that came with graduate studies - though I cannot fathom how I managed to do all that AND work. With the kid, and the little spinach fitz that we have made part of the family, there's little time left, only just enough to keep it together.

There are new adventures to look forward to with the kid's schooling in the fall, as we opt out of public education to try a blend of distance learning and tutoring and 'alternative' studies. This is quite a shift from where we were as a family a few years ago, the advocacy never goes away when you are a parent but feels good to leave the anger and sadness baggage behind. No more doctors, experts, or tests. We know what needs to happen. The glass is finally starting to feel half full.

Now about that spinach fitz or finnish spitz, the primitive dog creature from the wild lagoon that has joined our merry trio and is quite the challenging package though fun. Ultimately, I think she is going to make us stronger. But it's slow going, and the training seems like it will never end.

Life these days is all about training and learning ... in the workplace, I'm designing and creating learning experiences and at home, I'm doing some super-Jedi mind work where I've become a neuroscience and social emotional learning guru. And then, just to make sure if I didn't get the lesson before, there's the dog, acting as my conscience's Checkpoint Charlie. Did I get the cosmic karma lesson on empathy and problem solving? Invite not command? If not, I get a cycle of wash, rinse and repeat. It feels like I'm stuck in Saturn return land. But on the flip side, I’ve learned that there's no place like home.  

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

Week 3: Taking an 'ambient' approach to collaboration

This week's course unit started with a quote from Brian Eno "every collaboration helps you grow" which was promising, using a master musician, artist and pioneer of ambient music to underscore the importance of working together and how that process gives can give rise to new thoughts, new work and learning. But Eno had Bowie to riff off, and it's true any collaboration is ideally an interactive model, where two parties or more give and take equally, and somewhere along the way, after the work is all said and done - if this process is working, it's hard to say who actually contributed more or gets credit for the work. Digging into this quote led me to a synopsis in the New Yorker about our man Eno and his creative process, and his concept of ‘scenius’ or communal genius where great ideas are brought to fruition by groups of creative individuals not just one individual talent. This reminds me of the phrase 'standing on the shoulders of giants' that through connections and conversations you have with others as well as all the collective discoveries and failures this entails, the more productive you can be. It's a great ideal but that's musicians and artists, what about the day-to-day slog of working and learning with others such as your team mates and colleagues? How well do you collaborate with them? Does it help if you're a Bowie or an Eno or does it matter?

In our course, we were encouraged to critically reflect on our 'collaborative' style using this inventory from the David Lazear Group. I'm not a fan of social skills inventories, I feel continually bombarded by stories and management blogs extolling the rise of the 'creatives'  and how the power of problem solving, working socially, collaborating, and innovation are going to save us all, either rewarding us individually with job longevity or collectively by helping our company avoid financial ruin. Collaboration is not a panacea, it's something we have to do to get along and get work done.

And it relies on skills - skills in communication, consultation, paraphrasing, listening, and attitudes, being respectful to one another, being open, having confidence to build consensus, as well as experience, being able to 'read' reactions but not be overly sensitive to people's moods. The provocative empath. The conciliatory consensus-builder. The respectful time-keeper. All these collaborative roles require active participation in the process. And having 'good' collaboration - the kind that is open and productive, takes time. Time we don't usually have to foster the kind of trust and cooperation to move forward from 'problem' to 'solution' especially in virtual work environments.

I have learned that it doesn't help to be of half-empty glass countenance, you get better buy in when you frame tasks as 'opportunities'. You also get buy-in when you use phrases like "How might we..." versus "I think..." the former instils more confidence and assertions like "We need to xyx" closes off the loop. You need to leave an opening for your partners to jump into before you close it off with an invitation to form and norm such as "what are our next steps?"

I am learning to be more consultative, less skeptical. It hasn't been easy especially with a wave of positivity in the work place and the happiness police. It's not the introvert in me that recoils; it's that collaboration is inherently political and messy with egos and agendas at times. Stepping back and two sides to the left or right is really helpful to get a bit of perspective, and this has me thinking how can I accomplish more? What will make the collaboration process more of an 'authentic' process for me?

I'm going to look again to Brian Eno and his accomplishments with pioneering ambient music for starters...on this he said...

"Ambient Music must be able to accommodate many levels of listening attention without enforcing one in particular; it must be as ignorable as it is interesting." (Source: "Music for Airports").

 An ambient approach to collaboration therefore, is being able to listen and sift through conversational loops and rhythms, and surface the ideas and feelings that matter by giving everyone equal consideration. Or at the very least, I can try humming a few bars from the Art of Noise ambient collection during my next collaborative work session if all else fails.

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

Journal entry 10 - July 19 2014

The politics of learning and learning together alone

Throughout this course, I expanded my thinking by relating the learning and readings to my family's experiences, in particular reflecting on the role of educators and parents - adult learners - in the public education system, in the community, and at home. I was uncomfortable on how best or even whether to share my experiences or 'stories'. Is this narrative on the periphery of the individual? Yes. Yet if I share them am I doing what Brookfield encourages self-directed learners do? That by reaching out of my personal, selfish learning interests to at least let others opt-in into a conversation about what I am learning, thinking, it broadens my thinking, possibly 'our thinking', and that may one day lead to a little political or social change? That might be something I'm interested in.

In my university student days, I was an advocate for change, ready to take up a worthy protest or cause. Today, as a parent, good corporate citizen, and adult learner learning how to learn, I realize I have become overwhelming focused on my individual, private 'stuff'. Of course, I  have opinions about war, government bribery, education as a security matter and special education in public schools, but I tend to keep the voice in lock-down. For example, the Jenlink and Jenlink reading on social justice, I didn't comment on how it affected me reading it the first time around. I finally found some courage to discuss it in this last week of the course, and the backstory is, this phrase set me off: "...teachers, as public intellectuals, understand the viable role that education plays in preparing an active, critical democratic citizenry."

It's an innocent, aspirational statement but when I read the entire article and related it to the encounters we've had as a family with 'school,' it seemed in stark contrast and it became very charged for me. It's not all black and white of course. There have been glimpses of empathy and respect along the way but nothing as wide-sweeping as that statement purports and would therefore require all educators (people) understand that challenging behavior is deserving of the same compassion and tolerance as are applied to other cognitive delays. Weeks later, after more readings, time, reflection, trying to re-imagine the difficult conversations we have had with teachers, principals and school staff with a social justice lens, I have to believe that building an active, critical democratic citizenry is a goal of education. And I have to believe that my son is going to get an opportunity to re-enter the regular school community or else I will think that education has failed. Citizenry is belonging and participation.

Around the fourth week into this course, I attended a weekly workshop on social and emotional learning for parents. Here I was reading about self-regulation and self-directed learning for adults and there I was, trying to learn new skills and strategies to help me help my son regulate his emotions and build self-confidence to help him learn how to learn and navigate more effectively in group settings or 'community'. (Yes, different processes for adults and children but still the irony.) I realized I wasn't going for the 'learning' because on my night table sit books like ... "Twice Exceptional Children" "Parenting a Child Who has Intense Emotions" "Emotional Intensity in Gifted Children" and I can't recall how many books and textbooks on Autism, ADHD, Sensory Processing Disorder and childhood anxiety I've read over the years. I was going to class for the community. Every time class got together I recognized a pattern, we sat patiently through the first 45 minutes and then near the end, the shock and dismay about our interactions with school community bubbled over and bonded us, and we stayed longer to explore how we could educate ourselves and others.

In our farewell discussion forum for this course, I wrote that my most significant learning was when I read Brookfield's "Self-Directed Learning, Political Clarity, and the Critical Practice of Adult Education". It synthesized for me the need to move out of my head towards 'social' learning. I won't say that self-directed learning is isolation - it's a goal, process, approach (still a fan of interior, reflexive, critical self-dialogue) but I understand better why there needs to be more of a 'connection between private troubles and public issues'. How else do we make change if we don't share our thoughts, ideas, learning? To do that though, is tough, vulnerable stuff, and I've just taken some baby steps towards that. Why now? I am writing for the sake of possibility... I write to put my learning experiences into perspective and quite possibly this could lead to making a big or small change, for me, for my family, and quite possibly my community. Big aha? Learning alone together is nice but learning together in community is not so bad.

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

Journal entry 9 - July 18, 2014

Critical pedagogy and adult education: thoughts on a group assignment

It might be that I am in the throes of the last few courses in the degree, but I am getting more out of the collaborative assignment which seems to be a hallmark of every MDE course. This time, we had an opportunity to be co-constructors and our group took great artistic license to interpret the course materials in perhaps a refreshing but still critical way. The topic was to construct a response to the following question: "How can we utilize the purpose and goals of adult education in our interactions with learners outside the classroom? How may we continue to teach outside of a 'controlled classroom setting'? The catch is that we had to construct this response using a vehicle of a rap song, scene from a play, movie script or other. Our group selected a cartoon as the vehicle to explore the topic.

It was appealing because it allowed us to exaggerate ideas and use humor which seems antithetical (and fitting!) to the serious academic tone of the theories as presented through our coursework. We juxtaposed contrasting viewpoints and put the theorists into a situation - a bar - where they could be human and catch them 'behaving badly' (not really that badly just curmudgeonly). Our drinks menu - our credits of who's who - gave us a technique of identifying the characters and summarizing their viewpoints.

We definitely went into and out of the assignment with suspension of disbelief. Were we on the other side of tasteful? I didn't give it a moment's thought during our collaboration; we certainly embraced the playful spirit of the assignment. We packed it full of visual puns, caricatures, satire, and nonsense to integrate and showcase how learning together and learning alone is like a mosh-pit where practice and theory intermingle and no one adult education theory reigns supreme. Godzilla? Yes, absurd but doesn't that theme speak to tension between nature and society? Ultimately did we answer the question? Well, we didn't knock that out of the park but we certainly blended and alluded and some ideas were made more salient than others.

Interestingly, our group had discussions about female representation among educational theorists which of course started us to work in a visual gag of 'no seat at the table' - but we couldn't jam it all in. We did have Jimmy Buffet playing on the jukebox - one way of acknowledging the deficit. The refrain also alludes to a book published some years ago called Jimmy Buffet and Philosophy - The Porpoise Driven Life -- a segment on Mezirow's transformation learning theory is being applied to the Jimmy Buffet narrative. This may make the cut for books I’ll zone out on the beach with to compare against the real deal on transformational learning.

All in all, enjoyed the assignment, working collaboratively, and being net in terms of distilling the ideas down to the essentials. Scott Meunier did an awesome job as the artist bringing the characters to life. My favorite scene? Mezirow and Freire, having a go at each other about the role of critical emancipatory learning. And then Foucault and Sartre playing pinball, challenging each others' egos. Why shouldn't we have a little fun exploring how to present and interact with adult learning theory in new ways?

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

Journal entry 8 - July 13 2014

Solo reflecting machine and dangerous thoughts

I have had in the past a tough time with group work. During my first year, I didn't see the point. However, I did persist through it and have been glad that there were these opportunities - that's the only way I have come to 'know' a few others, having stayed connected with them through LinkedIn or Facebook.

Every person in a cohort/course is potentially a contact for future connection. However, after completing almost ten graduate courses, I have to say, my personal learning network (PLN) is pretty abysmal, and I feel very much like a failure on this point. But that's something I own and not sure that I would be able to change; it seems I'm just not built for persistent engaged sharing. This week, I'm feeling a little out of the loop on this last discussion forum, and it's certainly not due to the instructor - if ever there has been a course where the instructor has been 'on' this has been it! In fact, the management and facilitation of the discussion forums (well, everything!) has been amazing and fantastic. Call-outs, think abouts, direct positive and constructive feedback, it's been constant and everyone has been on point. I have never felt so supported in a learning journey, even if I'm feeling a tad on the periphery.

This week's readings I enjoyed but I didn't find them easy. Yet for everyone else it seemed like it was and they 'resonated' with it. Usually I can find a little entry point into a conversation but this time, I just couldn't seem to get there. I thought if I posted early it might help but no, I just watched the conversation unfold. I'm not sure if not being able to find the passage in Mezirow's reference to an adult educator being an 'empathetic provocateur' has thrown me off (how many times have I read and scanned for that phrase?), guarding always how much work context to share (always an issue for me) or just the conviviality of some folks finding common ground.

Discussion forums can give you a glimpse into learning; it can be boisterous chatter and sometimes jockeying for points, and often it can be personal and honest. It's hard work. You learn by reading others’ comments and you learn by having to form your viewpoint and discuss it. But leaving traces of my thinking there sometimes feels manufactured, but yet here in this space where no one is paying attention, I can relax. Discussion forum? Time to button up. Social etiquette comes into play, and I have to redact myself over and over again, and play up to what others say, think and feel. (Do I sound like a miserable Grinch; the female Jonathan Swift of learning? Perhaps.)

So what am I reacting to? Not feeling heard? Not being able to express myself fully, completely? Not having friends? Feeling vulnerable? I found the post by George Siemens some months ago "the vulnerability of learning" interesting for this very reason. What makes learning online so vulnerable? Brookfield talks about the emotional arc of learning and factors that can hold us back such as feeling like an impostor, not having the skill or talent or reason to feel worthy at the table of learning. Some worry about criticism from others. My thing is...I need time. I need a little space. I need to reflect, come back with something meaningful to share, and then let's see if we connect but not before I've done my due diligence. My colleagues laugh at my inflexible slow brain but I can't 'think on my feet'. I know what works for me, and it's a bit of rebel stance with the idea that you can't tell me what to think, sometimes it's nice when people are quiet with their words and ideas, and they leave spaces for others to play and drop in. I like when you can parachute in and intuit and interpret - but get too explicit, directive, instructive, predictive, sympathetic, I'm going to check out.

So I've checked myself out this time. Do I consider myself to be an empathetic provocateur in my adult educator role? No, not really, I don't have that many opportunities to facilitate classes and direct learning experiences face-to-face or virtually so I can't say that I embody the right balance of emotional support and inquiry to help others in the moment. I work primarily on the design of the course content, less removed in some ways, but I have resorted to inserting a lot more 'pause and think' moments in courses I work on and I encourage blogging. Critical reflection starts with self. I like to think of myself instead as a 'learning anarchist' and try to push back when I can, for example, my favorite is, 'why do we need a quiz?, let's just let the mystery be and not tell them this and see what happens?' Let's explain financial controls using the metaphor of a circus. (Yes, I did). It is a balancing act to walk the corporate line (here's something good you must consume) and to design and deliver it as artfully (or stealthily) as you can so that you leave room for others to intuit and interpret.

I was therefore very happy when I came across an interview with Brookfield about the connections between management education and adult education. He says something like just because you're a management educator, doesn't mean you are Satan and hopelessly compromised working for the man (that corporate capitalist system). Many people in the field are trying to sneak in some critical and democratic ideas and practices that adult educators support. I like to think that's what I try to do; put in some thinking spaces that help adult learners feel more in control of their own learning.

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

Journal entry 7 - July 6, 2014

Restlessly reflecting and not quite ready to engage

I wanted to write about reflection some weeks ago - the importance of it in adult education as a theme, as a practice, the variety of how it takes shape in experiential learning and in critical social learning but this week's readings have me thinking about it all differently. Maybe it's the wet almost wintery greyness here in Tofino at the beginning of summer that has me reviewing the last 36 hours, the readings over the past seven weeks, another ho-hum school year, or the daily challenge of parenting a kid who is different than the majority that has me reframing, recasting and reconstructing what I believe to be true.

My son was sick this weekend, on the brink of emergency care, but we beat it. When he woke up the cabin with his cheery shouts of "Hello world. I feel great!", it was like walking on cloud nine to hear his trumpeting voice once again. Is that disorienting dilemma? No, it takes 'traumatic severity' for the perspective transformation to stick. But it was enough of a jarring moment to give me pause and reset on what's important. What does this have to do with adult education learning theory and lifelong learning? It's been hard to separate his learning journey from mine. The compartments that keep work, life, school, family private and public are starting to meld and it doesn't feel comfortable but it's tiring to make sense of them in their own little pots. Moreover, I'm tired of feeling grateful to an education system that doesn't work well for kids that are outside of the norm and greeting parents who avoid us in our community.  The shame though has really been mine. I just haven't known what to do with it all, and haven't owned up to my part in the blame game - learning how to adapt doesn't stop and it surely isn't easy.

Reading Mezirow's work didn't flow for me to which I was a bit surprised; I thought it would be easy to consume but somehow the tone felt a little clinical and maybe even a bit dated sometimes, for example, the reference to Betty Friedan or to the saying "a woman's place is in the home". I understand it was written years ago reflecting the social politics of his times so I went into it with suspension of disbelief, and the parts where I labored somewhat in understanding were when he was relating Habermas learning domains to practice, it seemed a bit clunky, trying hard to make practice fit. Now, rational processes involve thinking which of course involves being analytical but meaning-making doesn't have to be bereft of inspiration. Mezirow writes that critical reflexivity involves personalizing what is learned by applying insights to one's own life' and stresses this isn't mere 'intellectualization.' Of course, the Clark and Wilson article really hit on that nerve - the loss of context, the concept of a 'unified, rational self' but to my surprise as well I felt a little protective and thought their arguments were a bit over the top at times. To claim that Mezirow incorporated his values uncritically into his theory and that they reflect hegemonic American values, i.e., masculine, white and middle-class, well, it was a bit like a hammer. Yes, this may be true but I don't believe that rational discourse is THE central process and goal of transformational theory. It is one thing, but not everything. Negotiating 'irregular' transformations towards 'meaning' is not just a solo act but as Mezirow adds can involve 'contractual solidarity', that is, access to 'other' perspectives, and assistance in helping adults 'construe experience'. 

In my last paper I wrote that "Mezirow's transformative learning theory aims to synthesize both the humanist focus on the individual with the sociological view of critical theory, by studying the individual process of transformation while also acknowledging the effects of society. It accomplishes this through the practices of self-reflection and critical reflection, by having us reformulate our meaning in life as we become aware of our subjectivity, thus linking 'subjective conditions of knowledge' with 'hidden aspects of social knowledge' (Cranton, 2013)." Two weeks after writing this, I still feel this fits. The interesting twist is, the social element is more subtle than how I described it. Mezirow writes: "The meaning perspective does tell the learner what to do; it presents a set of rules, tactics and criteria for judging. The decision to assume a new meaning perspective clearly implies action, but the behavior that results will depend on situational factors..."

The reference by Mezirow to Camus' 'a mind that watches itself' sums up the process of what happens in individual transformation. It is this angling towards the psychological inward focus that Clark and Wilson do not agree with, that is, they see rationality should not be an individual process but rather a communal one. However, every person has different situational factors, so meaning making has to be decontextualized. One size does not fit in terms of experiences.

I do, however, agree with Clark's notion that there is no unitary self. I had an aha moment when I came across an article she and Dirkx wrote about 'reflective dialogue' about moving beyond a unitary self. They started with the importance of knowing the self, the role of subjectivity, and how culture shapes the self. I like how Dirkx, similar to Clark, describes the self as divided, often odds with itself, and as a result, with others. About the nonunitary self Clark writes: "I feel increasingly fragmented in my life, and longing for an authentic self seems nostalgic at best. It's more than a multiplicity of roles; it's the awareness of multiple selves within these roles." Control is definitely missing from their equation, and together the arguments Clark and Wilson make to me are less nuanced than the article she wrote with Dirkx about the role of self in learning. I do like Clark's later writings on narrative learning (see Narrative Learning: Its Contours and Its Possibilities) and the idea that understanding the self as narratively constituted opens up new possibilities for learning theory - it does ironically draw heavily upon psychology and transformational learning, with the individual as the starring role.

Scott's article puts the two tensions from the Clark and Wilson and Mezirow's readings into better perspective than I have been able to articulate here. Scott sums up how critical social theorists view the individual as a "social agent with a sense of agency about what to do and how to act within the social or body politic"...  Thinking and action...whereas if we go back to Mezirow's theory of transformative learning, it is a smaller ripple in the pond where reflective discourse can involve both critical assessment of our assumptions and examining collective or common experiences to shift or transform previously held judgments. Thinking can lead to action. But it doesn't have to. And that change - that ripple in the pond - can be structural, enduring enough to effect others.

The idea that Mezirow's position might be labeled as left-andragogy really fits, with the focus on self-direction and a dogged belief that critical reflection is key to meaning making and seeing one's place in the world differently than before. Habit can be blinding and the intent of reflection is to lead to new paths of thinking and knowledge, and I suppose doing if you're the Action Jackson type. I'm not sure I'm there yet, though getting close as I find the battles with the same structures - school, teachers, doctors - like an old tape that has run its course. So, 'pedagogies of hope' - meaningful engagement with *special* education, I would like to embrace you but I'm not sure how to get there...Social justice? Dialectical theorizing? Public pedagogy? Art installation of the home notes, report cards, and recorded messages of three disjointed years of school? I'm still not past the haze of some anger to be clear about what's needed. But I ask, who gets to speak on behalf of a community? Do I really have anything new that hasn't been said? What is my community, anyway? For now, I'll continue my conversation with self and other parents, and assess where my temporary alliance lands me, poking away on my assumptions until it's clear what a path to action might be.

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

Journal entry 6 - June 29, 2014

Thoughts on a rainy Sunday about social learning

Trying to get into Engestrom after our readings with social learning theorists. I'm not satisfied with Wenger's concept of community of practice (CoP), maybe more thorough reading is needed. I find issues with mixed audiences - the peripheral learners and lurkers and the silence - not that there's anything wrong with that. I've been there and sometimes still am because fundamentally I'm not quite in and down with 'learning together'. And when it comes to social learning movements; I just can't help but feel that's politics and too ideological to 'organize' for a cranky existentialist with a laissez-faire attitude like me. It's complicated. Learning in communities is about vulnerability; finding your way; opening up to others - not just about the language of power and its relationships - these ideas, or affordances, seem to be lacking from social learning movement theorists...so far.

My curiosity has been piqued once again about organizational learning - it should as that's where practice and theory come together for me, my reality, my workplace. And now more curious about activity theory/expansive learning as it relates to organizational learning, and exploring the relationship between formal education and learning.  I agree there's no monopoly on learning, it can happen in the classroom or formal training program or it can happen in a group or talking to neighbours or co-workers or a solitary action like reading a book. It's what you, the individual or collective, 'make of that moment' to quote something notable from the workplace.

I'm intrigued by the terminology in activity theory though - the activities of production, distribution and exchange - and individuals and communities as producers of knowledge. It reminds me of that term produsage - user-led or commons-led knowledge production, a remnant from my course in open education. Maybe it's the Marxist terms that draw me in; the idea that they are incongruous with business and organizational learning for example, activity as cooperation; the division of labor; and exchange of knowledge and consumption - what is fair price for knowledge?

So what doesn't sit well with me about CoP? The idea of storming, forming and norming I guess, meaning it's not 'the learning' that leads to good cohesion of the members of that CoP but it's about more about effective assimilation of the community's shared values and norms - assumed consensus with the practices. Also as stated earlier, the mix of those in the know and those who aren't which means power relations can wreak a bit of havoc with access and progress in a community. Where was I reading something about CoP suffering from a 'problem of syntax' where community comes first but community also emerges out of practice....the chicken and egg problem...ahhhhh, but at the same time, you just never know where the conversation can go, it can be variable and organic, voluntary and when that happens, just like the ideal of organizational learning, it's a beautiful thing.

OK, now flagging and assigning myself some additional reading to do - Contu and Willmott's article on "Re-Embedding Situatedness: The Importance of Power Relations in Learning Theory"... and just can't resist tie-in to recent interview with poet Kenneth Goldsmith where he specifies the difference between 'alienated labor' and 'unalienated labor', the latter having a job you get something out of. Maybe that's how we need to think about CoP in the same way, alienated and unalienated members, or just face the facts, that there is no pleasing everyone.

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

Journal entry 5 - June 28, 2014

reflecting on informal learning that happens in the workplace

My skin got itchy early on in the course as I started to remember the debate between education and training. Within that is a whole lot of subdivisions, professional development, workplace learning, informal learning, and as I continue with readings, and work on my training projects at work, I am always reminded of the opportunity that 'informal' learning affords as it happens naturally as a part of the daily work-life routine. Is this lifelong learning? MAN-agement development? A learning organization? Does it matter?

In my first journal entry, I didn't quite articulate that given that adults are the learners who are the focus of the 'workplace' learning and that 'management development' programs happen in the same places where adult education programs take place, there is bound to be some cross-fertilization taking place, and that's a good thing. I came across this article "Exploring the Connections between Adult and Management Education" featuring both Brookfield who we had in our readings and Marilyn Laiken who I stumbled across in terms of workplace learning and reflective practice, and was heartened by what I read there. I have often joked with colleagues that sometimes I feel like I am a learning anarchist in my limited capacity to want to infiltrate top-down command and control compliance learning and make sure I design enough space to just let the learner breathe and do their own thinking without being fed a lot of rhetoric; and indeed it is a fine line to walk in corporate learning. I had no idea the field of critical management studies has been poking at this for years!

I realize that Brookfield's focus is on management education and the use of critical reflection and the inclusion of the learner - employee - worker - as a co-creator of the curriculum in management education but why just management education and not also more broadly to workplace learning? Why should reflective practice be concentrated on management or executives? It's for everyone to learn. Without question, it is a challenge to design and teach. In my workplace, we encourage all employees to use our social business platform to share our expertise, our learning, our knowledge and encourage reflection through blogging or through constructive conversations, thought sometimes, it can feel a little hit and miss. Yes, we have the architecture to foster this dialogue, but we need more clear indicators of what reflective practice looks like in the workplace, and spelling out the expectations and rules so everyone knows what reflection looks and feels like. (Sounds like I may soon be on a mission to be teach reflection at work from a guerilla fighter point of view...)

Now, the other term that makes me itchy... the learning organization. Sometimes I cringe at that one - can an organization learn? For this I went back to Senge's definition "where people continually expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free, and where people are continually learning how to learn together.” 

Can this ever truly happen in a business where there are management structures like performance objectives in place? Or where there is command and control thinking? Or if you have the tools but don't have the time to use them?

Now, if you take 'informal learning' what we learn when we're doing our work, maybe we are practicing how Senge envisioned the learning organization years ago? Jay Cross and Harold Jarche write about informal and workplace learning. Jarche had a post on this very idea that "work is learning and learning is the work" which refers to both what we do at work and how we do it; sort of a DIY version of the learning organization. (Must do more reading from the business learning side of the house whether reflection is baked into their versions of workplace learning).

From Schon's and Senge's work on organizational learning, I understand there's a reflective capability and that learning is supposed to have equal traffic between what the individual learns/applies in the workplace and what the greater organization, the collective, receives/gives from the individual. It's not just a transactional thing where you give/get as an individual through training, experiences and the organization gives/gets your expertise, ideas, knowledge. It's truly the freedom to create the 'results they truly desire' which is quite a mind shift to where learning is at the core of a learning organization; it's nurtured, part of the culture, and it doesn't need debate to be called a learning organization. It just is.

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

Journal entry 4 - June 7, 2014

Having the 'sisu' or grit to go beyond ready to learn

Readiness to learn, having the motivation and persistence to continue learning, to be able to self-regulate and keep oneself on task, some of us are better at it than others but it's a skill one can learn, or rather through experience one can learn. But what makes one 'ready' to learn? And how does this matter to self-directed learning where we learn 'for ourselves' but not necessarily 'by ourselves'?

Some time ago I flipped through Stuart Shankar's book on teaching self-regulation to kids, "Calm, Alert and Learning." I am familiar with the 'zones of regulation' and its application in the classroom; it is a great strategy for helping kids identify 'what' they are feeling but it needs other strategies, tools, and most importantly, a culture to go along with it to help teach kids how they can move into an appropriate zone, or rather state of mind, conducive to being open or relaxed for learning. It's one part of the emotional and behavioral challenge equation but the other is that kids need more active participation in how they can take control of handling their own emotional regulation themselves. I think about this often as I do my readings in adult learning and I wonder about the relationship now as I compare how I learn as an adult with how my son learns as a child; it's also my homework to learn about self-regulation research and practice with kids. It's an odd feeling when you recognize yourself as having some of that mental grit to be able to learn when you're tired and the tank is empty but when you see that your kid doesn't seem to have it at this time in his life at all, you wonder if they will ever be ready or if they have given up on 'learning' forever. I'm sure that's a common parental reaction but emphasized for our family as the parent of a kid who has been labeled 'not ready to learn.' But if I look back I know I didn't always have 'it'; the readiness to learn or the ability to stick-to-it with my studies. And certainly today, not everything I learn has a stick-to-it button. Why should I expect that my kid be any different?

During my school years, I was engaged with what I wanted to learn. In high school, I was lucky to have some teachers that encouraged self-directed study. My art teacher opened up a lot of doors - including the art room - to myself and a friend to expand our drawing beyond our 9th grade curriculum. Then another teacher started a small 'special studies' group where I and a few others started reading and discussing influential political and social theorists. I also took a 'correspondence' course to study beginners Russian through my high school and the ministry of education. As this is over 30 years ago, cassette tapes were shared back and forth to work through the lessons. Now, I call myself now a 'long distance self-directed' learner through my graduate studies at Athabasca but what I was doing way back then in high school really was being an early adopter of 'long distance' and I was learning how to be self-directed in my learning. No one made me take Russian, stay after school to make art or join my boho crew for a little critical inquiry.

In a previous course discussion forum, there was mention about creative aging theory. This topic reminded me of when I was working in my newly-found technical writing career, I took a sculpture course at Emily Carr but did this through distance education studies. I would do my projects, photograph and document them, and then send the assignments in the mail for marking. I would have a phone call from my instructor on a weekly basis to check in and talk about past and upcoming projects. I looked forward to this interaction and feedback which was like having my own private mentor; I never met the instructor in person though he lived on Bowen Island and I in Vancouver. The point is I was a virtual student back then who was able to intensely embrace the opportunity to explore my creative potential with support from the content - directions for assignments - and feedback and evaluation from an artist. Same as these folks in creative aging programs. I was also a bit more mature than I was in university and therefore, less anxious about my studies, and it was a 'playful' time. Same as these folks in creative aging programs.

Why am I thinking back on these learning experiences and what does it have to do with self-regulation? There's a thread here about learning how to learn, the importance of directing your study where your interests lie, the control that you need to recognize that you have in terms of negotiating your learning goals, the self-awareness you need to have to know when your study is important or is derailing you from other parts of your life.  You don't start out as a child with this or develop this well as a teenager, you may have interests that lead you to learn on your own but based on my own evidence, I wasn't being self-reflective about the progress of my studies at this age. Consider how distinguishing goals close at hand from those set in the near future is not easy for kids. Add in learner confidence or self-efficacy expectations and the importance of how to use the positive emotions to regulate learning and manage the negative feelings; getting to the state of being self-directed is a work in progress.

When I think about the continuum of learning in terms of when self-regulation in learning may take place, it is different for everyone in terms of where that happens against a typical development age. But there's a common element in learning that all ages share and that's the sense of play. Whether you want to call that flow or being fully engaged, or ready to learn, that to me is the start of the internal feelings by which all learners - young and old - judge their ability to engage in the task at hand and just get wrapped up in the learning. It's an important gateway to acquiring the self-efficacy needed to persevere and flourish with learning and become a self-directed learner. So, big lesson for mom the self-directed adult learner, must also keep on working with my youngster and helping him find his sisu, to overcome the challenges of the early school years and develop the mental resilience to become a self-directed learner. It's a work in progress.

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

Journal entry 3 - May 25, 2014

The unfolding of a personal mission statement

I didn't share one earlier this week because I didn't really feel that this was my ideal state; it was more of my real state. Or maybe in-between; a work in progress. Mission statements do that to you; they make you feel like they are just sheer rhetoric for future purpose and function. At least mine do. Does it really express my commitment to facilitate and promote lifelong learning as an adult educator? Do I want it to? I suppose is the question.

The purpose of the Plumb and Welton reading was sneaky; weaving in an overview of theories and then asking you to go and put a stake in the ground and define yourself as an adult educator.  To the section on "The Role of the Adult Educator," I made note of the influence of values on our perceptions of meaning, and on this, the theme in this reading was clear, that education is very personal, and we come to view how we learn and why we learn very differently. Therefore, when it comes to the purpose of the adult educator role, it's difficult to describe oneself with so many of us working in different capacities with adult learners - all of whom have very different motivations and reasons for learning. To this I wrote: It's all things, we take what we need. But we take more of some than others. We have a preference for what we think our roles should be as adult educators whether that is expansional, participational, integrational or personal. No great surprise to me when I put down enhancing personal development through new skills and knowledge ahead of participatory and organizational effectiveness (which I see those as outcomes not goals). It is more clear to me that I'm in the cult of the individual versus the cult of the social; this can feel odd when you are seen as a champion of workplace learning where the goal is ultimately to progress the individual for the betterment of the 'system.'

Has my worldview and experiences as a learner been marked by the work I do in adult education? Yes, my focus has been grounded in 'structure information' for skills and knowledge (the 'transmission of information' school). It started this way because I first worked as a technical writer, where the job was to structure and present content in a meaningful way so that it can be understood easily and used by an adult learner. In this role, you're not a subject matter expert, you are trying to present the object in context without superimposing too much of yourself and your thinking into the process. As my work evolved into training, I knew that I needed to know more about adult learning theory and practice so that I wouldn't impose myself. Today, I call it having a foot in the cognitive camp, and being a pragmatist because more and more, I am being asked to deliver and support learning through technology. My focus is still on making content 'meaningful' but now trying to balance modeling human values through the use of words, language, images, humour, stories, examples and still reliance on structure and putting in pauses, and follow-up through dialogue to overcome the increasing the distance in the interactions between learners, facilitators and content.

The other impact on my filter or worldview on my role as adult educator is that I am a learner myself. I have never seen myself as a teacher or educator or change agent. I am a parent. I serve as a mentor to others in my workplace. I am not an expert. I can and do share my experience and guide when needed but ultimately, the learning is up to the learner on what they will make of it or do with it.

So here is what I came up with for my personal mission statement:

I am committed to supporting adult learning in the workplace by helping employees cope with rapid changes in the workplace. To this end, I will design online and classroom instruction that values experience, reflection and dialogue. To carry out my role effectively, I will study, develop and online and face-to-face learning environments that encourage reflective conversation and inquiry.

It's feeling more genuine now, based in my current work situation. There's a few words that I wonder whether I could make more specific like  'committed' and 'cope' which I take to mean help be more effective. It's not aspirational language I realize but as explained I don't see myself as being the sole fountain of inspiration. It's a two-way street. (Though have to say, I did good when my eight-year old son announced that he was inspired by my writing to sit down beside me and pump out six stories on the computer last weekend while I wrote an essay.)

I realize the role of educator can be powerful and inspire but I feel most comfortable leaving it up to the learner to decide what they want to make of their learning. Experience, reflection, and dialogue, are processes that honour adult learners whether they are solo or in a group. The final sentence in my statement captures my intent to continue to improve my understanding of what works and doesn't work for adult learners and to adjust accordingly...Maybe 'inquiry' is a little stuffy, not really a workplace learning concept but captures the spirit of hoping to be able to bring about critical and creative thinking and offers the opportunity to wonder what is possible. (The 'creative thinking' curriculum like 'innovation' is all the rage these days). Am I at the fringe of practice? Does it matter?

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

Journal entry 2 - May 10, 2014

the role of motivation and being ready to learn

If you were a fan of the TV series Entourage, then you might remember way back in one of the early seasons an old-time movie producer called Bob Ryan (played by Martin Landau). He was always pitching something to anyone who would listen and it all started with his catch-phrase: "Is that something that you might be interested in?" The cool kids finally listen to Bob when he tells them he has a script about the Ramones. Things move forward, they get some face-time with a big studio exec to pitch the concept and Bob wastes no time in getting to the point of the meeting. The dialogue goes something like: "What if I was to tell you, you could make this picture for nothing, win an Oscar, and gross $100 million dollars? Is that something you might be interested in?" The exec responds with an emphatic 'Yes, that is something I might be interested in'.

This is our second week in the Adult Education and Lifelong Learning course, and naturally, there's been some discussion around the significance of motivation and its role in adult learning. The challenge with understanding motivation and learning intent is that it seems unknowable or invisible, as the cognitive process, being internal to the learner, is personal and also diverse, learning intent varying from learner to learner. But given adult learning theorists such as Knowles, Lindeman, Bandura, Zimmerman and experts in adult learning motivation such as Keller and Wlodkowski, we know there are practices that have been proven to help adult learning practitioners get their foot in the door to help 'know' the learner better and get them in the mood for a little learning.

Why do we try to demonstrate how we can help learners solve a problem or explain how this learning will benefit them? We want to tap into our natural human inclination towards curiosity and spark personal interest, and from there, we hope to get engagement and connection. Wlodkowski says: "Interest and choice are soul mates. One leads to the other." This for me is an understated yet accurate description of not just that process of how we actively try to guide learning after gaining someone's attention but the push and pull of learner and teacher in instruction, which Wlodkowski reminds us is ultimately systemic in nature. And while as designers of instruction we might want to follow a linear and prescriptive path, Wlodkowski reminds us human motivation with its underlying emotional base and instability does not always allow for it. When we're learning, we can't always be 'on' and ready to learn; eventually we get tired, zone out and must reset and start again. In other words, learning is looking like a series of episodes that we must string together.

In light of our readings this week I'm revisiting another theorist- Keller. His ARCS model (attention, relevance, confidence and satisfaction) was one of my first brushes with adult learning theory, and I regularly applied it to my training deliverables. With this model, Keller defines variables (and subsequent strategies) that can affect motivation, and like the first step in Gagne's nine events, gaining the learner's attention is a must-do priority for learning to happen. Which brings me back to Entourage and Bob...In training, we would say Bob is 'doing a WIFM' (What's in it for me). An instructional strategy that requires targeting how the learning will benefit the learner (an appeal to motivation) as opposed to what they will learn (not learning objectives). Bob's style is a little crude in comparison to how Keller suggests to gain attention (using perceptual and inquiry arousal); there's definitely no sense of wonderment or surprise applied here in this example. But with a concrete and relatable needs-based example customized to the individual, Bob does succeed in getting his audience's attention and making them open to wanting to know more. Which is the same as what we do in the learning world, having to be deliberate and intentional, and hopefully a little more artful.

Reference:

Wlodkowski, R. (2004). Creating Motivating Learning Environments. In M. W. Galbraith (ed.), Adult Learning Methods. 3rd ed. Malabar, FL: Krieger, 2004.

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

Journal entry 1- May 6, 2014

Adult education is a broad term; is it formal, informal, involve intentional and non-intentional learning? Yes, it's a mixed bag. Does it matter if the form of education is vocational, academic, in the community, or self-directed? Nope. Who are the learners, are they 25 and over? Younger? What's 'over'? Again, broad continuum of ages outside of formal public school; all with their own 'situations' and motivations but driven by self-interest; so common thread there. Continuing education, night school, basic adult education, literacy programs? Is that adult education? Yes, it stretches far and wide. What about training? Is that considered under the umbrella of adult education? Oh, some probably say no even today that workplace training doesn't promote social change or support self-development; training is about improving performance in one's current job, and the value exchange is 'business'. (We're not worthy and so the argument goes...) But if you transfer that 'training' to another job, one that improves your career; isn't that supporting self-development and giving back to society?

The definition that Draper gives to education as 'organized or intentional learning'; well, that causes me to grimace a bit too. It brings back the Smith and Ragan textbook (604?) on differences between instruction 'intentional facilitation of learning toward identified learning goals'; education where they say 'all experiences in which people learn'; and then there's training 'instructional experiences that are focused on specific skills that they would apply immediately'. Intentionality and immediacy. We apply what we learn immediately in training. There's that division...but for me, training involves and supports adult learner assumptions and principles and so fits in under the adult education umbrella. Adults as workers bring diverse experiences to the learning process; experiences that help them filter the new skills or information; this filtering is the same whether they get learn through employer-sponsored training or through formal education. So immediacy? Not really a requirement as we have a context to put that 'instructional experience' through our own experiences, and it might take some time.

Now is learning intentional and organized? Not always. Who owns that process and brokers what's intentional and what's organized? The continuum again but this time I give the nod to the learner. Here's why ...

The debate about andragogy, pedagogy and the evolution of the former according to Draper is the foundation for 'professionalism' in adult education. I take that to mean to be an adult educator and practitioner that we need to be aware of our set of assumptions about adult learners to better inform our own teaching and learning practices. This brings to mind a practice we do as instructional designers at my workplace, something we call 'deliberate practice' where we ask a question that a learner doesn't yet know the answer and allow them to explore possible outcomes. Some of us believe by manufacturing this learning discovery process that we are alchemists of learning art and science. Master architects of the learning universe. But I often think we lead a horse to water but he decides if he's going to drink. In other words, we can't always be sure 'what' the learner is going to take away from the learning experience we put in front of him. Wearing a practitioner hat - whether that's facilitator or instructional designer - you put the best conditions forward but as the learner, you decide which conditions matter and own the result.

This is what I'm thinking about week one...

[cognitiveoverdose-blog]

of planning and project management

Finally took a step this year to proceed with my studies. One more course got done. I did something 'smarter' in terms of study this term; I worked with a partner. Our project proposal was similar in ways and I knew that my organization might give me grief about disclosure and so I said forget it; I'll work on someone else's project, and it worked out quite alright. I learned from him; he learned from me; we both grappled with the lack of concrete examples and muddled through the readings; splitting up the work on assignments, it worked out quite well. We met at least twice a week, and almost daily if not twice daily during the week an assignment was due. When our first assignment returned to us (the first time I've ever encountered that in a grad class!); we worked through these bumps quickly and efficiently. Some team-up class experiences have been okay, some not so great, but this last one made me appreciate how much we adult learners try to balance work, study and life events into the mix. It's not so bad not going solo sometimes.