Author: Ajal

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Assessor judgements and everyday worker performance

Author: Hilary Timma, Recently completed PhD studies, The University of Melbourne

Edition: Volume 45, Number 2, July 2005

Summary:  The subjective nature of assessment focuses attention on the prior perceptions that workplace assessors can bring to formal assessment activities, regarding the competence of workers. This paper draws on a study into workplace learning and assessment practices and the construction of worker identities, which was conducted at three food production companies in North East Victoria. The paper proposes that, rather than concentrating principally on planned, formal assessment activities to determine the competence of workers, workplaces could develop an alternative approach and support assessors to utilize (and make publicly justifiable), the prior perceptions they have regarding workers’ skills and abilities on-the-job and include these in the overall assessment.

Keywords: assessment, workplace assessor, competence, formal

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Identifying and addressing the needs of adult students in higher education

Author: Karen L. Milheim, Doctoral Student, Penn State University, Harrisburg

Edition: Volume 45, Number 1, April 2005

Summary:  As the number of adult students enrolled within higher education programs increases, educational institutions must respond by addressing their needs on a continual basis. Adult learners possess a wide variety of characteristics which are not common to a traditional student, including personal life barriers, financial responsibilities and different learning styles. This article identifies some of these characteristics, and discusses ways for administrators and educators within higher education to address them in order to cultivate a positive learning experience for the adult student.

Keywords: adult student, learner, higher education, barrier,

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Millar’s story: The dynamic experience of an older adult computer learner

Authors: Helen Russell, Institute of Technology, Sydney

Edition: Volume 45, Number 1, April 2005

Summary:  The participation of older adults in computer learning environments is a recent phenomenon. Older adults of the twenty-first century have not grown up with information and communication technologies and are not likely to have used computers in their working lives. They may even feel alien in the world of technology. The purpose of this paper is to present a narrative description, and tentative analysis, of one person’s learning journey in this world. The interpretative analysis is guided by the principles of qualitative research, using case studies, and focusing on the individual experience of the learner. This article represents current findings in the early stage of a PhD thesis.

Keywords: older adult, technology, learner,

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Making connections: A dialogue about learning and teaching in a tertiary enabling program

Authors: Jennifer Debenham and Jo May, University of Newcastle, NSW

Edition: Volume 45, Number 1, April 2005

Summary: This paper concerns the experiences and effects of a tertiary entrance program from two perspectives: that of a former student now engaged in her Honours program and of her enabling lecturer. The main aim of the paper is to present a literature review of published studies about mature women’s engagement with tertiary study at the entry level. The authors utilise their enabling education biographies to connect the review of literature to lived experiences. The study asks: how far does the literature cover their experiences and what gaps, if any, are there? The first section briefly outlines the approach taken in the paper. In the second section the enabling experience is discussed in three parts: motivations to enter, the first assignment and course encounters. The third section examines the wider effects of participation in enabling on the self, family and friends. The paper bears out the findings of recent literature that highlighted the powerful transformative effects of such programs in all spheres of the students’ lives and the importance of making connections in enabling programs. It suggests that more research needs to be carried out in a number of areas, especially gender, race and class.

Keywords: tertiary entrance, literature review, mature, entry level, enabling experience

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Assessing learning achievements and development impact: Ghana’s national functional literacy program

Author: Aya Aoki, PhD candidate, Tokyo Institute of Technology

Edition: Volume 45, Number 1, April 2005

Summary: This paper summarises findings and lessons from a recently conducted evaluation of an adult functional literacy program in Ghana. The study attempted to assess learners’ literacy and numeracy skills, and ascertain participants’ knowledge and skills in various development aspects as well as their impact. The literacy and numeracy skills assessment exercise suggested that the learners are gaining significant reading skills and modest numeracy skills, while achievements in writing appear to remain weak. The findings also highlight the question of sustainability of these skills, which implies a need for improvements in post-literacy programs. The assessment demonstrated significant impact of the program on various areas of development. In particular, the study revealed the program’s strong impact on learners’ and their children’s education and livelihood activities. In addition, the learners gained knowledge and skills in health, environment and civic awareness.

Keywords: adult, functional literacy, numeracy, sustainability, post-literacy

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Lifelong, life-wide or life sentence?

Author: Terry Clark, Charles Darwin University

Edition: Volume 45, Number 1, April 2005

Summary: This paper examines the life-wide dimensions of lifelong learning. Although the benefits of a life-wide approach to learning are well recognised, there appears to be little explicit attention given to the concept of life-wide learning in Australia. It is argued that recent pronouncements by the Australian Government about the challenges of an ageing population would be better informed by reference to lifelong learning that includes its life-wide dimensions, rather than continued concentration on formal learning.

Keywords: life-wide, lifelong, formal learning,

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Epistemological agency and the new employee

Author: Raymond Smith, Griffith University

Edition: Volume 45, Number 1, April 2005

Summary: The necessary learning actions new employees must undertake to meet the performance requirements of their new job may be said to constitute a constructivist epistemology of necessity. This view forms a useful basis of inquiry into new employee workplace learning as it seeks to explicate the significance of what new employees ‘do’ in and through their learning. This paper briefly outlines the rationale and findings of one such inquiry. It proposes that what new employees ‘do’ may be best conceptualised as exercising their epistemological agency. An interpretive analysis of this ‘doing’, through a framework that identified the mediating factors of new employee learning, characterises the new employee-learner as a manager of their personal workplace learning agenda. It gives new emphasis to the role of the individual in the social construction of knowledge. Such an understanding of the new employee-learner suggests possibilities for enhancing a sociocultural constructivist view of learning that seeks to account for the personal purpose and consequence of learning.

Keywords: constructivist epistemology, epistemological, employee-learner, workplace learning

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Interrogating our practices of integrating spirituality into workplace education

Authors: Leona M English, St. Francis Xavier University, Canada; Tara J. Fenwick, University of Alberta, Canada; Jim Parsons, University of Alberta, Canada.

Edition: Volume 45, Number 1, April 2005

Summary: Workplace education’s interest in spirituality is examined, with an emphasis placed on why this interest might be increasing and what challenges it presents. This article interrogates commonplace strategies to integrate spirituality in workplace education, – providing holistic education, creating sacred spaces and mentoring – questions each approach and suggests ways that they might be integrated in an authentic manner into the workplace. The authors then examine how educators might interrogate their teaching practices by inquiring into their own motivations, ethics and values. An attempt is made to stem the flood of spirituality in workplace education by asking: For what purpose is spirituality being promoted in this workplace? And in whose interests?

Keywords: workplace education, spirituality, holistic, sacred, mentor

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Outside the box: The danish Folkehojskole as educational innovator

Author: John Collins, Private researcher, Merungle Hill, NSW

Edition: Volume 53, Number 2, July 2013

Summary: 170 years on, the Folk High School continues to supply Denmark a valued educational and social service. Does the modern Folk High School system offer Australian educators a model of relevance?

Keywords: Folk, education, relevant, Scandinavia,

 

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 53_2. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

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Abridged too far? Credit transfer: Examining the transition process from TAFE to University

Author: Theresa Millman, University of Wollongong

Edition: Volume 53, Number 2, July 2013

Summary: In responding to a global audience, universities are increasingly bound up in priorities of maintaining viability within landscapes of globalised market imperatives, and with changing paradigms of purpose; universities need to be accessible to all. In Australia, pathways to university provided by Credit Transfer have increased student mobility; the dichotomy however, is that alongside discourses of inclusivity is the need for students to adjust to the often rigorous academic demands of higher education. This paper examines the Bachelor of Communication and Media at the University of Wollongong (UOW), and the Diploma of Communication & Media Studies at the Illawarra Institute of Technical and Further Education (TAFE). Some of the common challenges transitioning students face in their first year at UOW are discussed, including; adapting to different workloads and the demands of self-directed, independent learning. A potential solution is a pre- university entry induction program for TAFE students.

Keywords: transition, credit transfer, advanced standing, Mezirow, transformation

 

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 53_2. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.