Adult Theory Eucation

Abstract

Our academic system has grown in reverse order. Subjects and teachers constitute the starting point, learners are secondary. In conventional education the learner is required to adjust themselves to an established curriculum. Too much of learning consists of substitution of someone else's experience and knowledge. Psychology teaches us that we learn what we do. Experience is the adult learner's living textbook. This article will examine accounting programs of a college and the adult education programs. This will be looked at from the perspective of the instructor in adult education programs. This article will look at the differences in the learner's ages, needs, and desires.

How Adults Learn

In 'the good ole days' a college professor or administrator would be able to dictate to the student what was to be done. For example, the idea of a core curriculum is valuable to the learner fresh from high school. The core teaches a potential student how to learn and maybe catches him or her up on necessary subjects such as mathematics and English. Traditionally, all education was directed at the 18 year old college freshman. Times have changed and colleges necessarily changed with them.

The age of the learners in the classroom is a major adjustment for any college professor. For those instructors that are used to having the attention of the class merely by the virtue of being the oldest in the class is no longer a reality. Even in the traditional programs older students are enrolled. The instructor must take into account that he or she may not be the oldest person in the room and be able to effectively deal with that situation. Along with the age comes experience, most of the students in an adult learning program have a great deal of practical experience. It is up to the instructor to draw upon that experience and use it in the classroom. A positive aspect of older students in an adult program is that they are usually all there to get an education. This means that rarely will you have to deal with a rowdy individual upsetting the class. The students, because of their age, quickly set positive norms in the classroom and enforce those norms. For the instructor being younger than most students can be a challenge; however, the advantages of older students outweigh the negatives in the classroom situation.

In preparing to teach an accounting class of adult learners it is important that I as an instructor take into account the needs of such a group. In most cases the adult learners do not require the foundations present in traditional learning. For example, in a class concerning accounting the adult learner may need answers to particular questions and not a review of the basics. In an introductory accounting class, students will able to identify the concept of "Debits equals liabilities plus owner's equity" in their own working worlds. In this case the students had experienced the concept, but had not been given a name to the phenomenon. This is actually an example of working down Bloom's Taxonomy. The students can understand and apply a concept, by virtue of having experienced it in their career.

Adult Education Theory

Embodied Learning Theory and Accounting

Embodied learning situations provide students with opportunities to learn from the interaction of their physical bodies within an environment of information (Brookfield, 1984). Students develop experiential knowledge that involves senses, perceptions, and mind-body actions and reactions. As an accounting educator I will look to build curriculum, teaching methods, and technology to bring the body back into educational theory and practice.

As an educator I should become more familiar with, and support experiential learning. I assume that as a learner with preparation in the educational process that I would be open to an innovative learning experience. I will discover over time my resistance to both the content and the process. The content should not threaten my reality as a woman and an accountant, and the process should not threaten my reality as an educator and student. First, I was challenged to re-examine my ways of conceptualizing accounting, and my body.

My professional experience in accounting has taught me when, how, and which resources to mobilize in promoting my well-being, and that of others. These were comfortable and known ways of understanding my way of being in the world. Embodied learning challenged my ideas about both. To engage in embodied learning is to resist the dominant discourse about teaching and learning. My ways of understanding teaching and learning are central