04/01/2010 by lizit.

Finding lots of interesting ideas in papers written some years back. Getting the background seems to involve a constant moving backwards. I can’t possibly read everything ever written, but I can read a lot of stuff and get a sense of big picture.

Brown, Collins & Duguid (1989) present some useful contrasts between different types and contexts of learning in developing their ideas about situated cognition.I find their description of the learning of ‘just plain folk’ (JPF) relates to the questions I am asking about the learning of parents of children and young people with ASDs and how they learn to provide appropriate support and care for their children.

Brown, et al, start from the “distinction between mere acquisition of inert concepts and the development of useful, robust knowledge” citing Whitehead’s 1929 treatise on the aims of education. The implication is that it is possible to possess a tool, or knowledge, and not have a clue how to use it. Similarly it is possible to have good working knowledge of the use of a tool without knowing why it works as it does. In the real world, we learn how to use tools from others and through practice. The same tool may be used differently by different communities of users - example is given of chisel which is used differently by carpenters and cabinet makers, Just as we need to learn how to use physical tools, the same is necessary with conceptual tools. As with physical tools, the conceptual tools only really make sense in the context of practice. It is suggested that learners learn through enculturation or socialisation into a community of practice.

As tools are used in authentic context they gain meaning & relevance. Brown, et al, comment that “the process may appear informal, but it is nonetheless full-blooded, authentic activity that can be deeply informative - in a way that textbook examples and declarative examples are not.” This is illustrated using Lave’s example of the apprenticeship of tailors.

Brown, et al, then consider the learning of JPFs, students and practitioners. When a JPF wants to learn something they can become an apprentice or a student. As the former, they enculturate into the community of practice. As the latter they go to school where “the general strategies for intuitive reasoning, resolving issues, and negotiating meaning (…) are superseded by the precise, well-defined problems, formal definitions, and symbol manipulation of much school activity.” Brown, et al, suggest the JPF is closer to the practitioner in learning & practice than students whose learning & practice is abstracted from real life, implying that contextualisation is vital for learning to be meaningful.

The discussion can be related to the current educational policy debates where politicians are demanding more focus on vocational education in higher education. Brown, et al, suggest that it is only in post graduate study that students begin to become practitioners through an apprenticeship process embedded in the supervisory relationship with an experienced researcher. However, there is no discussion of the thinking and analytical skills developed through the education system.

They suggest more work is needed on understanding the “relationship between explicit knowledge and implicit understanding”.
Brown, J. S., Collins, A., & Duguid, P. (1989). Situated Cognition and the Culture of Learning. Educational Researcher, 18 (1), 32-42.

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03/11/2009 by lizit.

There is an interesting article in the Guardian on ELQ and the costs to students http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/nov/03/second-degrees-higher-education-funding. Although my focus is more on incidental and serendipitous learning, it strikes me that the kind of sums of money involved in taking an additional qualification deemed to be at the same level as one already held is likely to result in a number - potentially large number - of people seeking to gain skills, training, expertise other than through formal education. It also makes me realise how fortunate I have been in the funding of my own education. Even if I have groused from time to time about having to pay my own postgraduate fees, at least they have been heavily subsidised. Whatever the government might be saying about wanting to increase the proportion of the population with degree level education, the possibility of increasing undergraduate fees and the excessive cost of retraining might well prove to have unintended consequences, especially for those who will not be entering the most highly paid of jobs.

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15/10/2009 by lizit.

This feels like a good time to do a bit of taking stock and forward planning.

I’ve been looking at some of the DR2 modules and what comes through most clearly is the need for focus. This  came across particularly clearly in the lit review module which emphasised not getting sidetracked by interesting ideas, but was also very clear in the research methods module. This made sense to me as one of my main concerns is scoping my work so that it is actually both meaningful and doable in the allotted time.

Although I haven’t got a neat and tidy lit review, I do feel I have a good understanding of the informal learning area and some of the problematics of working in that area. I am also clear about the problems of language, especially the use of ‘informal learning’ in corporate training contexts and the changing use of ’social learning’. Looking at the informal learning literature has clarified the connections with adult education, lifelong learning, etc, and has also shown the paucity of material on children and informal learning - just one futurelab report as far as I can see. I am keeping up-to-date with Second Life and virtual worlds more generally through both literature and involvement in a number of mailing lists and attendance at various workshops and conferences. I have also explored the literature around virtual communities, including that focusing on 2D communities. Although I have revisited community development material, I have not done so as thoroughly as I originally intended to and there may be a need to look at more of this.

Other blogs and entries in my wiki focus on the reading I have been doing on motivation - Csikszentmihalyi and Deci and Ryan - and on social learning theory as propounded by Bandura. These are potentially useful theories for analysing data in the studies I am proposing.

So what am I actually proposing to do and why? I am increasingly coming to the view that my work needs to be located in relation to the recent government white paper on informal learning. The white paper makes a number of assumptions about informal learning, including about its potential role in adult education and about the need for it to be recognised in some way or other. Apart from the potential elements of cost-cutting or of formalising the informal, I feel the white paper raises a number of issues which are not properly addressed.

So where do I go from here?

Firstly, I think I need to re-read the white paper and the earlier consultative document and responses. I will be looking particularly at how informal learning is understood in those documents and how it is seen to relate to the lifelong learning and widening participation agendas.

Secondly, I need to frame my research question(s) in the context of the white paper. (Given the forthcoming general election, it would be useful to check what the position of other major political parties is on informal learning, but given there is also an EU dimension, I suspect the changes are more likely to be in relation to priorities rather than direction.)

Thirdly, I need to revisit the work I have been doing in outlining potential studies and ensuring these actually address my research question.

That sounds like enough for the moment.

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15/06/2009 by lizit.

Was chatting about the White Paper on informal learning (DIUS. (2009). The Learning Revolution. Cm7555) over supper and mentioned how easy it is to be suspicious if not even cynical about the government’s motivation in suddenly deciding to support informal education after years of decreasing the funding given to adult education, except for those classes which led to formally recognised qualifications. The white paper itself recognises this: “The Government has taken the decision to re-prioritise LSC funding on longer, more valuable accredited courses that provide real help for people to get on in work” (para 24, p. 9) and goes on to acknowledge this has led to to an ‘expected reduction in shorter courses: “Many were in areas like health and safety at work or food hygiene which are properly the responsibility of employers. Some have been in areas which, while popular, would not attract the highest priority, or where learners are willing to pay full fees. Recreational language classes used to be one of the short courses most heavily-subsidised by the LSC and many still take place, but in a different form” (para 25, p.9). So thriving adult education classes have been closed or passed to other providers and people have found other learning opportunities which are not funded by Government leading to a flourishing informal learning sector which often goes unnoticed and unrecognised.

Now if we turn the clock back 25 years or so, we find huge changes in social care provision under the Conservative government of the day. Promises of support for the voluntary sector turned to support for volunteers (when it was realised how much voluntary organisations cost) and then to informal and family carers (when it was realised volunteers do not come completely free of overheads). During those years we saw the beginning of the contracting out of social care to voluntary and private organisations,  the closure of the large mental hospitals in favour of care in the community, and the move from public sector funding of care to the lottery. OK, not all that has happened in the social care field is bad, and some people may have slightly more say in the care they receive now, but there are also many casusalties of the caring revolution.

So where will the learning revolution lead.  It is driven by economic and demographic factors - the credit crunch and the increasing number of older, economically inactive people and younger people with few employment prospects. One can almost hear the thinking, now if we can formally recognise all the work these non-funded bodies and informal groups are doing and label it learning and perhaps even accredit some of it, we can reduce the amount we spend on formal education while claiming to increase the total amount of learning happening within the UK.  We can even disguise what we are doing with our digital agenda pointing to the need to ensure everybody is upskilled for the digital age.

Call me an old cynic, but these are worrying times we live in.

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