ACE – Australian Journal of Adult Learning

April 24, 2017April 26, 2017

Second chance learning in Neighbourhood Houses in Victoria

Author: Tracey Ollis, Karen Starr, Cheryl Ryan, Jennifer Angwin and Ursula Harrison
Deakin University

Edition: Volume 57, Number 1, April 2017

Summary: Neighbourhood Houses in Victoria are significant sites of formal and informal education for adult learners. Intrinsically connected to local communities they play an important role in decreasing social isolation and building social inclusion. The focus of this research is on adult learners and adult learning that engages with ‘second chance’ learners who participate in adult learning programs in the Barwon and South West regions of Victoria. The greater Geelong region is characterised by declining car automotive and textile manufacturing industries and emerging new industries such as hospitality and tourism. The data from the research participants in the study include career changers, long term and recently unemployed, newly arrived and migrant communities, young people and older adults. This paper focuses on the learning practices of second chance learners who frequently have negative perceptions of themselves as unsuccessful learners, but are transformed through their learning experiences in Neighbourhood Houses. We argue the unique social space of the Neighbourhood House, the support and guidance offered by staff and teachers, the unique pedagogy and small group learning experiences, allows adult learners to reconstruct a new identity of themselves as successful learners.

Keywords: informal learning, formal learning, adult education, ACE, VET, training reform, Neighbourhood Houses

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 57_1. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

April 13, 2016April 13, 2016

University-based enabling program outcomes: comparing distance education and internal study

Author: Cheryl Bookallil and John Rolfe, Central Queensland University

Edition: Volume 56, Number 1, April 2016

Summary: Enrolment in university enabling programs has expanded dramatically in the last decade as universities strive to increase enrolments, particularly of students from low socioeconomic backgrounds. Offering enabling study by distance education has been part of this expansion with the benefit of providing access to a wider enrolment base. The purpose of this study was to compare enabling program completions and articulations to undergraduate study as well as student academic performance between those students who undertook enabling by internal mode and those who opted for distance education. Archival data from the host university student records system was extracted covering the time period from 2001 to 2011. Statistical analysis found significant differences existed in both course completion and articulation for students enrolled in online learning versus face-to-face teaching. Analysis also revealed academic achievement in the enabling programs, as measured by Grade point Average (GPA), to be higher among internal students compared to
distance students.

Keywords: University enabling programs; distance education; attrition; completion; articulation; grade point average

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 56_1. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

April 13, 2016

Unlocking the potential within: A preliminary study of individual and community outcomes from a university enabling program in rural Australia

Author: Susan Johns, Nicole Crawford, Cherie Hawkins, Lynn Jarvis, Mike Harris and David McCormack, University of Tasmania

Edition: Volume 56, Number 1, April 2016

Summary: Many rural communities have a pool of mature-aged local people seeking a career change or better lifestyle, which inevitably involves reskilling or upskilling. These people have strong local ties and are committed to their community. University enabling programs provide a bridge to higher education. This longitudinal study explores the impact on rural mature-aged people of participation in a university enabling program, in terms of further study and employment outcomes. The benefits of enabling programs extend beyond individuals, to family and friends, and beyond. These broader benefits include an enhanced local skills base in key industry areas, and an increased awareness of the value of higher education within the community. Enabling programs are a powerful but under-valued tool in helping to unlock and harness the potential within rural communities, both in the medium and longer term.

Keywords: educational aspirations, enabling program, outcomes of education, rural education, social inclusion

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 56_1. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

April 13, 2016April 13, 2016

Learning to swim using video modelling and video feedback within a self-management program

Author: So-An Lao, Brett E. Furlonger, Dennis W. Moore and Margherita Busacca, Monash University

Edition: Volume 56, Number 1, April 2016

Summary: Although many adults who cannot swim are primarily interested in learning by direct coaching there are options that have a focus on self-directed learning. As an alternative a self-management program combined with video modelling, video feedback and high quality and affordable video technology was used to assess its effectiveness to assisting an adult to develop and practice swimming skills. The participant was a 36 year-old non-swimmer who had previously attempted unsuccessfully to learn to swim on previous occasions. A single subject design with baseline, intervention and 12-month postintervention phase were conducted. Dependent variables included a continuous 25-metre swimming distance goal using the freestyle stroke. After a 13-week intervention phase the continuous swimming distance had increased to 25 metres. For this adult participant, selfmanaged learning proved to be an effective way to learn to swim and greatly improved her confidence around deep water.

Keywords: self-management, video, modelling, feedback, swimming, adult

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 56_1. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

November 18, 2015

Book Review: Problematizing Public Pedagogy

The Work: Problematizing Public Pedagogy. Jake Burdick, Jennifer A. Sandlin and Michael P. O’Malley (Eds.) Routledge, New York, 2014, 212 pages

Reviewer: Karen Charman, Victoria University

Edition: Volume 55, Number 3, November 2015

In Brief: The breadth of this edited collection on public pedagogy is testimony to the richness of the field. As the title suggests one of the appeals of this book is the very problematisation of the terms public and pedagogy. The editors begin in ‘Breaking without Fixing’ by……..

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 55_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

November 18, 2015

Remaking education from below: the Chilean student movement as public pedagogy

Author: Jo Williams, Victoria University

Edition: Volume 55, Number 3, November 2015

Summary: This article considers the Chilean student movement and its ten-year struggle for public education as an example of public pedagogy. Secondary and university students, along with the parents, teachers, workers and community members who have supported them, have engaged in the most sustained political activism seen in Chile since the democratic movement against the Pinochet military dictatorship between 1983 and 1989. The students have successfully forced a nationwide discussion on education, resulting not only in significant educational reform, but also a community rethinking of the relationship between education and social and economic inequality in a neoliberal context. Framed through Giroux’s conceptual definition of public pedagogies and drawing on field
research conducted throughout 2014 as well as existing literature and media sources, this article considers the role of the student movement in Chile in redefining the concept of ‘public’ and the
implications for radical perspectives on learning and teaching.

Keywords: students, activism, Chile, public pedagogy

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 55_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

November 18, 2015November 18, 2015

“Come in and look around.” Professional development of student teachers through public pedagogy in a library exhibition

Authors: Anne Hickling-Hudson & Erika Hepple, Queensland University of Technology

Edition: Volume 55, Number 3, November 2015

Summary: This paper describes a public pedagogy project embedded into The Global Teacher, a subject within the Bachelor of Education program for student teachers at an Australian university. The subject provides a global perspective on socio-political issues that shape education. In 2013, The Global Teacher introduced an approach that asked student teachers to create a museum-style exhibition depicting six global education themes. This exhibition was displayed in the State Library and the public were invited to engage with the installations and the student teachers who created them.

Our paper describes how the project was implemented by means of close collaboration between the QUT teacher educators, curators at the State Library of Queensland (SLQ), and student groups working
on visually translating their understandings of global educational issues into a public exhibition. We discuss what was learned by our students and ourselves, as teacher educators, by engaging in this public pedagogy.
Keywords: global education, public library, group work, transformative learning, social justice, public learning space.

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 55_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

November 18, 2015November 18, 2015

Reaching for the arts in unexpected places: public pedagogy in the gardens

Author: Ligia Pelosi, Victoria University

Edition: Volume 55, Number 3, November 2015

Summary: What constitutes public pedagogy? The term is broad and can be applied in so many situations and settings to the learning that occurs outside of formal schooling. In this article, the author explores how a community event – a painting competition held in a Melbourne suburb’s botanic gardens – constitutes public pedagogy. The event centres on appreciation of the gardens, and on fostering the arts in the community. Local schools and residents have shown their appreciation
of the competition through increased participation over the past five years. However, there is much learning that is unexpected and far less tangible, which flourishes beneath the surface of the event. Capturing a collective memory of the suburb is one aspect of such learning that is historically significant. The author argues that the event can also be seen as activist in a political sense, through the way it has restored the arts to the community in a way that education in a neo-liberal climate is currently unable to do.

Keywords: Arts, curriculum, community, public pedagogy

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 55_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.

November 18, 2015November 18, 2015

Visual Communication Design as a form of public pedagogy

Author: Meghan Kelly, Deakin University

Edition: Volume 55, Number 3, November 2015

Summary: This paper identifies visual communication design as a form of public pedagogy. Communication design practices aim to achieve the successful transmission of a message to a recipient in a visual mode. Understanding the theories and practices of visual communication design can assist in enhancing the reception of the communication, as these practices become a tool to increase the effectiveness of learning in a public space. To demonstrate this, I will use the example of museums
as an informal place of public learning, and argue design, and in particular visual communication design strategies, are extremely important in the creation of successful learning. If participants are
not engaged or entertained, their capacity for learning will diminish. Engagement depends on the representation of the information and the successful interpretation of that information by the visitor. Further, this paper will emphasise the vital role communication design plays in all forms of public pedagogy, not just within the museum context. However, non-designers create many public learning environments and although this paper argues the benefits of communication design to increasing the effectiveness of learning, it recognises the narrow opportunities of applying this knowledge.

Keywords: public space, visual communication design, museum, public learning

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 55_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.