Andragogy Effective Teaching Philo

Janie P

Given the differences between Pedagogy and Andragogy and Blanchard's situational leadership styles/Transformational Leadership, how would you make yourself an effective adult learning professional?

Becoming an effective adult learning professional will come about by applying the methods of teaching observed in other professionals and modeling it. Of course, over time, more of your own style of leadership will emerge where you are teaching naturally rather than depending on someone else’s leadership style. As you are forming your own teaching style, you are reflecting on practices that brought about effective results and what did not. This experiences help guide you into the discovery of new practices that you hadn’t used or reinforce the methods you were relying on. Once you have your footing, you would move towards refining your practices and gaining expertise. I think on my preparation to be a teacher. I was trained in pedagogy practices and grew in proficiency over time. While I know I have mastered many areas, I am growing in expertise all the time. I would expect this same process to occur by making the jump as an adult learning professional. Wlodkowski (1985) states. “Facilitators who develop the characteristics of expertise, empathy, enthusiasm and clarity are likely to be highly motivating instructors”. So, as your expertise is being refined, always utilize the empathy, enthusiasm and clarity until you arrive as an effective adult instructor.
A transformative instructor is one that supports students in their progression of the emancipatory learning process. Emanicipatory learning’s purpose is, “to develop understanding and knowledge about the nature and root causes of unsatisfactory circumstances in order to develop real strategies to change them,” (Thompson, 2011). The definition of emanicipatory learning is, “The radical tradition in adult learning is concerned with how learning, knowledge and education can be used to assist individuals and groups to overcome educational disadvantage, combat social exclusion and discrimination, and challenge economic and political inequalities - with a view to securing their own emancipation and promoting progressive social change,” (2011). Blanchard’s situational leadership model shows how someone’s leadership style changes based on the needs of the followers. Based on the meaning of emancipatory learning and Blanchard’s situational leadership, I feel that you will mold yourself to be whatever your students need to inspire them to go further than they thought possible. Your students will give evidence of what they are in need of, whether it is more or less direction or more or less support.