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DIUS

Page history last edited by PBworks 15 years, 10 months ago

Adult Informal Learning Consultation

LGC Response

 

Nigel and Fred are working on this

 

DIUS Consultation

 

DIUS Response Form

 

 

Nigel and Fred's Second Draft (with help from John!)

 

Learner-Generated Context Group response on

DIUS Adult Informal Learning Consultation

 

1. Understanding and improving on current provision

 

a) How can we understand more about the factors that are driving this diversity of activity?

Informal Adult Learning is one of the glories of Civil Society in this country and makes it worth living in. We need to enable the diversity of interests that people engage in to lead to learning and social and community development.

b) What are the conditions that make it easier for learners to learn? How can we support people to be more instrumental in their own learning?

Learning is a social process and people want to learn. We need an education system that provides multiple opportunities to learn in a range of modes and enables learners to become teachers too. This is something that the Learner Generated Contexts Group have discussed and developed in the Open Context Model of Learning.

c) How can we support and develop models of self-organised adult education, learning from (for example) the U3A model?

We need to develop system-wide e-mature institutions that allow for and support self-organisation. This can be achieved through the development of “Architectures of Participation”

 

d) How can we improve the connectivity between different kinds of learning episodes, for example by helping people move from watching a TV programme to using the web, to joining a group and then to pro-actively teaching or sharing information with others?

1. Cybrarian model of engagement through technology

2. Cybrarian model delivered through Kickstart TV

3. ELGG model of Learners owning their learning

4. SCARLETT-like connectivity with Community Metadata model

 

 

e) How can we further develop the culture of volunteering to support informal adult learning?

Learner-centred learning works best as a collaborative acticivty with various kinds of learning support. Typically this involves peer-support and mentoring by fellow learners. If learner-centred learning becomes the norm it will involve learning support by volunteers

 

 

f) What are the conditions most likely to foster innovative approaches to adult learning?

1. Self-regulating system with a participatory PV framework;

2. Providers own their KPI’s in a more professional less managerial system

 

 

 

 

2. The Government contribution

 

a) Whether, and if so how, Government support for informal adult learning can be improved?

Critical issue is re-conceptualising Informal Adult Learning. Currently this is seen as an afterthought in educational provision and funding is provided reluctantly as an afterthought. Informal Adult Learning should be viewed as a key element in the provision of a learner-driven lifelong learning offer. If so it can became an area of society in which citizens can learn how to engage with and CREATE the Knowledge Economy. People need time to reflect and discuss without the pressure of meeting the particularly narrow demands of qualification-driven education

 

 

b) Whether you agree that, given the diversity of demand, need and type of provision that is made, it would be inappropriate to aim for a common funding system across Government, or a centralised strategy?

I think we should be saying something about the need to provide funding without central policy strings attached and encourage local communities to develop the capability and capacity to develop services and opportunities around their circumstances. Provision of support linked to community objectives would help develop case studies and models of provision to be shared through collaborative community networks. We could split this answer for the following – I think we could argue for a core funding plus local element model incorporating population size, deprivation and dispersion of communities.

 

 

c) How can we ensure there is proper recognition and understanding of the wide variety of ways in which Government is supporting informal adult learning?

Government should be concerned with strengthening the lineaments of Civil Society which is about a strong and healthy local society with organisations and people concerned to respond to local needs. A strong Civil Society will provide all sorts of rewards for government.  This is about more co-ordinated local communications rather than centralised communications “managed” by policy wonks. We need to support and develop networks of collaboration (Garnett and Ecclesfield (2008a)

 

 

d) How can we make better use of Government resources, for example better use of premises?

It is not just about making premises available at evenings and weekends, it’s about making resources available e.g. network capacity, mobile technology – bartering with other owners of potential premises and facilities e.g. employers making their training and learning facilities available to their communities in return for their gains via the Skills Agenda/Leitch.

We need to take a more integrative approach to the design of space. Some BSF schools and Academy’s, such as the RSA Academy, are working with learners at the design stage, so they are designing buildings to meet learning need; a strategy recommended by Will Alsop. Some locations such as the Creativity CETL at Sussex University were designed to be available for Informal Adult Learning outside University terms. We need to design for the full range of learning and make use of well-funded institutions to provide Learning Support Centres

 

 

e) Are there areas where Government should be actively removing barriers or creating new flexibilities in order to improve the use of resources?

Yes it should be providing developmental support for the development of participatory local democracy driven by local resourcing and local accountability. A learner-driven Informal Adult Learning sector can be a key component in re-invigorating local Civil Society

 

 

3. DIUS-funded informal adult education

 

a) Is the adult education service basically a 1970s model, now overtaken by the developments summarised in Chapter 1? Or is it a successful service that has the potential, with the reforms currently in train, to develop and thrive in the 21st century?

This response by the Learner Generated Contexts Group is concerned to focus on a number of key issues necessary to put in place in order to meet the challenges of the 21st Century. We see these as concerning how we develop a community-based and learner-led service building on existing provision, but developing the collaborative resources to share and disseminate good practice.…

 

 

 

b) How are Local Authorities now organising their adult education services? What are their visions for the future and what are their experiences of different models of delivery today?

The conceptualisation of Informal Adult Learning as being about delivery indicates the fault lines in governments thinking in this area. Informal Adult Learning is seen as a cost-area not as providing a critical opportunity to invest in the skills and talents of its citizens and enable them to contribute creatively to society, and so to the economy. Informal Adult Learning should be concerned with providing hubs and resources which enable participation, regeneration and learner-lead local provision co-ordinated by local Trusted Intermediaries

There are detailed answers in the outputs of ACL inspections over seven years and the research studies funded with and through NIACE as well as the outcomes of JRF research activities from 2000 onwards.

 

 

c) Have we taken partnership working as far as we can? The scale of the support from other Government departments is important for each partnership to grasp and take advantage of.

The belief in partnerships is a great strength of government policy. There exists an opportunity for Informal Adult Learning to be developed in the context of adaptive institutions working across collaborative networks, the description of our future education system given by Ecclesfield and Garnett in “Towards Developing an Organisational Architecture of Participation” (BJET 2008). This is based on partnerships working across an e-enabled education system. Informal Adult Learning should be a key component of this and could also complement 14-19 Diploma offerings.

 

 

 

d) In terms of using the DIUS safeguarded budget, would it be better in future to focus spend on infrastructure and on the organisation of an effective service, rather than through direct subsidies to providers for putting on courses?

It’s not one or the other it is about enabling services to make the transition from being provider-led to learner and community led.

Local Informal Adult Learning could return value to the locality by being part of an integrated local educational offer. The safeguarded budget should be about enabling locally-owned and locally-driven Informal Adult Learning to contribute to sustainable local development.

 

 

 

e) Do we need the service to become more learner-led? Would a way of doing that be to explore the possible use of real or virtual vouchers, taking advantage of new technologies? These might build on the Skills Accounts mechanism being phased in, starting in 2010.

Yes the service needs to be more learner-led, but this is a sophisticated activity which also requires the service to be co-designed with learners, using key Trusted Intermediaries, developing the role of practitioners as “learning brokers” and the use of an Open Context model where teaching also develops learning and negotiating skills. Local Authorities need to pro-actively design a learner-led service. There is also the question of the hard to reach and multiple-disadvantaged who will lose out in a voucher system which adds a layer of expenditure on audit processes that is not productive in any sense. The newly announced employers scheme is a good step forward however, and Skills Accounts could be provide a good way of negotiating between learner need and local provision

 

 

4. Equality of access

 

a) How can we do better in ensuring that no one is excluded from the benefits of learning? Or from the same opportunities that others enjoy?

Develop an education system that is concern with inculcating an interest in learning in all contexts rather than creating a National Curriculum driven education system focussed on testing. We should engage with and support communities and not try to control or direct learning through centralised policies and the policing of those policies through a financial audit process. We need to develop greater local accountability and trust.

 

 

b) How well do we understand the barriers to learning as they exist at present, and how they affect particular parts of society? To what extent are the barriers financial? What action would address each of the barriers?

Government appears to recognise, but not understand the range and complexity of barriers – even those identified by the inspectorates and community researchers. CPAG has recently identified how important the effects of financial barriers are in people’s lives. Rather than disaggregating public funding, we need to look at how individuals can access the learning they need without having to deal with complex and discomfiting procedures – aggregation of resource through networks not by dilution into elements that are unlikely to make a difference.

Everyone wants to learn and learning is a social process. However the current education system offers a singular subject-driven approach to education which blames those learners that fail to adapt to its very limited testing driven view of education.  Having worked in many contexts where learning is about social inclusion I would say that you start with learners interests and adaptively offer them a range of learning pathways, as offered by the 14-19 Diploma. The barriers are political and systemic. Trust educators as professionals and trust learners to learn.

 

 

 

c) What further actions could Government most usefully take to ensure more equal access to informal learning?

1. Develop and education system that is concerned to put learners in charge of their learning

2. Integrate informal learning with the needs of the local community and don’t allow “contracted out” local provision

3. Evolve models of entitlement and democratic control at community level.

4. Provide support for local control through enablement of individuals and community mechanisms, a possible model might be the extension of the model of learning reps in recent TUC work.

 

 

 

d) What further actions could others most usefully take?

Allocation of resources for community action and involvement in learning, collaboration in research and facilitation, sponsorship and staffing allocation to pump-prime community activities.

Develop Public Value accountability systems that enable access to informal learning

 

 

 

e) What more can Government do to overcome the 'digital divide' where the people who could most benefit from new ways of participating in adult learning are the least equipped to take advantage of them?

1. Develop processes to encourage community and personal development

2. Avoid the focus on capital expenditure that prioritises the kit against people and processes and locks providers into using kit that is quickly redundant and does not empower users.

3. Develop Participative Media Literacy Skills in everyone

4. Listen to people who know about socially inclusive learning strategies

5. Don’t cut social inclusion learning budgets just before elections, such as with the Cybrarian Digital Divide project, just because there are more votes in schools and Universities. This is just cynical and works against a healthy Civil Society.

 

 

 

5. Broadcasting and technology

 

a) What are the barriers to making the most of technology for learners? How can these be overcome?

1. Over-reliance on technology that keeps within Treasury guidelines are entirely inappropriate in this context.

2. Move the focus towards sustainable technology, with a focus on process and systems that support delivery, communication and distribution.

3. We need a greater understanding of how new technology can provide new and different learning opportunities.

4. Develop new learning processes, like the Open Context Model where practitioners who understand learning work with learners who understand certain technologies that they use, such as mobiles, games consoles and certain web 2.0 sites.

 

 

 

b) What do we know about the learning opportunities that will become available utilising new technology over the next 10 to 15 years? What is the best way of identifying these opportunities?

Not by relying on Leitch or abstract modelling, fatalistic responses to the future, that follow command economic principles. Recent developments in Web 2.0 and networking demonstrate that developments come as much from user appropriation of the technology as from the technology itself. Users will make the future, given the opportunity. Encouraging community learning will provide the test beds for the development of the technology, not through subsidies for producers.

We think learning will be come more context and learning need dependent as the technology becomes more ubiquitous and easier to use. We will need to redesign our learning systems to support purposeful self-organised learning. What we call “A coincidence of motivations leading to agile configurations”

 

 

 

c) What opportunities, if any, are there to make learning a more central consideration in the future of broadband and the digital switchover? And in the development of mobile phone applications?

Should have big implications for informal mobile learning. The big 'problem' or barrier for government is will it be able to understand the emerging socially bound informal learning trends that mobiles enable? And as always accrediting it will be tough (if that is what they want to do) ... People will opt into diverse services that suit their needs (See previous comment)

 

d) How can we make greater use of interactive television?

This is an area where the regulation of new technologies is undertaken in one ministry and its use for learning in another. OFCOM has been concerned to enable terrestrial and satellite broadcasters to continue to offer a traditional corporation-driven model. Projects such as Kickstart TV and INTOmedia using template driven resource creation models, show the fantastic possibilities for using interactive tv for learning which OFCOM isn’t interested in. Media Literacy has also been handled poorly, it should be promoting Participative Media Literacy. A media literate population creating digital resources should be a Knowledge Economy driver but these opportunities have been consistently spurned by short sighted. The government seems to think that the end of the modernising government agenda in 2005…

 

 

 

e) How can the connectivity between broadcast, physical and virtual resources and informal learning be further enhanced?

We need to devlop better Learning Design Tools like Professor Rose Luckin’s “Ecology of Resources” model and learn from the JISC work on designing for learning. Teaching needs to move away from pedagogically limited classroom delivery to enable coherent learning in multiple contexts.

 

 

f) How can we bring new Information and Communications Technology together with more established teaching and learning models so that there are integrated opportunities to learn?

ICT’s provide the capability of transforming the way we learn. The LGC group have spent much time reflecting on this and we propose that the co-construction of teaching and learning using the collaborative affordances of ICT’s is the key way forward. We have developed an “Open Context Model of Learning” (the most interesting thing going on in the Uk – John Seeley Brown) that addresses this by incorporating the traditional “andragogic” model of Adult Learning with the “heutagogic” learning model required for socially useful learning in the Knowledge Economy. This changes the processes and measures of learning and requires a more collaborative learning approach supported by practitioners and “trusted intermediaries”. See http://learnergeneratedcontexts.pbwiki.com/opencontextmodel/

 

 

These discussion points are intended to prompt debate. They are not intended to limit or constrain what needs to be a challenging and innovative consultation. So if you feel that there are other equally important issues which should be addressed, please feel free to do so in the text area below.

 

Any other comments or suggestions not previously covered?

About you

 

Fred's First Draft

 

DIUS – Informal Adult Learning Consultation

 

1. Current Provision

a) Culture and History

b) Open Context Model & Ecology of Resources

     No National Curriculum and test-oriented education

c) e-mature institutions

     Provider 2.0

     Learner-Generated Contexts model

d) 1. Cybrarian model of engagement through technology

    2. Cybrarian model delivered through Kickstart TV

    3. ELGG model of Learners owning their learning

    4. SCARLETT-like connectivity with Community Metadata model

e) Greater role for Trusted Intermediaries

    Greater role for accreditation of actions beyond the school

f) 1. Self-regulating system with a participatory PV framework;

    2. Providers own their KPI’s in a more professional less managerial system

 

2. Government Contribution

a) move away from radical adjustments to funding mechanisms, especially for such small amounts of money – this is social glue

b) Need an integrated way of using the system levers; First think of the education system as a whole, not a prioritised one focussed on secondary schools and HE, with a common quality framework

c)  Integrated system with power devolved to key actors against quality reviews, celebrate the diversity of provision and approaches, enabling the sharing of best practice by “scaling innovation”

d) treat the system as a whole and enable providers and professionals to make these decisions, see the EMFFE

e) An integrated self-regulating system would enable this

 

3. DIUS-funded Informal Learning

a)  1970s model, need an integrated system including linking DCMS activities MLA Informal  and Media Literacy (especially)

b) Local Authorities have been adaptive, contracting out, providing a service or integrating AIL across Libraries and/or citizenship. Integration…

c) Partnership working is key but needs to take on lessons of Public Value and identifying shared outcomes across local , national and European government. Need Innovation networks model (eg Hargreaves)

d) Need to fund a plan for providing the service being described here.- needs to be more intelligent than LIP

e)  A learner-led system also needs to be a provider-led system with less direct  government intervention, especially where, say extended school provision leads to the shut-down of schools, not their extension

 

4. Equality of Access

a) 1. Integrated System treating all learning equally

    2,Resources like Cybrarian and SCARLETT

 b) 1. The current  “achievement” system is a barrier

     2. Cultural factors are a barrier (CDML)

  3. Motivation factors are a barrier

c) Government Address Contextualising factors

d) Others address contextualising factors

e) Digital Divide is one of multiple divides, each of which need addressing

 

5. Broadcasting and Technology

a) What are the barriers to making the most of technology for learners?

How can they be overcome?

Lack of e-mature organisations

Lack of pedagogically aware professionals

Greater Media Literacy, Digital Literacy and Learning Literacy in Learners

 

b) What learning opportunities will become available for learners over the next 15 years. What is the best way of identifying them?

Learning needs to be related to context; learners will need to know how to

 

c) What of the future of broadband? The digital switchover? Mobile applications

Broadband is a critical utility as “more is different”

 

d) How can we make greater use of Interactive TV?

Don’t be scared of the big telecoms companies

Provide Developmental standards

Use OFCOM to guide the development of a Digital Infrastructure fit for purpose for the Knowledge Economy

Use template driven Interactive iDTV resources like Kickstarttv.tv to develop content

Use the Community Channel to provide multiple access points

Use narrative driven content creation templates like INTOmedia to help learners co-create learning using iTV

 

 

e) How can connectivity between broadcast, physical and virtual resources and informal learning be enhanced

Develop e-mature systems DESIGNED to integrate learning contexts and resources.

TRAIN developers to design for multiple contexts.

USE media literate learners and youngsters to work with

Design for informality learning not achievement

 

f) How can we bring new ICT together with more established teaching and learning models so that there are integrated opportunities to learn?

 

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