The Importance of Andragogy in Education | LEARNing To LEARN | 21st Century Learning and Teaching | Scoop.it
From linkis.com - April 13, 2015 1:28 PM

As educators one would expect that teachers and teacher/administrators should be experts on the best most effective and efficient methods of getting large groups of children to 

understand, learn, and use information responsibly to create more information. Theoretically, these educators have an understanding of pedagogy and methodology in order to accomplish these goals. I firmly believe most educators have these very skills to accomplish this with kids.

A question that haunts me however, at almost any education conference that I attend is: Why are so many (not all) of these educators, who are so skilled in a classroom of kids, so bad at teaching in a room full of adults for professional development?


According to an article, “Adult Learning Theory and Principles” from The Clinical Educator’s Resource Kit, Malcolm Knowles, an American practitioner and theorist of adult education, defined andragogy as “the art and science of helping adults learn”.

Knowles identified the six principles of adult learning as:

  • Adults are internally motivated and self-directed
  • Adults bring life experiences and knowledge to learning experiences
  • Adults are goal oriented
  • Adults are relevancy oriented
  • Adults are practical
  • Adult learners like to be respected


Learn more:


- https://gustmees.wordpress.com/2015/03/15/professional-development-why-educators-and-teachers-cant-catch-up-that-quickly-and-how-to-change-it/


- https://gustmees.wordpress.com/2015/03/28/learning-to-learn-for-my-professional-development-i-did-it-my-way/


- http://www.scoop.it/t/21st-century-learning-and-teaching/?tag=andragogy