Adult+Learning+Theorists

**Stephen Brookfield** www.stephenbrookfield.com
Born in Liverpool, England 1949 raised and educated in England. Married Kim, 1986. Children: Molly Brookfield, Colin Brookfield. Started his teaching career in 1970. He has held appointments in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada ,and Australia. Currently Stephen is a Distinguished Professor at the University of St. Thomas in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA. He has run numerous workshops on teaching, adult learning, and critical thinking around the world to college and university groups, major US companies such as IBM, AT&T, Eli Lilly, and educational institutions in Canada and the United Kingdom. He has delivered keynote addresses at regional, national, and international education conferences. His work has been translated into German, Finnish, and Chinese. He has received several awards: 2001 Leadership Award from the Association for Continuing Higher Education (ACHE). Awarded for "extraordinary contributions to the general field of continuing education on a national and international level"; 1996 Cyril O. Houle World Award for Literature in Adult Education. Awarded by the American Association for Adult and Continuing Education for Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher; 1989 Cyril O. Houle World Award for Literature in Adult Education. Awarded by the American Association for Adult and Continuing Education for Developing Critical Thinkers; 1986 Cyril O. Houle World Award for Literature in Adult Education. Awarded by the American Association for Adult and Continuing Education for Understanding and Facilitating Adult Learning; 1986 Imogene Okes Award for Outstanding Research in Adult Education. Awarded by the American Association for Adult and Continuing Education for Understanding and Facilitating Adult Learning. Author of 10 books.

**Adult Learning Theory:**

There are four main areas of adult learning.
 * **Self-Directed Learning** – adults take control of their own learning by setting their own goals, locating the appropriate resources, what method of learning to use and how to evaluate the learning.
 * **Critical Reflection** – adults constructs such as embedded logic, dialectical thinking, working intelligence, reflective judgment, post-formal reasoning and epistemic cognition
 * **Experiential Learning** – emphasis on experience, a continuing process of evaluating experiences
 * **Learning to Learn** – to become skilled at learning in a range of different situations and styles

**Carl Rogers** (1902-1987)
During his time, Carl Rogers was an influential man in his field and considered to be one of the founding fathers of psychotherapy research. Carl was born on January 8, 1902 and died in San Diego, California on February 4, 1987. He started his life in Oak Park, Ill., a suburb of Chicago. His father was a civil engineer and his mother was a typical housewife. He was one of six siblings. Carl and his family moved to a farm about 30 miles west of Chicago when he was 12. His teenage years were very strict and isolated from others in his age group. As an adult, he became independent and self-disciplined. Carl attended several colleges before receiving a Ph.D. in psychology from Columbia University in 1931. Throughout his life, Carl did clinical work, taught in universities, gave speeches and wrote books until his death. Carl Rogers’ theory of adult development came about thru years of experience with psychotherapy and counseling. He created client-centered therapy and counseling, student-centered education, and person-centered approaches to human relations and community building. Rogers called his theory the actualizing tendency or "self-actualization". It simply means that each human has a built in motivation to develop oneself into the best possible outcome. He believed that everything strives to make the very best out of life. It didn’t matter whether the life was in plants, animals or humans. All life needs water, air and food to survive. With these built in motivations, people created the society we live in. Everything we do leads to personal growth and development. Carl Rogers was a major writer and believer in the humanist orientation. In his work, Rogers’ theory of learning contained two types of learning, cognitive (which is meaningless) and experiential (which is significant). The first one are things that we memorize like math tables, vocabulary words or other languages. The second one was learning how to build a roof or make a cake. Rogers’ believed there were several characteristics involved in experiential learning: personal involvement, self-initiated, pervasive, evaluation and essence of meaning. This learning is where personal growth and the feeling of self worth initiates. Following the footsteps of the great Sigmund Freud and Abraham Maslow and their humanist views, Carl Rogers became the founding father of American psychologist in the 20th century. Many scholars today are building on Rogers’ theory like Ruth Sanford, Allan Turner and BF Skinner. John Conti recommends studying Carl Rogers and his theory for anyone studying adult development. Carl’s book //Freedom to Learn: A View of What Education Might Become// is one of his best. Today we have a lengthy list of theorist who studied in depth and written about adult learners. Research has shown that two factors, speed and meaningfulness, play a role in the adult learning process. As we get older, our response time slows. We have a harder time recalling facts. So, adults stick to learning things that have meaning over nonsense memorization of information. As an adult learner, I need to have a purpose and drive to learn something new. I am less than motivated at work when I’m told you will do this in your classroom. The more I read about Carl Rogers, the more I liked him. I truly believe the motivation that drives me comes from within. Carl Rogers reminded me of Stephen Brookfield. I can draw lines and connect point in each of these men’s theories.