The theory of transformative learning and its notion of freedom, that we are not trapped by one way of looking at the world or being in the world, fosters a fundamental re-ordering and radical questioning of how one thinks or acts. As a theory of adult learning, it emerged from the women's movement in the US, echoing what it means to become a…

COVID-19 and the looming economic recession threatens adult educators' long-fought battle to create dialogical spaces for transformatory learning. Previous experience of designing and delivering community programmes to marginalised, non-traditional students, has taught us the necessity of building strong tutor-student and student-peer…

In practice, adult basic education activities are educational activities that adults engage in systematically so they can gain new forms of knowledge, skills, attitudes, or values for self-sustenance to ensure self-improvement and national development. Achieving these requires an appropriate approach which is vital for the participation of…

Transformative learning refers to a perspective transformation or change in worldview. Teachers in literacy education and adult basic education as well as GED instructors can learn how to foster transformative learning. These techniques can help learners engage in critical thought and discussion with others and may gain a broader, more inclusive…

Many think of Edith Stein as a phenomenological philosopher who experienced a dramatic religious conversion, but contemporary adult educators may also look to her as a model for the application of social activism based in theory. This article explores Stein's continued relevance for adult educators who research and then try to apply key concepts…

In this paper I reflect on epiphany moments in teaching and learning and the ways in which writing such moments can serve both to refresh and revitalise what Palmer calls the inner landscape of the educator, while also offering opportunities to enliven pedagogy. I use the notion of the liminal disposition to position such writing as an agentic act…

Adult education in healthcare comes in several forms: degree and certificate programs aimed at preparing better academic and clinical educators; and community education programs aimed at wellness, rehabilitation, or learning to live with chronic diseases. Patient-centered healthcare, however, is part of something new: coordinated and transitional…

So, what exactly is narrative learning? And why should adult educators know about it and use it in practice? Well, the short answer to both questions is that one makes sense of all experience by narrating it (constructing it as a kind of story), so understanding how narrative works will make the practice of adult educators more effective. But…

In adult education there is always a problem of prefabricated and in many respect fixed opinions and views of the world. In this sense, I will argue, that the starting point of radical education should be in the destruction of these walls of belief that people build around themselves in order to feel safe. In this connection I will talk about…

This reflective paper discusses aspects of the author's personal development as an adult learner. Though that development is reflected in her practice as an adult educator, she does not explore those implications in the paper. Instead, she grapples with what it means to make meaning, to determine how she knows what she thinks she knows. The author…

In this chapter, the author will explore the significance of race from a social constructionist perspective. He will focus on immigration laws and on examples of legal cases that have set the stage for current definitions of whiteness and racial identification. A community-based transformational organizing model will be presented. The model will…

Emotion-laden images that arise within adult learning provide a symbolic language for helping teachers and learners understand and facilitate transformation at both the individual and group levels.

This chapter describes a four-lens model for understanding adult learning theories and provides adult educators and administrators with a useful conceptual framework for working with adult learners in adult degree programs.

This chapter offers a conceptual map for describing different means by which expressive ways of knowing support a holistic approach to transformative learning.

In the mid-1960s, the foundations of Participatory Research were being laid in Tanzania and around the world through the work of muckraking adult educators--President Julius Nyerere, Marja-Liisa Swantz, Orlando Fals Borda, Rajesh Tandon, Budd Hall and many more of their friends and colleagues. At the same time, a bunch of American kids were over…