The MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) providers promote their courses as education that builds marketable skills. However, little research examines the role of relevance in the success of MOOCs or how this relevance influences learner behaviors. This study highlights the importance of MOOC relevance by decomposing it into personal relevance and…

Delving into the linguistic performance of EFL learners with varying linguistic backgrounds and potentials appears to be of huge significance, particularly in EFL classrooms. The knowledge of the potential variations between monolingual and bilingual EFL learners might help teachers better meet the needs of these learners, for instance through…

This study describes adult learners understanding in learning Islam using the andragogy approach in Singapore comprising multicultural and multi-religious society. Singapore is a secular state where freedom of religion is encrypted in the constitution and Malay/Muslim comprises 13.3% of the population. Adults learn Islam to deepen their…

In this article, we interpreted, in light of Mezirow's theory of transformative learning, interviews with 13 educators regarding their work with marginalized adult learners in prisons in the northeastern United States. Transformative learning may have been aided by the educators' response to unplanned activating events, humor, and respect, and…

Existing tools aim to detect university students with early diagnosis of dyslexia or reading difficulties, but there are not developed tools that let those students better understand some aspects of their difficulties. In this paper, a dashboard for visualizing and inspecting early detected reading difficulties and their characteristics, called…

This study describes adult learners' understanding in learning Islam using andragogy approach in which the study was conducted in Kampung Siglap Mosque and Al-Zuhri Higher Learning Institute. Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) educate his companions of who are adults from the shackles of "jahiliyyah," spiritual and intellectual…

In independent learning contexts, the effectiveness of the feedback dialogue between student and tutor or, in the absence of a tutor, the quality of the learning materials, is essential to successful learning. Using the voices of participants as the prime source of data through a combination of data-driven and concept-driven approaches, this…

This dissertation explores the role first-year composition (FYC) courses play in the academic lives of working-class adult students in the University of Louisville, an institution that, during portions of its long history, has been a valuable educational resource for working adults in the Louisville area. A confluence of political and…

This article argues for a flexible model of learning for adults which allows them to make choices and contextualise their learning in a manner appropriate to their own professional practice whilst also developing as a member of a learning community. It presents a design based around online "learning activities" which draws on ideas of…

Critical pedagogy is an instructional approach to teaching that employs a theoretical framework by which social injustices are critiqued. This type of pedagogy encourages the learner to critique obstructions to the learner's full participation in society, and encourages critical collective action, through the engagement of the learner's…

This descriptive case study explored how repurposing and a pedagogical-based instructional design model, the multimodal model (Picciano, 2009), were used to create quality courses in a rapid development setting at a Midwestern land grant university. Data triangulation was used to secure data from faculty member interviews, course syllabi, and…

The study suggests a general model that could guarantee the cooperation between teachers and their students to overcome the difficulties encountered in ESP learning. It tries to join together different perspectives in the research of adult education, specifically in the teaching of English for Specific Purposes. It also provides some sort of trust…

The current study merges theory and research in higher education and organizational psychology in order to investigate student retention in adult learners. Factors that are associated with student retention were examined and points of intervention are recommended. Specifically, this study focuses on the role of campus environment, classroom…

In the rapidly changing world of higher education, innovative approaches to teaching adults are needed to drive instructional practices for helping to prepare the professionals of the future. The papers collected in "Innovations in Teaching Adults" were originally presented at a conference at City University of Seattle. The authors of…

Adult students have become the new majority in online distance education. Research in online distance education, however, is still predominantly based on the historical perspective of the traditional student profile. This study examines adult students' learning engagement in online courses and explores the impact of online course design models and…