Teaching and Supporting Adult Learners

An accessible and up to date text on teaching and supporting adult learners, aimed at both student teachers and experienced practitioners. It explores teaching adult learners within a traditional further education (FE) context but also working with those adult learners on Higher Education (HE) courses taught within FE.

Adult learners have a distinct set of needs and challenges which can include issues of self confidence, fear of technology, time management and financial constraints, and which may not always be fully recognised by educational practitioners or institutions. Teachers and student stories are used throughout this book to analyse learner needs and motivations, highlight possible barriers to learning and explore strategies for support.

This publication enables those teaching adult learners to gain an understanding of the difficulties that students may experience while developing their own professional practice in order to create effective, focused and inclusive teaching strategies for this group.

Introduction: Why we have written the book and who we are ? How to use the book.

Part One; Understanding your learners

Chapter one:  Contextualisation

Chapter two: Internal motivation

Chapter Three: External motivation

 Chapter Four: Student and teacher stories

Part Two: Inclusive strategies to create a supportive learning experience

Chapter Five: Practicalities: the nuts and bolts of teaching

Chapter Six: Technologies : how they can help, how they can hinder.

Chapter Seven:Building relationships

Part Three: Pulling it all together

Chapter Eight: Detailed scenarios for analysis which will encompass all the above content

Glossary of terms eg. some definitions of inclusion, on-line learning, etc

References

Index

Sue Wallace is the Professor of Continuing Education at Nottingham Trent University. Her particular interest is in mentoring and the ways in which a successful mentoring relationship can support personal and professional development. She has researched and published extensively on education, training and management of behaviour, and is a popular keynote speaker at conferences.

Jackie Scruton is a Senior Lecturer at Nottingham Trent University, and part of her role is to support adult learners on a range of undergraduate and postgraduate courses. She has taught adult learners in a range of settings and on courses, such as Basic Skills and Degree programmes. She has a particular interest in working with learners for whom inclusion may be an issue, this includes, amongst others, adult learners  This interest was developed as a result of not only working with such learners but also from her experience of ‘finding’ education later in life. 

Belinda Feruson is a Senior Lecturer in Education at Nottingham Trent University,currently teaching on part-time degrees and teacher training courses and previously having taught in FE for 10 years on professional courses and initial teacher training. She has worked with adult learners throughout her career, and has seen the challenges and pressures they face along with the pleasure of success and the opportunities created. As a former mature, post-graduate student she has an empathy for students who find themselves juggling childcare and work with their studies.