A Toolkit for Teaching Adults: Analyze Adult Learners in the UAE - Paper Example

This toolkit is useful in guiding any academic teacher. It has been put together in four parts that analyze adult learners in the UAE and the type of programs they can take, the possible challenges, as well as adult education.

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Introduction

Education is a factor of great concern, and this is evident in the increasing interest that countries have in the modern society and how people focus on the acquisition of education. The fact that promotion in the workplaces is based on the level of education one has makes education to of a greater importance thereby establishing the need to take an analysis on the same to help in the dissemination of skills that and ensure that everyone has the ability to acquire education for their personal and professional development. There is an increasing demand for improvement of educational levels among in the adults which call for the need to form structures that can allow adults to further their education despite their daily commitments in the society. In this case, the focus is the need to develop a generic tool that can be used for teaching adults, such as toolkit would help the elderly to acquire education at any age, and get the opportunity to develop their professionalism.

Much focus is to engage in the development of a toolkit that would help adults to further their education and focus on the promotion of effective learning for adults. The toolkit would allow both intermediate and advanced users to scan reminders in the process of developing instruction where they do not have to read the full text. There are various sections of the toolkit which provide holistic information about the development of ideas and acquisition of relevant information. The first section is the outlining of the overview of the whole toolkit which helps in outlining the different parts of the same and its contents. In this way, focus in is the definition of purpose, outlining of the audience, learning objectives, methods of delivery, and the class and the size of the parties. The importance of adult education is evident in the United Arab Emirates as there is increasing number of adults seeking this type of education. In the country, the age recommended as adult education is forty years of age. It is at this age that adult are deemed fit for adult education

What is Different in Adult Education

In the process of analyzing adult education, there is a need to understand what is different in adult education and the necessary tools required in making teaching adults a success. Developing a teaching toolkit required the teachers to understand the adults and the way they learn. To reach adults in the best way and help in delivery of services in the right manner, there are factors that need to be considered to help in the process of developing the toolkit. One factor that needs to be considered is that the material presented need to be very useful to the learners and the adults need to use it immediately for their benefits. Additionally, the material which is presented need to be relevant to adults in their processes of learning and help in the acquisition of information Third, the environment need to be conducive to the learners and be welcoming for the learners to make them focus and participate during the lectures. Fourth, the training presentation should be engaging to help in the acquisition of the relevant concepts and ideas in from the learning. The opportunity of the learners to engage helps in the development of ideas through communication between the adult students and their teachers. Finally, the training of adults need to be presented in a respectable manner where the adults have the opportunity to share their experiences with one another. The respectful delivery of lessons in adult education also encourages adults to share information and experience in the process of educating them.

The key factors help in making the right decisions and determines what to include in the process of training and how to present the same to the learners. The same also helps in making the training process relevant to the adults, and to be fitting to the unique backgrounds of adults. One way of engaging the audience it to use examples and anecdotes that they can relate with to show the relevance of the course content learnt in the process. The available programs for adult education in the UAE are such as school-based, distance learning and full-time. The available methods allow for flexibility in the acquisition of education and allow for professional and intellectual development of adults in the UAE. There is a need to acknowledge the benefits of the same in the acquisition of knowledge in the country.

Overview of Adult Learning Toolkit

Effective Methods

Developing learning Objectives

Delivering Training

Effective Methods

The first step of developing adult learning toolkit is to develop the most effective ways of disseminating information to the adult students, and this is possible through the examination of the various ways that are applied in the process. One approach that proves to be of great importance in learning is making focusing less on what to be taught by on what the students need to learn from the lectures. The change of perspective leads to the change of focus thereby helping the development process in a great way. In the change of perspective, there is a need to understand the audience and their learning needs. It is the onus of the instructor to understand the audience and their learning needs; this requires the instructors to know the type of information that clients already have and what they need to learn. Teachers should do a short description of the audience to help in understanding them in details. To help in the dissemination of information for the benefit of the audience.

In addressing the concerns, questions that arise are; who to be taught, the background of the students, and the necessity of some more training for some of the audience. In identifying whom to teach during in the adult courses, there is a need to get the names of the audience, their titles, and their places of work. In understanding the backgrounds of the audience, there is a need to determine educational backgrounds of the students to determine the depth of information to cover in the process of teaching and make the teaching more relevant in the classroom. Third, there are cases where there is a need to provided more training than others; this is where there are great differences in the skill levels thereby requiring the teachers to hold different sessions with different expertise. An example of such a situation is where frontline workers and managers are in the same class.

Developing Learning Objectives

The main purpose of teaching needs to meld the key components of the audience, the training needs, the deficits in the skills and knowledge, and what to accomplish in the course. Such requires the instructors to match what the audience need to learn from the training. The students need to leave the training with new information and skills that they did not possess at the start of the course. Learning objective serve as a contract between the audience and the instructors in that they help in putting training in measurable and concrete terms. On the occasions when participants do not know the objectives of the lectures, they would have the challenge of acquiring concepts delivered in classroom. In this manner, they would have the challenge of learning what they are expected to learn from the same. Additionally, objectives also help the audience to develop focus on the desired outcomes of the lessons.

Prior to the development of learning objectives, it is a matter of great importance to determine the kind of learning that students would gain, and how such would help in the development of their lives. With the identification of Knowledge, Skills, and Attitudes (KSA), the teachers get to learn the specific learning objectives and how to fulfill such in the modern society. There is a need for the teachers to engage in the acquisition of the right knowledge that can be used in the development of the learning objectives to ensure that the course is suited to the needs of the audience.

Development of learning objectives that can help in the fulfillment of purpose of teaching proves to be a challenging task thereby necessitating instructors to employ various skills in the process. Objectives need to be written from the perspective of the participants because it aims at delivering the right content to the audience and help in the acquisition of information. The development of learning objectives therefore requires following of few steps to help in the delivery of course objectives. The objectives need to outline and emphasize what the instructor wants the students to value understand or do with the information or skills being taught. Developing learning objectives require teachers to focus on three main questions. The first question is what the audience would do because of the acquisition of knowledge, and going through the training or course. The second question in the identification of the conditions where the participants would perform the activities and the knowledge they require to do such in the most effective manner. Finally, there is the need to identify the level of proficiency required applying the skill or do such tasks successfully.

SMART MODEL

Specific

Measurable

Achievable

Relevant

Time-bound

ABCD MODEL

Audience

Behavior

Condition

Degree

Various models can be employed in the development of learning objectives, and help in the fulfillment of the course objectives in the modern society. Development of practical objectives require the use of SMART model. The second model that can be used is the A-B-C-D model which focuses more on behavior change, and the role of the same in helping to fulfill the needs of clients. In making decision regarding the kind of training that teachers should develop, various factors need to be considered and these are such as resources available, potential challenges to the training, the contents that need to be created, and the evaluation of instruments that should be use. Activities and contents of the course that best suits the course should be in tandem with the learning needs and objectives of the same. All of which should then be tailored to the audience.

There are more adult female learners compared to their male counterparts. This could be due to the fact that many of the male learners opt to partake in some cultural practices such as marriage before returning to continue with their learning. Additionally, there are more female learners because they want to make themselves productive people in the society and help their households in meeting some of the expenditure. Appropriate programs for adult learners should be in line with their talents and abilities so that they can sharpen their skills. Adult learners face challenges in their programs because family situations affects the learning of the populace making them drop out of their programs besides negative learning environments, which hinder study and class attendance. Economic situations also affect learning since working times can take up study hours. According to a survey done in the UAE, 42% of the reasons why students dropped out of their programs were due to social reasons whereas economic reasons accounted for 30% and educational reason took up 28%.

Activity Packet

Size of the Class

Teaching adults face-to-face requires that a maximum size of the classroom needs to be 15 students per class; however, there are ongoing debates on the right number of students that should be present in class. Smaller classes make it easy to deliver leani...