Module+7


 * Module 7:**


 * Description:**

In the 21 st  Century, technology is allowing people to accomplish what was impossible over twenty years ago, which is refreshing and inspiring. I am an example of someone whom U of A would not have been available to before. I am from PA and live hundreds of miles away from Akron; however, I am able to collaborate and contribute to a program that is helping me reach my goals.

**Impact**:

This module helped me reaffirm what I had already believed about adult education before, adults tend to learn differently as compared to children; therefore, adult instruction and training needs to be structured differently. One major reason is that as a person’s life circumstances can shape how a person will learn. With this in mind, adults need to have choices in what they learn and how they learn. Providing choices for training sessions for adults to attend (like having advanced and basic courses) is extremely helpful and motivating.

**Intent:**

As I have stated on the discussion boards, I believe that adult learning should take an Andragogical or “situation-specific” approach, because it is very important for adults to apply and understand what they have learned. There is nothing worse than wasting your time listening and learning about a particular topic, only to never use it again. This approach also emphasizes that learning should be structured in a way that the learner progresses from reliance (on the instructor) to independence.

All of these lessons became real to me this past summer. I have been fortunate enough to teach over twenty face to face graduate level courses in Pennsylvania, Maryland, and New Jersey over the past five years; however, in the summer of 2013, I was given the opportunity to develop an online graduate course in Universal Design for Learning. The process was tedious and very eye opening. Even though I have a philosophy that I have acquired through experience, I have found that it is constantly evolving and changing. As I currently pilot this course in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, I have found that my philosophy continues to change (as it should). In some ways it is frustrating and other ways it is encouraging because I never want to get to the point where I feel that I have all of the answers.