Pedagogical development in older adult education: A critical community-based approach

Abstract

This paper informs pedagogical development in older adult education. It draws on qualitative data of a longitudinal community-based educational action research study. Informed by critical theory, Freirean and postcolonial literature, the educational initiative comprised a critical and praxis-oriented engagement with generative themes co-identified with participants – such as capitalism, consumerism, education and the Internet. Participants’ artistic talents, subcultural affiliations and chaperoning and mentoring rituals that characterised their community context were used as educational tools. Workshop-based sessions elicited critical problematization of the generative themes and co-production of related artistic yields, such as poetry and prose in the community’s dialects and also traditional folk song. Together with interviews, focus groups and participant observations, the artistic yields provided primary qualitative data. Thematic analysis of this varied data informed the development of pedagogy for community-based adult education grounded in participatory democracy and enhanced historicity. However, gaps, contradictions and ambivalences in the data testified to participants’ nuanced engagement. The study showed the educational value of such nuances because they provided spaces for learners to come into presence in an unscripted manner. Recommendations include pedagogical development rooted in the profiling of learners’ community and life stories, and investment in small-scale community-based initiatives.

Keywords:

• Community development
• critical theory
• non-formal older adult education
• pedagogy
• postcolonial education

Notes

Disclosure statement

The author declares that no conflict of interest characterised the study and the submission of this paper.

Notes

1 Classifying dynamics and outputs of the educational initiative under andragogy, geragogy or heutagogy was beyond the remit of the study. For this reason, throughout the discussion in this paper use of the term ‘pedagogy’ is a generalised one that draws on the Freirean tradition, as explained in the section discussing the theoretical framework of the paper.

2 Whilst duly considering the sometimes fuzzy distinctions between formal, informal and non-formal education (Eshach 2007) and debates on the accreditation of informal and non-formal education providers and educational achievements (Gallacher and Feutrie 2003), the research study engaged with non-formal education because the study’s educational initiative took place ‘in a planned but highly adaptable manner’ (Eshach 2007, p. 173); it featured a flexible curriculum, a curriculum and methodology that were adapted to the needs and interests of participants (Zaki Dib 1988, p. 301); time was ‘not a pre-established factor but…contingent upon’ participants’ work pace (Zaki Dib 1988) and the educational process was engaged within a community-based scenario that was ‘beyond the spheres of formal and informal education’ (Eshach 2007, p. 173)

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otably, although the data informing the analytic discussion concern a non-formal educational initiative, the discussion can also inform pedagogical development of formal community-based and institutional educational initiatives.

3 Freire (1973, 1985) identifies three stages of consciousness that feature in the journey towards ‘conscientizaςāo’. These are relevant to the understanding of the dynamic of dialogue that takes place in the context of a Freirean cultural circle. The three stages are:

• The semi-intransitive consciousness, whereby there is no human agency and social realities are experienced as irrevocably set in place, as things just happening in some mysterious way;

• The naïve transitive consciousness, whereby cause and effect operate in fragmented ways and thus human agency embarks on changes in a short-sighted fragmented manner with no address to broader fundamental issues;

• The critically transitive consciousness, whereby human agency recognises connections between the immediate, micro experience of society and the broader socio-economic, political and historical dimension within which the micro experience is embedded (Freire 1973, 1985).

4 Another concept grappled with in the analysis of power in the context of this study is the concept of transformation. In his critique, Inglis (1997) draws on the critical theory perspective arguing that understanding the world as ‘shaped through individual agency’ (p. 8) would imply

…turning a materialist perspective on its head. It is not that social being determines consciousness, but rather human consciousness, although emancipated, which determines social being. Both Foucault and the Frankfurt school are adamant that such conceptions have to be abandoned…(p. 8).

5 A trend that to date broadly mirrors the situation at national level (NSO 2019, p. 21; Includ-ED 2010).

6 All recrutiment and fieldwork was carried out further to obtaining official approval of the study and its research design from the author’s institution’s research ethics committee.

7 All primary data were translated from Maltese to English by the researcher.

8 Poems and prose were translated by the author from the orginal Maltese or dialects, thus priortizing linguistic understanding, over artistic use of language.

9 In this discussion, the term ‘chaperoning’ is being used to refer to the situation where participation was triggered and / or supported by the participation of one or more other participants.

The term ‘mentoring’ is being used to refer to a stronger and deeper relationship between participants whereby one participant advised and guided another participant in view of his / her expertise.

10 As the study was drawing to its end, plans concerning the future of the cultural circle included a second series of thematic meetings, the recording of an album of the collection of folks songs and literary write-ups developed during the thematic meetings, the establishment of a permanent centre for folk singers and writers of the community and the establishment of a folk song museum in the community.