TEACHING OLD DOGS NEW TRICKS: A PARADIGM OF LIFELONG ...

More documents

Recommendations

Info

learner’s ability to boost expected learning outcome through adequate and personal belief in one’s capabilities and self-worth. Prefatory The spiral demand by the general public for placement in Higher Institutions of Learning (HIL) is a criterion with which to measure the incapability of many conventional institutions to effectively cope with the absorptive capacity of the teeming African population. This therefore, calls for a more viable and economic route to widen access of majority of people to higher education. The most plausible solution to this problem is the deliberate adoption of Open Distance Learning (ODL) because of its attractive virtues which according to Braimoh (1998) include the following: • It mitigates the perennial problem of restricted admission process • It encourages learning and earning to go pari-passu. This is because it is no longer rewarding for the employers of labour to grant study leave with pay to their employees as a result of the global economic recession. Consequently too, it is also no longer attractive to the employees to resign their jobs for the luxury of full time study in the face of deepening global unemployment situation. • It stimulates intellectual activity and skills development as a result of independent thinking arising from learners’ exposure to variety of learning materials both in print and electronic formats. • It is more cost effective when compared with the conventional higher education, particularly when it is considered from the premise of the enormity of expenditure that goes into the running conventional tertiary institutions to achieve the same goal of person-power development through the ODL route. • It has the element of immediacy, especially in the application of the skills and knowledge gained while studying for the purpose of improving the learner’s job performance at his/her work post. • It encourages massification of products as a result of the heterogeneity of clientele, subject coverage and geographical dispersion of learners’ location. • It is not disruptive in any form, as distance learning does not require the learner to be completely removed from his/her community, workplace or family members. It must however be noted, that majority of single, bi-modal or mixed modal Distance Higher Education Institutions (DHEIs) in most African countries are staffed with academics drawn predominantly from the F2F traditional Institutions. Consequently, because of their initial academic training, practical orientation and work experience, which are at variance with ODL Institutions, adaptability to ODL practice therefore becomes a ”war” with concomitant effect on academic quality, weak reflexive research output and a frustrating throughput rate. This paper therefore, proposes the adoption of a strategic approach, to the improvement of academic quality of staff of African ODL institutions, especially, through
a deliberate lifelong professional training and development programme. This will not only create a continuous learning environment among academic staff members in terms of the theories, principles and practices of ODL, but it will also enhance their productivity in all its ramifications with a resultant positive change in the unholy metaphor of access without success. Background One common axiom especially in the teaching-learning environment, which focuses particularly on knowledge generation, creation, appreciation and or acquisition, is that “old dogs” cannot be taught. Several explanations are teased to often understand this standpoint, but, without any equivocation, in teaching-learning environment, there is an in-built mechanism for the assessment of personal efforts in learning outcome. For instance, the teacher and or programme facilitator (PF) is able, to consistently and periodically evaluate, through his/her daily instructional contribution, the generation of knowledge and meaningful ideas that would be germane to changing learners’ behaviour. Learners’ behaviour depict the assumed consequent effect of learning input which can either be, ‘excellent academic performance (otherwise behaviour)’, ‘good academic performance’, ‘average academic performance’, ‘poor academic performance’, and or ‘academic failure’ when evaluated. There are different categories of learners as studies have shown. For instance, there are learners who either develop their capacity to maximize learning opportunities early or those whose capacities are merely prompted much later in life. Others operate within the set-up of multi-complex learning styles and which some studies have attested to (Jackson, Hobman, Jimmieson & Martin, 2008; Osiki, 2008; Siadaty & Taghiyareh, 2007). If the learner’s capacity to appreciate new information is at a loss and or blocked due to certain intervening variables such as illnesses and or emotional trauma, there are known psychological methods that could be harnessed to invigorate learning process. Using the difficult terrain that may block the learnt information, and subsequently affect information retrieval, Osiki (2008) stresses that old learners are unambiguously prompted to maximize learning opportunities through the application of relaxation techniques and reframing methods which are subsumed through psychotherapeutic facilitation. Osiki (2008), Osiki & Braimoh, (2008) opine that employing the manipulation of learners’ emotionality along the application of selected psychotherapies, could positively boost teaching outcomes involving distance learners (DLs). According to the gleaned outcome details from the ‘Centre for Positive Practices’ (2008), the stimulation of effective learning outcome could be explained through the implication of multi-factors among which are: self-concept, self-esteem, self-confidence, anxiety, background, socio-economic status, gender and self-efficacy according to . Self-efficacy according to Pajares & Miller, (1994), is shown to hold greater explanatory and predictive power for academic outcomes than many other determinants. Learning Process Learning is an abstract, invisible, unending and permanent phenomenon. Everyone, no matter the age, academic qualification, social level, marital status or gender difference, is bound to learn, although the pace of learning and the ability to comprehend the learnt information may however, differ from person to person. The reality is that any meaningful learning is expected to lead to behavioural change in the recipient. In other words, according to Braimoh (2008), human beings must engage in learning process in order to learn new ideas and gain valuable knowledge while at the
Page 1: TEACHING OLD DOGS NEW TRICKS: A PAR
Page 5 and 6: demonstrated how learning materials
Page 7 and 8: education, such as problem solving
Page 9 and 10: esearch empowerment gets goaded whe
Page 11: • Osiki, J. O. & Braimoh, Dele. (

TEACHING OLD DOGS NEW TRICKS: A PARADIGM OF LIFELONG ...

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?