Five philosophies of adult education in the United States

Teaching Philosophies

Adult education has been a phenomenon particularly prevalent in the United States, in order to deal with the great influx of immigrants. These foreigners needed skills, especially in language, in order to help themselves in the new country. Today, adult education, or andragogy, has become a major educational field used to empower millions of adults across the United States. As andragogy has been in existence practically since the founding of the country, several philosophies have been created to explain and to improve the practices related to educating adults in the United States. Five major philosophies are then generally associated with this phenomenon: the liberal, humanist, progressive, behavioral and radical philosophies. Following is a discussion of each philosophy, together with a consideration of how an educator might find a philosophy of his or her own that would best suit a particular group of learners.

The Liberal Philosophy

The liberal philosophy is founded within the classic Greek philosophies of education and culture. Of course these have been adjusted to suit the particular needs of the culture adapting the liberal philosophy to their own needs. Nonetheless, the basic premise of the Greek system remains. The basis of this system is then a structured set of definite, unchangeable rules (Werner, 2000). In the United States, this philosophy enjoyed the most prominence during the years before the Civil War.

According to Werner (2000), this philosophy is still evident in some systems today, including colleges, community learning programs and continuing education. As in ancient Greece, education within this philosophy exists and is undertaken for its own sake, in order to stimulate intellectual growth and emphasize liberal learning. The focus is then also on the intellect rather than on acquiring practical skill.

While few Universities offer this as the sole system of education, liberal studies are useful in stimulating thinking skills and expanding the mind. This occurs through the discussion of classic works of poetry and literature, and the intellectual stimulation offered by this practice makes the philosophy useful as part of a larger curriculum.

The teaching method associated with this philosophy is mainly authoritative. Learners are expected to gain insight rather than just knowledge through discussion and intellectual effort.

The Behaviorist Philosophy

The behaviorist philosophy is promoted by John Watson and B.F. Skinner, entailing the premise that all human behavior is conditioned. From this, behaviorists derive the theory that the environment is so influential in human conditioning, that it can be manipulated to control behavior (Werner, 2000).

Like the progressive philosophy, behaviorism is also focused on scientific means to achieve its end. Education occurs within a controlled environment, with objectives that can be measured. The educational goal is then to change the learner's behavior only through environmental stimuli, without a concern for any other aspects of humanity such as emotion. The objective here is only to change behavior according to specific goals such as competency and programmed learning. Occupational training and professional development programs have benefited from this philosophy. The focus is heavily on stimulus-response designs in order to stimulate new behavior.

In terms of teaching methodology, this philosophy is somewhat depersonalized, as much of behaviorist-associated learning can take place with the help of machines, programs and other stimuli. Once again the teacher serves as facilitator, but personal attention is not as prevalent as in the progressive philosophy (Merriam and Caffarella, 1991).

The Humanist Philosophy

Humanism is a very broad philosophy, incorporating several modes of thinking, including Marxism, Christianity and scientific humanism. In contrast to behaviorism, this theory includes all aspects of humanity, firstly concerning itself with providing access to education for all learners, and secondly with the learner and his or her needs. The focus is thus on the learner and his or her world, as well as how the educational experience can best be adapted to the learner's needs, rather than the other way around (Werner, 2000).

In this philosophy, adults are then helped to understand their own experiences with learning, and their reasons for wanting to learn. There are few judgments, and generally this philosophy entails providing an environment that adapts itself to best suit the needs of the learner (Werner, 2000). The aim is then to help individuals become autonomous and self-actualized rather than imitators of others' learning. Learning is thus directed by the learners themselves, rather than by learning objectives or teacher-centered paradigms (Merriam and Caffarella, 1991).

According to the humanist philosophy, human beings will learn naturally if provided with the correct type of environment. If therefore, enough stimuli and encouragement are provided, the learning process is expected to proceed naturally. It is this philosophy that gives rise to the word "andragogy," and the philosophy of Malcolm Knowles (Smith, 2002). According to Knowles, andragogy is focused on self-direction in the learning process, and the individual should be the point of focus. This term is specifically focused on adults, since they are expected to change their own self-concept from dependency in learning to independence and self-directed learning, whereas children are dependent learners for most of their lives.

This paradigm of learning thus attempts to include all human aspects of the learner to help stimulate self-direction, such as attitude, personality and behavior. The environment provided is thus expected to be highly individualized according to each of the learner's needs.

The Radical Philosophy

The aim of the radical philosophy is to provide people with a means of understanding society and its structure in order to improve their lives and/or escape from oppression. The focus here is much on social issues such as society in general, politics or the economy. Education is then a means of liberation for those who find themselves powerless or oppressed. The very purpose of education in this philosophy thus changes to become a means to a more important end, rather than the end, or indeed rather than personal fulfillment as its end (Kett, 1994).

One of the most important aspects here is Paulo Freire's emphasis on dialogue in order to gain an understanding of circumstances, as opposed to the traditional, teacher-centered type of education. This type of education has worked best within societies that contain large amounts of oppressive practices, where the oppressed need to learn some autonomy. More developed countries however tend to favor the more traditional types of education (Werner, 2000).

Conclusion

It is important to assess the specific needs of one's own educational environment. Some environments, as seen above, would benefit more from the behaviorist philosophy than from the humanist philosophy, and vice versa. It is therefore important to establish an initial focus, determine goals, and assess student needs. When there is for example a need for strongly skill-centered learning, such as a computer-skills course, this would benefit little from a behaviorist methodology. When the course is however more flexible and artistic, it might be better to focus on students' individual needs and concerns. In order to find what would work best in a specific classroom therefore, once should assess needs and determine whether only one, or a combination of several philosophies would be the best approach to best serve the needs of learners.