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Methods in seniors education today: what do we need?

Professor Dr. Keith Percy, Lancaster University, UK.

Ladies and gentlemen, it is a great honour to be here at this conference at the

University of Ulm and to be given the opportunity to speak to you.

The title of this talk has gone through several changes and I have to confess to

you that I am not sure, even now, if its intentions are absolutely clear. I do not

want you to expect that I shall take the promise of the title - what do we need -

literally and offer you a shopping list of new and old learning and teaching

methods for the future. We can all produce lists but it is not clear that they have

much value unless we attach to them an analysis of what is politically, culturally

and financially possible. That would take much longer than the twenty minutes

which are available for this presentation. Instead, I want to stand back a little

and to reflect on what we are talking about in this conference, in particular, what

are the constructs, assumptions and ideas which may be taken- for- granted by

us in relation to methods. By the way, when the first draft of this talk was

written, it became apparent that a range of other nouns were naturally being

used as synonyms for the noun seniors older adults, older people, later-life

learners, third agers and more. That seemed undesirable so the term older

people was adopted as standard. In English this is the most neutral - the least

value-laden - term.

The talk has three parts:

1) Some introductory reminders about the imprecise and generalised way in

which we speak about older people and learning

2) A discussion of six propositions concerning teaching and learning methods

which we may think older people need

3) A conclusion that, in the field of older peoples learning, we should

distinguish between our vision and the methods that we think will bring

about that vision

Part 1.

There has been a great deal of literature published in the last thirty or forty years

on the learning and teaching of older people. What much of it seems to disregard

is the obvious heterogeneity of older people. There are few statements which we

can make with validity and truth which can begin as to their teaching and

learning, older people shouldor.. older people do or older people prefer. Or

with regard to their teaching and learning, older people need Perhaps some

older people. But not all of them. There are so many older people. They are

everybody who happens to have lived beyond a certain age. They will differ in

terms of age, gender, social class, educational and employment background,


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income, nationality, culture, religion, health, values, learning interests and so on.

Any one of these factors might affect what older people want to learn, their

readiness to learn and the methods through which they can learn effectively. So,

universal statements about older people and learning are difficult to make.

The other introductory comment is to note a fascination with the way in whichwe do talk about older people and learning and the ways in which our vocabulary

shifts over time and, more importantly, the content of what we regard as

important shifts. We shall not dwell here on the way in which we talk about

learning and education almost interchangeably and the manner in which,

twenty years ago, we talked quite happily about educational gerontology and

gerogogy but have now slid imperceptibly into using softer terms such as

learning in later life or later-life learning. Think rather about, for example, the

growing dominance over the past decade of policy argument and research

activities connected to the wider benefits of learning and of the way later-life

learning has become part of the discussion. Thus, in this dominant paradigm,learning for older people is justified not intrinsically as a good in itself but in

terms of its possible other benefits connected to health, longevity of life and

savings on the health budget. There is nothing wrong with this but you need to

be conscious of what is occurring and be aware of the connection with political,

administrative and financial priorities. You could do a similar analysis of the

current talk of active ageing, of the need for older people to lead active lives.

There is nothing wrong with this kind of talk; it makes a lot of sense. But you

need to ask if the terminology is sufficient. What is omitted? If older people are

not able, or choose not, to be active do we blame or penalise them? Hopefully

not. If they do age actively is their future secure? Not necessarily. An active olderperson will not necessarily escape the economic, societal and political

constraints which control the way they live out their lives.

Part 2

The second part of this talk addresses directly the question of what claims and

assumptions are in fact made about the learning and teaching methods

needed for older people. It focuses on six, although there are several more

with which could be dealt with if there were time. In these claims and

assumptions we are asking if there is anything about being older, compared to

being younger, which mean that particular learning and teaching methods orapproaches are needed. We leave aside, for the moment, the question of when

does one become older, having ceased to be younger.

Do older, compared to younger, people need methods of teaching and

learning that:

1) fit their age?

This statement seems close to being self-evident, a tautology. There will

clearly be physical aspects of older age that affect learning and should be

borne in mind by a teacher, which might include a teacher teaching at adistance. It is not necessary to detail the obvious, but factors connected to


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sight, hearing, physical conditions, illnesses, perhaps concentration spans

experienced variously by older people - will be among them. Memory is

a most interesting issue here. There is a great deal of detailed research

about the effects of ageing upon memory and some of these may require

adjustment in teaching and learning methods. The Memory literature

seems to suggest, additionally, that almost as important as the effects of

ageing upon memory are the beliefs, often negative, which older people

have about their memories. Thus believing, perhaps falsely, that you have

a poor memory can inhibit, or even prevent, your learning. This is clearly a

factor which a good teacher, or preparer of learning materials, would want

to take into consideration and wish to counteract .

2) are social, interactive, inter-personal

It is a common piece of received wisdom that a major benefit of learning

for older people is that they leave their homes, go to a place where other

people are, and meet and interact with them in a class or learning

situation. This is active learning; it is an aspect of social inclusion, it is

characterised as an antidote to social isolation and as a significant

contribution to mental health. There is much anecdotal self-reported

material from older people to illustrate this benefit and a significant body

of research, again mainly based on self-report by older people, to confirm

it.

So this is an important proposition. An obvious comment is, of course, that

social situations, not describing themselves as connected to learning and

teaching, can and are organised which will presumably bring the same

benefits for older people who participate. However, it must be unwise to

argue that all learning by older people needs to be in the presence, the

physical presence, of other people. Older people can also learn alone; they

can learn at a distance; they can learn through ICT- enabled networks (and

this, in a different way, is social) as our colleagues here at Ulm havedemonstrated.

3) are peer-based, not didactic,

The British U3A, the University of the Third Age, has grown up since the

1980s with a particular ideology. It is that older people have passed

beyond the age, and the stages in life, when they want an expert to

stand in front of them and to transmit knowledge to them as passive

learners. The ideology maintains that a group of U3A members,experienced people and motivated learners, can function as a learning


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community and teach each other. Some will know more and help the

others; some will take turns to prepare so that they can pass on their

knowledge to others. In a research study into a British U3A group

published in the International Journal of Education and Ageing last year

(Marsden, 2011) one member said

If you have one person speaking for the whole time, you dont learn

very

much from each otherPeople have had enough of formal learning

but

they still want to go on learning and sharing what each other

learned

over the years

This research study showed, however, a difference between this kind of

statement and what actually occurred in the University of the Third Age

group. The author identified four different kinds of learning situation, four

different kinds of teaching and learning, in the U3A group researched,

including formal didactic teaching. The truth was that among the 800 or so

members, a variety of teaching and learning methods were both desired and

made available by these older people. This variety of method is surely what isneeded generally.

4) use their life-experience

Findsen & Formosa (2012), write

The learning experience must take advantage of the extensive

experiences of older learners

This must be true. This approach must be a way of making learning

immediately meaningful, of allowing older people to find examples in their

own experience which exemplify or confirm what is being taught, and to

compare with other members of a class how understanding of new

knowledge can be achieved through reflection on what is already known

and experienced. By definition older people have a longer life experience

upon which to draw. It is also seems fruitful to consider notions that later

life is the time when people might reflect upon, summarise and re-order

their life experience and come to some conclusions about its value and


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meaning. Those who write about this process describe it is as both a

learning activity and as therapeutic. However, two brief comments:

1) the claim that teaching should take account of the life experience of

learners is true for all adult education, for all ages of adults, not just for

those whom we describe as older. A thirty year old already hassignificant life experience which can be drawn into the process of learning.

2) We should not only generalise on this point but consider actual

contexts, actual classrooms and actual subjects being learned. Take

subjects such as astronomy, archaeology, mathematics. How is life

experience to be drawn upon in teaching these subjects? There probably

are answers but, again, if there are they apply equally to younger as to

older people.

5) liberate them

Over the past 20 - 25 years there has been a significant body of

academics and thinkers concerned with later-life learning who, following

Paolo Freire, think that teachers of older people should be concerned with

their liberation. Essentially, Freire argued that we are all prisoners of the

ideas, goals, concepts and standards which socialisation processes and

schooling have made available to us and fed into us. The implication is

that we accept the status quo, accept a society which is hierarchical with

haves and have-nots - and people and groups who are disadvantaged,

marginalised and oppressed (Freire, 1972). Among them are the large

groups of older people, poor, ill, isolated, who can be categorised as

among the oppressed. Over-simplified, perhaps, the argument from those

influenced by Freirean thinking is that the teaching and learning of older

people should help them to realise that they they are oppressed in their

minds as well as in their lives. This would be the first step. An older person

thus liberated and aware of his or her disadvantaged situation, the

argument goes, is then more likely to seek to take action, to become

involved in civil society, to seek to change things.

The Freirean analysis is interesting. There is an essential truth that aswe go through life we normally think within the thought-limits which our

society constructs and it is a worthwhile goal of education to try to break

out of that closed circle, if it is possible. However, I have myself,

nevertheless, written criticising this analysis, mainly on the grounds that

we should leave it to the individual to decide whether he or she should be

liberated in the way described and also that, when you consider the

classroom and subject learning level, it is difficult to see how you apply

the Freirean approach in practice (Percy,1990). However, the thinking

behind this proposition stands as a useful corrective to all those who think

that teaching older adults is a neutral, value-free, activity.


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6) promote self-directed learning

Clearly, teaching and learning of older people should particularly promote

self-directed learning. By self-directed, or independent, learning, of

course, we mean learning which the older person does on his or her own,

without a teacher, through reading, internet, media, talking to other

people or, really, any method that seems appropriate. Of course, self-

directed learning is important at any age and sufficient research has been

done worldwide over the past 40 years to suggest that it is a very

extensive form of adult learning. Why then, make the case particularly

with regard to older people? Because 1) there is research, although its

reliability is not certain, which does hint that older people are less likely to

engage in self-directed learning than those younger. If this is true, we do

not know the reasons for it but they are likely to be multiple and include

lack of confidence in ability to learn successfully in this mode; lack of

awareness of the teacher-less means of learning available; and a lack of

educational background. 2) Secondly, self-directed learning should be

promoted for its appropriateness for the situation of many older people. It

can be cheap, it does not necessarily require travel and the learning

resources available are potentially boundless. But, of course, it does not

bring with it the benefits of peer and group based learning and it does not

normally give access to an expert who can guide learning and supply

expertise.

Part 3

All of the six propositions about teaching and learning of older people are

significant and all have at least some elements of truth and relevance

which merit debate. As indicated, there are further propositions which

could have presented in this paper and you will be able to think of others.

The final section of this paper looks behind the propositions.

Teaching and learning are second order processes in the sense that

discussion of them often begs the questions ofwhatis to be taught and

whatlearned. It is fascinating that many discussions of later-life learning

neglect the what that is to be learned in a specific case, almost as if it

will not make a difference to an analysis. This is often because we do not

necessarily want to talk only about teaching and learning in itself but

rather about the higher order questions of what it can lead to. These

questions will be of the nature of what should the life of older people be

like, how should society treat older people, what should be changed, what

kind of society do we want, what kind of world, what kind of people, what

kind of older people? Thus, if you return to the six propositions in the

central part of this talk, underlying them are beliefs, questions and

aspirations about older people being active, older people being treated

properly, older people being treated as peers and equals, older peoplebeing respected for their position in life and for their life experience, older


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people being liberated and older people making choices for themselves

and being independent. And that is fine and that is good. What is not good

is to think that they are only propositions about teaching and learning.

Each proposition contains a vision.

Actually this conference is an excellent example. It is full of visions. Ofcourse, inter-generational dialogue and ICT based networked learning, for

example, can be discussed as methods of teaching and learning for older

people. However, behind each of them is a larger vision of the kind of

society and the kind of world to which we can aspire, if we wish to do so.

One offers us a civil society in which different generations communicate

with, learn from, value and depend upon each other for mutual benefit

and societal harmony. The other suggests a new world of national and

international communication in which the best of new learning technology

is adapted to enable communication in which the historic barriers of time,

cost and distance can be ignored and overcome. In each of these visions,older people are presented as key participants if they are able, and are

willing, to experience new learning situations.

For me, the most intriguing big vision to be discovered in this conference

is that of the joining together of the Danube countries in an international

sharing and understanding in which older people can play an important

part. I speak as a British person, brought up in the context of nationalistic

imperial pride, the island nation - state, rigidly timid about foreigners,

about speaking foreign languages and the notion of being European. The

vision of crossing national boundaries, exploring shared history, culture

and life experience, promoting peace, prosperity, civic engagement and

professional activity on an international basis is profound and exciting

from this restricted perspective. The image of the great River Danube

linking all of these aspects together is powerful and promises something

significant. The inclusion of teaching and learning, particularly of older

people, within this vision makes sense. However, let us always remember

what is the vision and what are the means to bring about the vision; let us

discriminate between the first and the second order questions. Then our

discussions about methods in seniors education will be better founded

and the outcomes will be what we need.

References

Findsen, B. & Formosa, M (2012) Lifelong learning in later life: a handbook

on older adultlearning. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.

Freire, P (1972) Pedagogy of the oppressed. Harmondsworth: Penguin.

Marsden, R (2012) A study of the co-operative learning model used by

University of the Third Age in the United Kingdom. International Journal of

Education and Ageing, 2, 1, 55-66.


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Percy, K. (1990) The future of educational gerontology: a second

statement of first principles. In F. Glendenning & K. Percy (Eds.)Ageing,

education and society: readings ineducational gerontology. Keele,

Staffordshire: Association for Educational Gerontology.

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