Adult Learning: A Debriefing of the 2009 Midwest Research to Practice Conference

Shirley J. Caruso, from NEIU's department of Educational Leadership and Development, shared her experience as an HR professional and a current graduate student on Nov. 10. Caruso spoke of informal learning and how it can be used to succeed in a school/work related setting.

Caruso commenced by explaining how in adult education, informal learning (in contrast to formal curriculum-driven) suggests greater flexibility or self-directness for learners. Informal learning accounts for upwards of 70 percent of learning in the workplace. It is supposedly acquired through interacting with co-workers, clientele, and colleagues, and discovering of new performance enhancing methods. Further more, it is described as impulsive, unstructured, embedded, and even accidental at times.

Caruso then explained the contents that make informal learning possible: self-directed, incidental and socialization or tacit learning.

"The way adults learn," Caruso said, "is that learners become increasingly self-directed as they mature. In its broadest meaning self-directed learning is a process in which individuals take the initiative, with or without the help of others, in diagnosing their learning needs, formulating learning goals, identifying human and material resources for learning, choosing and implement appropriate learning, choosing and implement appropriate learning strategies, and evaluating learning outcomes."

According to Caruso, self-directed learning becomes even more powerful when the learner uses a systematic approach to determine what areas of knowledge and skills are needed in order to accomplish a task (learning needs and goals), how required knowledge and skills are acquired (learning objectives and activities), and how the learner will know that his/her task of learning is accomplished (learning evaluation).

"Incidental Learning is unintentional or unplanned," Caruso further described. "Workplace incidental learning is a result of certain work related activities and work place interactions. Incidental learning is a surprise or by-product of any such work place."

She then explained tacit knowledge as an ability we unknowingly have. "It involves learning a skill, but not in a way that can be easily written down," Caruso described, "it is embedded in our daily work life and is rather implicit."

"My implication is that HR Development professionals must adopt methods of extracting individual knowledge into content and then deliver it to their entire organization," concluded Caruso. "Performance support tools are depositories for information gained from informal workplace learning. Employee-driven learning and its ensuing performance should be recognized, embraced, integrated and shared as a necessary component of amalgamated workplace learning."