Adult Learning TheoryBy

Kathryn Patricia Cross

Kathryn Patricia Cross

•She started her career in the educational field after obtaining after obtaining her M.A in psychology and a P.H.D in social Psychology.•In 1964 she became the director of educational program at Princeton.•In 1980 she started teaching at Harvard as Professor of education.

• Cross (1981) presents the Characteristics of Adults as Learners (CAL) in the adult learning theory.

• the CAL model consists of two classes of variables: personal characteristics and situational characteristics.

Personal Characteristics• Personal characteristics include: aging and life

phases.• Aging results in the deterioration of certain

sensory-motor abilities (e.g., eyesight, hearing, reaction time) while intelligence abilities (e.g., decision-making skills, reasoning, vocabulary) tend to improve.

• Life phases (e.g., marriage, job changes, retirement).

• Situational characteristics consist of part-time versus full-time learning, and voluntary versus compulsory learning.

• Examples: Consider three adults: a nursing student, a new parent, and a middle-aged social worker about to take a course on child development. Each of these individuals differs in age (20,30,40) and life/developmental phases (adolescent/searching, young/striving, mature/stable).

• They also differ in terms of situational characteristics: for the nursing student, the course is full-time and compulsory, for the parent, it is part-time and optional; for the social worker it is part-time but required.

• According to the CAL model, a different learning strategy might be necessary for these three individuals to accommodate the differences in personal and situational characteristics.

Principles• Adult learning programs should capitalize on the

experience of participants. • Adult learning programs should adapt to the

aging limitations of the participants. • Adults should be challenged to move to

increasingly advanced stages of personal development.

• Adults should have as much choice as possible in the availability and organization of learning programs.

Reference

• Adults as Learners. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1981.

• Adult learning process : K.P.Cross, Marissa C. Galicia-Castillo, 2004