Rebecca Lawrence Theory Review

Theory Review: Environment and Context in Learning

Rebecca Lawrence

Ball State University

EDAC 635: Strategies for Teaching Adults

Dr. Bo Chang

September 24, 2021

Name	Commented On
Rebecca Lawrence	Sean Schooley

Introduction

Environments can influence and affect how someone learns and how they feel about learning. MacKeracher (2010) identifies five different environmental concerns; the Physical Environment, the Cultural Environment, the Power Environment, the Knowledge Environment, and the 'Real Life' Environment. (pp.186-187) These points make up the main part of the theory of Environment and Context in Learning.

Main Theoretical Points

 Physical Environment

The physical environment is the literal physical environment that the teaching or program happens in. Mackeracher identifies four points that make up the ergonomics of the physical space. The comfort of chairs, the sound quality, the light and visual quality, and the air quality. These factors affect learning because they can affect someone being able to access the information, such as with poor sound quality or light and visual quality or someone not being able to sit in a class with poor seating. They can also affect people being able to focus or retain information, such as with lighting that has a hum or heat that can be distracting when trying to learn. (MacKeracher, 2010, pp.188-189) The physical environment needs to be able to be altered for the people in your program, as Thomas (2010) says "learning spaces need to be adaptive, malleable—almost fluid". This is especially important in physical spaces because everyone is so different and has different needs.

Cultural Environment

The cultural environment is the context and belief systems that make up our identities. The cultural environments affect learning because they affect how you interact with others and what knowledge and beliefs you may have before the program. This is important to consider because as MacKeracher (2010) says, "We become consciously aware of our culture only when we encounter people who do not share it." (p. 192) If you are not aware of cultural differences then you are at risk of offending or creating conflict in the program, which often hinders the learning process.

Power Environment

The power environment can be looked at as a subset of the cultural environment. It usually is looked at as how the cultures "permeate the interpersonal environments" (MacKeracher, 2010, p.196) This generally affects how people interact with each other depending on their power structure and who holds the power in the learning environment. This is important to be aware of because many times people may not be aware of their own privileges and power in situations that can cause power imbalances and discomfort. You need to be able to amplify the voices that are not being heard so that you can get the best view of the situation and make sure that your program fits as many people as possible. As Butterwick and Roy (2016) said in response to different documentary film festivals, "Voices previously ignored were heard and stories of victory provided hope for people facing their own challenges." (p. 59)

Knowledge Environment

The knowledge environment refers to what epistemology is being used in the environment. Dr. Ross-Gordon (2017) describes epistemology as, "Our understanding of what is knowledge, is at the core of educational thought" (p.140) This is that epistemology is what knowledge a person has and what they believe is true or fact. Everyone's perception is different, "Your personal model of reality is as much an epistemology as mine." (MaKeracher, 2010, p. 198) Understanding that people may perceive things differently and have different knowledge systems is important for developing a knowledge environment that works for everyone and can build each person's knowledge system. Also similar to cultural environments, not being aware of everyone's different knowledge systems puts you and everyone at risk of offending and upsetting people if their epistemology is dismissed or ignored.

'Real Life' Environment

The 'real life' environment refers to how the information that is being presented works in the different real-world contexts. Mackeracher describes this as situated cognition and situated learning. (CITE mack) This is important to education because if you want people to be able to use the information that you are giving them then you need to make sure that you can relate it to what they actually need the information for. Such as if they need the information for a certain life skill, teach it in a way that connects to that, or if they need to learn a skill then practicing that skill in a similar way that they would be using said skill in real life would help them best.

Application

These points can all be used in many different ways in practice. For example, you can work with different physical environments by talking with your program members to see what part of the space they like and don't like and then altering it for them, this can include things like moving chairs so people face each other, dimming or adding lights as needed, or playing music or sounds if people prefer that. For cultural environments, you could have people do assignments that have them reflect on what they consider their culture to be and to talk to others about theirs. For power environments, you could set things up to make sure that everyone involved in the program has the same amount of speaking time or involvement so that there are no people that don't have a voice or power. For the knowledge environment, you can make sure that people all are on the same page with their basic knowledge. If people have different knowledge systems and you don't account for that you can end up leaving people behind or causing conflict. You can find out what information people already know and what you may need to go over to get everyone on the same page by having a pre-quiz or questionnaire at the beginning of the program. This is also good because it doesn't single people out in front of everyone. Finally for the 'real life' environment you want can relate the information you are teaching to different real-life contexts or have simulations that are similar to real life. You can do this by having participants brainstorm ideas of how they can use these in their life or work. You can also have simulations or have participants do work in specific contexts. For example, if you are hosting a training for a program you can have people shadow others in the program so they can learn in the context or can learn how the information fits in.

Reflection

I think this assignment was interesting because it gave me other perspectives on what is considered a learning environment. I understood the physical and 'real life' environments when it comes to learning but I hadn't considered the cultural, power, or knowledge ones as much before this,

Highlights

I would say that the most significant part of the assignment would be the application of the theory points. The application is important because you can study and learn all day but if you can't use the information it doesn't matter.  

For the uniqueness of this assignment, I think having every group do a different theory was a good idea because it allows people to look over the theories but groups mean that several people do the same theory and this allows you to get multiple perspectives on each theory. 

Process

I started this assignment by first searching OneSearch and searching "learning environment" and other similar terms to find articles and books available. Then I read over these quickly and marked what seemed like it would be usable. After writing the different points I went back to the articles and looked over them for parts that fit with each point I was looking at. I then went through my textbooks for other classes because my classes have similar themes so many of the books will have parts that are usable. After that, I looked through the past assignments to make sure that the format of the assignment was correct. For time management tips, I tried to spend an hour each day working on different parts. Finally, I think the part that helped me a lot was finding textbooks from other classes when also looking for articles.

Tables

	The main theoretical ideas –Be specific	Summary of how to apply the main theoretical ideas in practice
Idea 1	Physical Environment	Making sure that the physical space works for each person in the group, including physical accommodations needed, but also what works best in general.
Idea 2	Cultural Environment	Making sure that you account for differences in cultures between both program participants and facilitators.
Idea 3	Power Environment	Making sure that you keep the power dynamics in a group fairly balanced and making sure that each person in the group has an equal chance to present their voice.
Idea 4	Knowledge Environment	Making sure that you account for the differences in knowledge and beliefs within the program. This includes being willing to alter the work or work with people to either fill in the information they need for the program or work around any belief systems that may conflict with the program.
Idea 5	'Real Life' Environment	Making sure that the information can be used in real-world contexts. This can be by relating said information to contexts or by having people learn the information in the contexts from the start, such as with simulations, internships, volunteering, or work shadowing.

Avila, M. (2018). Transformative Civic Engagement Through Community Organizing. Stylus Publishing, LLC. 

Butterwick, S. J., & Roy, C. (2016). Working the Margins of Community-Based Adult Learning: The Power of Arts-Making in Finding Voice and Creating Conditions for Seeing/Listening. Sense publ. 

Imms, W., Kvan, T. (2021). Space Are Places in Which We Learn. In Teacher Transition into Innovative Learning Environments: A Global Perspective. essay, Springer. 

Lüdtke, O., Robitzsch, A., Trautwein, U., & Kunter, M. (2009). Assessing the Impact of Learning Environments: How to Use Student Ratings of Classroom or School Characteristics in Multilevel Modeling. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 34(2), 120–131. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cedpsych.2008.12.001

MacKeracher, D. (2010). Making Sense of Adult Learning. University of Toronto Press. 

Ross-Gordon, J. M., Rose, A. D., & Kasworm, C. E. (2017). Foundations of adult and continuing education. Jossey-Bass. 

Thomas, H. (2010). Learning Spaces, Learning Environments and the Displacement of Learning. British Journal of Educational Technology, 41(3), 502–511. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8535.2009.00974.x