Learning Conversations

Most of us accept that Education does not meet the needs of learners today, nor their employers. This mismatch is a key reason why a shockingly high level of de-motivated youth, as well as workers and managers remain unable to develop themselves. They have been other­ organised and are unprepared for the world of work and the challenges of life. Again, traditional education is becoming uneconomic and future learning is increasingly using distant learning and digital technology on a global scale for transmitting the curriculum. Yet, how a person learns remains a hidden process even from the learners themselves. There is a pedagogic deficit since learning itself is not directly addressed.

This book offers a new conversational science of human learning based on Self-Organised­ Learning (SOL) and offers systematic reflective procedures called the Learning Conversation to enable individuals of all ages, backgrounds and disciplines to heighten awareness of their uniquely personal learning process. Learners are best seen as self-organised entities experiencing Learning Conversations as they seek to construct personal meaning, and to experiment with their learning skills. Personal learning myths which imprison learners, can be
overcome as they gain awareness and become engaged in developing their learning competence. The learner is encouraged to model their learning process and to act as their own scientist creating their own learning experiments and evaluating their progress by primarily generating their own feedback. They learn to engage in Learning Conversations with themselves and others expanding their horizons of learning. The method of the Learning Conversation is fully described and a Taxonomy of Conversational, Experiential and Behavioural Tools is introduced which augment its power.