Nature of Adult Teaching and Learning: Some Implications for Pedagogy

Abstract

In the provision of ESL teaching, adult education has become more prevalent as more adult students are seeking higher education. The positive outcome of this global trend is educational institutions are having big volume of nontraditional studentpopulations seeking linguistic competence which is, however, comparatively a new challenge to adult educators and programme developers. Adult students are, in a large-scale, expected to balance the needs of work, family, and related obligations. Because of their age, knowledge, and experience, adult learners have different orientations and emphases than traditional learners. Furthermore, adult instructors can, oftentimes, come across adult learners having acute economical insolvency, pressures of normal day-to-day tasks, previous experience of hopeless academic situations which may raise the bar of perplexity. As an adult educator, one can tailor instruction that helps adults overcome their fears, anxieties, and concerns and increases their self-confidence to be interactive. Appropriate teaching strategies, relevant lesson plans and productive learning environment lead them to selfdiscovery, to transferring of knowledge by bridging the gap between the old skills and the emerging new skills and professional competence. This paper intends to explore what exactly an adult learner is, and also to review adult learning principles and their implications for the mentors. From here, the focus is on what pedagogical and other techniques and methods would be appropriate to best support the needs of adult learners.