Changing learners’ beliefs in adult classrooms

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CHANGING LEARNERS' BELIEFS IN ADULT CLASSROOMS

Ye. I. KANIVETS (senior lecturer),

L. M. ONIPCHENKO (senior lecturer)

Donetsk National Technical University

This article analyses the psychological and generational peculiarities of adult education, which has become an important and growing sector in modern conditions. The students ' beliefs are substantiated as influencing self-esteem and intrinsic motivation of learners. Special attention is paid to the beliefs ' system transformation from disempowering beliefs into empowering ones. This essentially influences the students' self-development process in foreign language acquisition. The teachers ' role is set to be vital.

Key words: belief system, disempowering and empowering, beliefs, transformation process.

adult education foreign language

Е. И. Канивец, Л. Н. Онипченко

Донецкий национальный технический университет

Преобразование системы убеждений студентов во взрослой аудитории

Статья анализирует психологические особенности образования взрослых. В статье рассматривается роль осознанных и неосознанных убеждений студентов как фактор влияющий на самооценку и внутреннюю мотивацию их в этом процессе. Особенное внимание уделяется процессу изменений системы убеждений из негативных в позитивные, что существенно повлияет на улучшение процесса саморазвития студентов в ходе их обучения иностранным языкам. Установлено, что роль преподавателя в процессе трансформации отрицательных убеждений в положительные существенна.

Ключевые слова: система осознанных и неосознанных убеждений, позитивные и негативные убеждения, трансформационный процесс.

О. І. Канівець, Л. М. Оніпченко

Донецький національний технічний університет

Перетворення системи настановлень студентів у дорослої аудиторії

В статті проаналізовано психологічні особливості освіти дорослих. Стаття розглядає роль усвідомлених та неусвідомлених настановлень студентів як фактор, що впливає на самооцінку і внутрішню мотивацію їх у цьому процесі. Особлива увага приділяється процесу змін системи настановлень з негативних в позитивні, що суттєво впливає на покращення процесу саморозвитку студентів при навчанні іноземним мовам. Встановлена суттєва роль викладача в процесі трансформації негативних настановлень в позитивні.

Ключові слова: система усвідомлених і неусвідомлених настановлень, позитивні та негативні настановлення, трансформаційний процес.

Problem setting in general and its connection with important scientific and practical tasks. Education has been undergoing massive transformations for the last two decades and these changes have been challenging for both learners and teachers. The idea of `continuous learning' has been gaining more and more popularity and nowadays adult learners, who are returning back into education for a variety of personal and professional reasons, make up a large segment of the student population. The characteristics of adult learners influence efficiency of teaching practices as working with adult learners is often different than working with younger students. This situation can be problematic for teachers who are unprepared to deal with psychological and generational differences when selecting teaching strategies and designing learning activities.

The latest papers and publications on the problem. Learners' beliefs about language learning have been considered as an important psychological variable, like many other individual differences in language learning. Over the past two decades, many researchers have explored language learning beliefs in various studies, covering varying groups of learners in different settings of learning: foreign language learners and English as a foreign or second language (EFL/ESL) learners in the US and the United Kingdom (e.g. Horwitz, Kern, Loewen) and outside these countries (e.g. Bernat, Diab, Peacock, Riley). This situation reflects the potential impact of the beliefs on language learning, and consequently on the outcome of learning.

The aim of the present article is to show main psychological and generational characteristics of adult learners, analyze learners' belief system in learning process and teachers' role in transformation of disempowering beliefs into empowering ones.

The body of the article. It is a common idea that good teaching practices are good teaching practices regardless of the age group at which they are aimed. However, there are some techniques that work better for learners of certain ages based on some fundamental generational differences beyond the learner's control [5]. The basic characteristics of adults which must be taken into account for the sake of quality adult learning are as follows:

* Adults must first understand why they need to know something before they actually invest time in learning it

Most adults have a fully formed self-image and tend to become resentful when these images are not valued in a learning situation

Adults need to feel as if their life experience is important as it helps them make connections between old and new knowledge

Adults will generally prepare more for a learning situation

Adults “want to learn to solve or address a particular problem, and are more satisfied with their learning if everyday experiences, is practical, or is current” [3, p. 11].

Adults are more intrinsically motivated to learn than children are. They are in the learning situation by choice and do not require the extrinsic motivational rewards that children do.

Knowledge of these characteristics is a necessity for teachers as they greatly influence quality of teaching and learning in their adult classes. But it is just one of the dimensions. There is general agreement not only between practitioners but also between language teaching methodologists alike that there are no easy answers to the questions of what it is that determines success in adult groups. Really, adult students are highly motivated as they know for sure that they need English for live communication and work, they have already some qualifications, they are prepared for intense and independent work, they are rather autonomous; we as teachers try to see them as partners and create positive and friendly environment in our classrooms, we use different materials and individual approaches to our students... But their results are so different even if we are speaking about students who have started with more or less the same initial levels. As some methodologists and practitioners claim success depends less on materials and textbooks and more on what goes on between the people in the classroom and inside minds of our students. We do not intend to say that materials, textbooks, skills and techniques that the teacher generally tends to focus on are insignificant, but we stress the even greater importance of less obvious processes in language learning. In this paper by these less obvious processes we understand positive and negative beliefs of learners' and teachers' attitudes towards these beliefs, since beliefs about capabilities, as well as beliefs about identity have their significant influence on the students' learning outcomes, especially through students' self-esteem. This does not claim that all the teachers in their classrooms need to do is to think positively and everything will be all right. However, we should not ignore the fact that lack of positive beliefs contributes very much to failure in language learning, though surely, it is not the only reason of this failure.

What are human beliefs and how do they act?

Belief is information, attitudes, values, expectations, learning theories, assumptions about teaching and learning that adult students and their teachers build up over time and bring to the classroom with them [1]. Surely, beliefs play a significant role in all spheres of life (art, sport, health, etc) not just learning.

Beliefs may exist in the definite form or in some unclear fragmented form, and they may be both positive and negative. So, in this way they may be defined as both filters and guidelines. On one side, beliefs are filters of human perception of reality, that is we interpret everything according to our belief system. On the other side, beliefs are guidelines of human behaviour, as what we do depends on what we believe.

Not only teachers but their adult students as well, have their own belief systems that are brought to the classrooms. Students' beliefs form a structural set of principles, derived from their prior experience, school practice, personality, some education theories and other sources. Differences in students' beliefs result from the amount of learning experience they have got and influence students' approach to language learning. But, as these beliefs can be both positive and negative, the influence can be positive or negative as well. In other words, students' belief system can act as one of the supportive pillars in learning or some obstacle in the process of learning. Surely, a student with supportive beliefs has better basis for success than a student who is convinced that he is hopeless in something. Fortunately, any belief system is not absolutely stable, it can be changed. If a student succeeds in changing his/her negative or limiting beliefs, it expands the potentials and choices to learn.

Changing negative beliefs into positive ones is essential in improving possibilities for success in language learning. But as teachers we cannot act directly to change our students' belief system - in other words, we cannot do it for them. As the Chinese proverb says "Teacher opens the door, but you must enter for yourself. Nobody except a student can change his/her belief system. However, the role of a teacher in this process is rather important: we can help our students in identifying limiting beliefs and in chucking them out.

First, identifying the limiting belief. Many of the beliefs and attitudes that guide human behaviour are outside our conscious awareness. That makes them doubly powerful because, as we do not know we have them, we cannot challenge them. Identifying limiting beliefs is very often a process of unearthing beliefs and bringing them into the conscious awareness of those concerned. How to do it practically? It takes little time for an adult student to produce a list of disempowering beliefs. When the list is ready students become aware of their obstacles in language learning. But this is the good beginning, but not the whole of the battle. Ask your students to produce a counter-list of empowering beliefs to foster their development in the classrooms. It will be the second step, which will help our students to re-route their thinking process in such a way that learning becomes easier. The way to do this is offering an alternative belief. Offering alternatives is like opening windows and doors in a closed room, so that the person inside realizes what is outside the room. When we correct grammar mistakes, we do not just mark the mistake, but we also lead the student towards the correct answer. Working with beliefs and attitudes follows the same pattern. In the following chart, we have listed some disempowering beliefs that are often encountered in our students and the empowering belief that can be offered as an alternative. Naturally these are only intended as an example.

Offering alternative paths does not guarantee that they will be walked. But as teachers, we should provide our students with new valuable possibilities that expand their choices and raise their self-esteem.

Conclusions. Adults tend to learn differently than younger students because of their psychological and generational characteristics, so it is imperative that the teacher be cognizant of these aspects when selecting teaching strategies and designing learning activities. We would like to stress once more the role of our adult students' beliefs in their language learning, as a belief system is one of the pillars on which the learning process is based on. The more supportive our students' beliefs about their capabilities and identity are, the better their learning outcomes may be. Surely, only students themselves can transform their negative or limiting beliefs into positive ones that will expand their choices to learn, but as teachers we can help them to understand the limiting forces of disempowering beliefs and foster the development of empowering beliefs in our adult students. This will encourage our students to make the most of their current capabilities and to develop new skills. This will raise their learner independence and self-esteem and make them more self- directed and intrinsically motivated.

References

Ellis R. Understanding Second Language Acquisition. - Oxford University Press, 1985.

Johnson K. Learning to teach: Instructional actions and decisions of pre-service ESL teachers. - 1992.

Knowles M.S. A History of the Adult Education Movement in the United States. - 1994.

Schmidt R. The role of consciousness in second language learning. - 1990.

Teaching Adults. Cambridge University Press. - 1996.

Tileston D. Ten Best Teaching Practices. - Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press, 2000.

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