Building on Out of Classroom Experiences Reinforces the Value of Life-Long Learning

By Celeste Carmichael -- 

What is the equation of experiences that helps us to identify as learners, leaders, and enthusiasts?  For most that equation goes beyond the classroom and into out of school time activities, recreation, jobs, and relationships.  What if we, as formal educators, intentionally recognize the value of those experiences and point to similar opportunities for enrichment? 

The Center for Multicultural Education at the University of Washington and the LIFE Center— a research collaboration between the University of Washington, Stanford University, and SRI International, supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF)—established a panel to study this question and develop a set of principles that could help us to weave together learning across contexts and help students succeed. The panel poses that if educators make use of the informal learning that occurs in the homes, communities, and co-curricular activities of students, the achievement gap can be reduced.


While the study is not focused on Ag Education, the principals are connected to what we have been pushing around - what experiences build confidence and competence in students so that they are ready to learn and lead in and the classroom and more critically, in the field?    

 

The report Learning in and out of school in diverse environments: Life-Long, Life-Wide, Life-Deep points to four principles:

1.       Learning is situated in broad socio-economic and historical contexts and is mediated by local cultural practices and perspectives.  What is the lived experiences of the students in your classroom and how can that serve as an anchoring experience that helps them identify with classroom learning?

2.       Learning takes place not only in school but also in the multiple contexts and valued practices of everyday lives across the life span. Consider opportunities with professional development organizations like the Agriculture Future of America (AFA), Virginia Farm Bureau (VAFB), Virginia Biological Farming (VABF),  and Virginia Cooperative Extension (VCE).

3.       All learners need multiple sources of support from a variety of institutions to promote their personal and intellectual development. Mentors, heroes in the field, collaborative partners, cross collegial connections can reinforce what we want to learn and become.

4.       Learning is facilitated when learners are encouraged to use their home and community language resources as a basis for expanding their linguistic repertoires.  Here we might ask in what ways are our student language and culture being used to grow our agricultural education and our global economy?

 

Learning in and out of school in diverse environments: Life-Long, Life-Wide, Life-Deep includes an assessment to help identify practices that are being/could be used to help recognize student experiences beyond the classroom.  Access the full report here: https://education.uw.edu/sites/default/files/cme/docs/LEARNING%20LIFE%20REPORT.pdf

 

Banks, J., Au, K., Ball, A. F., Bell, P., Gordon, E., Gutierrez, K., Brice-Heath, S., Lee, C. D., Mahiri, J., Nasir, N., Valdes, G., & Zhou, M. (2007). Learning in and out of school in diverse environments: Life-Long, Life-Wide, Life-Deep.

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