Article: Falk, J. H. (2005) Free-choice environmental learning: framing the discussion. Environmental Education Research, 11:3, 265-280, https://doi.org/10.1080/13504620500081129
John H. Falk, – Sea Grant Professor of Free-Choice Learning at Oregon State University and Director of the OSU Center for Research on Lifelong STEM Learning, and advisor to Time Team America
Free-choice learning (FCL) is something I have been conducting for some time now without having had the ‘correct’ terminology to describe it. As a mature student completing my degree for interest rather than as a compulsory part of schooling or work, I am very much a free-choice learner. I choose to spend the resources (in terms of time and money) doing this degree with no real expectation as to the end result other than self-improvement. The key points I took from this reading were as follows:
Free-choice learning is effectively the non-compulsory learning experiences where the learner has a deal of control over the fundamentals of said learning: the how/why/what/where and when (p.265).
All visitors (to a museum for example) will learn something from their visit, but that something may not be what the institution wanted or expected.
People undertake FCL for more than one reason: self-improvement, value creation, fulfilling personal intellectual/emotional needs (p.266).
Most learning, especially environmental learning, occurs outside of formal schooling (p.266).
The more the work/school/family/elective spheres of environmental learning overlap, the greater the learning success will be.
There are 3 core constructs at play: learning, free-choice learning and learning infrastructure.
Learning
Learning is difficult to define; it incorporates many parts of the brain and varied bio-chemical/electrical/mechanical stimuli. Each person learns differently even when presented with the same stimuli:
People [learn] through a constant process of relating past experiences to the present, connecting what is happening in the present to what has happened in the past… Learning is a dialogue between the individual and his or her social/cultural and physical environment; learning is a contextually driven effort to make meaning in order to survive and prosper in the world.1
Learning is:
highly personal
non-linear
idiosyncratic
contextual
a process
informed by prior knowledge
a product
time-consuming
cumulative
collaborative
social
sociocultural
Asking questions to gauge the learner’s take-home education from a learning experience often misses the point; instead of asking ‘what did they learn?’ we should be asking ‘how did their learning today contribute to their overall experience?’.
Free-choice learning
As already covered, free-choice learning occurs when the learners have significant and meaningful control over their learning. It is important to note that while the physical context is relatively important, the settings/institution are not significant factors:
there is no convincing evidence that the fundamental processes of learning differ solely as a function of the physical setting… there is no basis to assume that open-ended, optional, inquiry-based experiences within a school setting are somehow fundamentally different from open-ended, optional, inquiry-based experiences at a nature center. (p.271)
This implies that there is no real need for terms such as formal/informal/non-formal – learning is either free-choice or it is not and can occur in any setting or institution (p.271-2).
FCL challenges the top-down mass market curricula imposed by statutory educational institutions which will be of increasing importance as we transition to a knowledge-based socio-economic culture (p.272).
Infractructure for FCL
Mark St John: formal educational system & broader FCL as parts of the same larger educational infrastructure. 2
‘The educational institutions that help to provide citizens with current and accurate knowledge and information, whether it is about health, politics, economics or the environment, form the fundamental backbone of the knowledge economy. ‘ (p.274).
Interest on its own however does not have enough momentum to enculture an environmentally aware populace; you need both interest and an infrastructure in place because FCL is not a ‘once and for all’ thing you can pick up in early schooling and then never revisit (p.274-5).
Quality FCL opportunities not only need to be accessible to learners from all social demographics, but those learners need to be aware that said opportunities exist in the first place (p.276).
I am aware that this post has gone on for some time so I think I’ll end it here and post my thoughts on it when I’ve had chance to think about what Falk is saying.
Falk, J. H & Dierking, L. d. (2000) Learning from museums: visitor experiences and the making of meaning. Walnut Creek, CA: Altamira Press. ↵
St. John, M. & Perry, D. (1993) A framework for evaluation and research: science, infrastructure and relationships. In: S. Bicknell & G. Farmelo (eds.) Museum visitor studies in the 90s. (London: Science Museum) pp.59-66. ↵
Our first session of ED553E encouraged us to think about what learning meant to us, our experiences of learning and how we would categorise good versus bad learning. This is something that I had been thinking about on and off for some time; I’ve been lucky enough to have had driven, committed and enthusiastic teachers at various points throughout my learning journey, but equally, I have had unengaged and tedious tutors at times. I will give examples below, but first, the outcome of the first session.
We were asked to draw what we considered learning to consist of, with a bullet point marker, and then to list a few examples of good and bad learning. I will admit to a bit of a sinking feeling when Liz said we were going to be drawing; I only have one arm, courtesy of a motorbike accident, and it was my dominant arm which was lost. While I have taught myself to write with the ‘wrong’ hand, my drawing skills leave a lot to be desired, which is tedious as I was pretty good at art before my accident (but see below for one of the reasons why I wasn’t really good at art).
Here’s what I came up with:
Step aside, Van Gogh.
On the left you have my idea of learning. Of course, it’s completely obvious what each of those scrawls is supposed to be, so explaining them is probably superfluous, but permit me to go through each of them anyway. At the bottom is a learner with an open book, which for me is where most of my learning starts. Then you can see a computer linked to the left, which is supposed to represent internet-based research. Above that is a conversation taking place between the learner and a supposedly interested party (as you can no doubt tell from his highly expressive face). Below and to the right of this conversation is the learner looking at some artwork, which is meant to represent taking the book/internet knowledge out into the real world.
As it happens, my drawings weren’t the worst despite being a hand down on everyone else, but as I discovered through pairs and small group work, we all seemed to have more or less the same ideas. I worked with Meghann as a pair and she had some points I didn’t cover but did generally agree with; her key point was that she didn’t like to be rushed, and that she needed a decent amount of time to do learn effectively. I would definitely agree with this in principle. although I must admit to being a bit of a last-minute-wonder; I am that person who procrastinates until the week before an assignment is due, and then lurches into action in a whirlwind of productivity and self-flagellation. ‘Never again,’ I say, after each manic typing session, ‘next time I will start my reading earlier and have it done a week before the due date to leave plenty of time to proofread and edit.’ Then, a hollow chuckle, as I know I’ll do exactly the same next time.
We amalgamated our ideas on good and bad learning, as you can see here:
Possibly the most teachery handwriting ever.
Most of these points are self-explanatory but I would like to pick up on the power aspect of the student-teacher relationship. Certainly, at a school age, the power dynamic is very heavily weighted towards the teacher. I can’t think of a single example throughout my schooling where a teacher’s dominion over knowledge was challenged. The only challenge to the teacher I remember was the occasional defiant pupil, but on the whole, we were a relatively passive group of empty vessels, awaiting the pouring in of knowledge.
As I have continued learning in my middle age, I am aware now of a different dynamic. I feel that now, I could challenge a lecturer on aspects of learning, were it necessary. This is almost certainly down to a few factors:
being older, I have more personal learning experiences to draw upon, some of which may be at a different level or of a different type from the tutor
as this degree is essentially for interest rather than compulsory learning, I feel that as a consumer paying for the education I owe it to myself to get the most value from the resources (i.e. the lecturer’s knowledge) possible
not being a teenager with crippling self-esteem and confidence problems anymore means I don’t mind challenging something in class, if I don’t agree or don’t understand – I don’t worry about looking ‘stupid’ in front of other people
Now for a couple of examples of where I’ve had a bad learning experience. These aren’t exactly earth-shattering educational episodes but have affected me enough that I can still readily call them back to mind.
The first example I’d like to share is from when I was in junior school, aged around 7 or 8. The lesson was maths (ugh) and we had to draw out some boxes on our graph paper that then formed the backbone of an exercise (so basically we were just drawing rectangles to put figures into). I used to be a very artistic individual, drawing above notwithstanding, and I decided that after drawing these rectangles that I would draw in some background, and I think I’d worked out that I could fit a dragon in (I was obsessed with dragons having just read the Hobbit). Our lesson was being taken by the headteacher for some reason I can’t quite recall, and she was less than impressed by my artistic endeavours. She didn’t even let me explain what I was doing, she just tore a strip off me in front of the whole class, which was embarrassing, to say the least. I’ve hated maths for as long as I can recall and I’m sure this didn’t make me any more charitably disposed towards the subject.
The second example I want to give is from around the same age, when we were learning about the human body. We had these little cardboard wallets for our work, that were kept in binder holders on a unit in the classroom. My form tutor, who I adored, called me up in front of the class and held my bulging wallet out in front of her and then one by one pulled out half finished pieces of work and recited sarcastically the titles of each bit of paper (some only had the title written on) and then drooped them on the floor. She was disgusted at how much paper I’d wasted with my false starts, and discarded almost everything in the folder onto the floor while I stood in front of the class, in tears (sensitive child, cue ‘Our Song’ music). What I couldn’t explain (then) to her was that I am an immense perfectionist who finds blank pages incredibly daunting because I don’t want to get ‘it’ wrong, whatever ‘it’ happens to be at the time. I wanted my work to be perfect and whenever that wasn’t the case, whether from messy handwriting or having to cross something out when making a mistake, I had to start over. What I had then was a huge fear of failure; after the public disembowelment in this example, I added a fear of getting caught failing.
The last example I want to give is more of a general learning experience gained across two or three years when I was 15 or 16 years old. I loved art and would draw all the time at home, mostly animals but also cartoons and especially drawing from my imagination. But this love of creativity was slowly ground out of me by a couple of art teachers who were unenthusiastic and told me flat out that drawing something from memory or imagination was doing art ‘wrongly’, and that cartoons were the lowest form of artistic skill imaginable. I was never that into art in terms of learning who different painters were (I still can’t tell the difference between a Manet and a Monet) but felt it was a bit rich telling me that while expecting me to appreciate Picasso’s nightmarish figures. The boring still life pictures we were expected to churn out and a complete collapse in motivation during my GCSE Art & Design led to me getting a C grade, which was a terrible waste of talent, in retrospect. I got a C for Maths, which I loathed with every fibre of my being, so getting the same for Art was a real shame.
I think teaching school-age children is a massive undertaking, and I tip my hat to those that can do it. I think I would be paralysed (no pun intended) by a fear of imparting the same kind of bad experiences I had to my pupils. I’m sure that any of the teachers I highlighted here would be surprised to learn just how big an impact they had on my education, whether good or bad. I still hate Maths and I still have an urge to hide or destroy substandard work. But, every day’s a school day, as the saying goes.
The next section of this e-portfolio (having done enough budget therapy) will start to consider the introductory readings we have been assigned. There is a lot to get through.
