When I initially began this course I honesty had not paid much attention as to how I have learned material in the past. I thought that behaviorism and cognitive theories best described my learning habits. Now that I have been exposed to so much more I have to rethink those theories. In the big scheme of learning I think my personal learning experiences encompass a bit more of all the learning theories. I rely heavily on visual and audio information to help in making the learning experience one that I can walk away from feeling like I will not only retain the information, but I will also be able to recall and apply it when needed.
As an adult leaner the idea of drawing upon my self-concepts, life and work experiences, to draw on and help shape my learning motivates me to want to learn even more. Also, my motivation for learning is very different than when I was in high school or even the first year of college. Now my learning experiences are based on my desire to not only create meaningful learning experiences, but to apply the learned knowledge immediately in my professional setting. Social Constructivism and Connectivism creates experiences where I can interact with other working adults to share information and learn from their past ideas and knowledge. For example, when I began the learning process to understand how to utilize the LexisNexis legal research tool the instructor spent a lot of time initially explaining the layout without class participation. This did not give me or other students the hands-on experience we were looking for to help us understand how the program functioned. It was not until the instructor gave us some very much needed free range to start exploring how the system operated. One of the ideas I was able to take away from many of the other learners in that shared experience was the idea that research could be accomplished in more than one way. If I had not experienced this social learning experience I might have simply felt stuck in trying to manipulate my way around this learning process.
When it comes to technology, I have always been a bit fascinated with what they have to offer. I must admit that I am no way the savviest of individuals when it comes to using technology, but I am very opened to the ideas and simplistic they bring to our everyday life. Since I have begun this journey of educating others I have relied heavily upon the advancement of technology to not only spark excitement in the learning process, but to further help bring everyday devices into the classroom. When I reflect back to when I received my initial training in the military as a paralegal the only piece of technology we were using was the electric typewriter. I teach a course to the students on Emerging Technology within the field and they get a big laugh when I explain how we use to produce documents for clients and the headaches of conducting legal research. The take away I ask them to remember is that today’s technology has advanced us so far in the work place; it is up to us to take advantage of all that these technologies have to offer. The idea of being afraid to explore new technology should not be something anyone should shun away from, but they need to be embraced. Any learner of technology should take on any new technology as a learning experience to expand their knowledge base and make their work experiences a much simpler and informative one.
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