Contexts That Motivate Learning
Based on the research of Malcolm Knowles, there are four distinct contexts that stimulate adults to learn, practical, personal, experiential, and idealistic. Practical context is the need to know to deal with a situation; this type is open to learning but most enthusiastic about it when there is a gain from it. Personal context is more of an independent drive to succeed and accomplish important goals. There is set goals that is being work toward and are prepared for any obstacles. Experiential is based more on what has been learned throughout life and in life experiences that will be reflected upon to help in future incidents. As for idealistic, this is more of a drive to try out new ideas and concepts with a desire to discover something new. Idealistic are more interested in the theory behind something than the practice, they also enjoy learning something with no significant value.
The context that I feel that motivates me in learning the most would have to be personal context, with a little bit of idealistic context. I’ve always enjoyed working in a kitchen in a restaurant; at age twenty six I was general manager of a restaurant. To save on labor I ran the kitchen the majority of the time so I was living my dream. Until the economy went bad and the restaurant I was running was one of the many that got shut down. Even though it’s been a couple of years and I have tried other jobs along the way I have always still wanted to get back into a kitchen. Now that I am back in a kitchen at a restaurant that I enjoy working at I must go back to school to go any farther in the field I am pursuing. So even though it has taken me longer then I anticipated I still have not lost site of my final goal and what I am trying to accomplish.