2.6.2 More about formal and informal learning
Karen, one of the Learning to learn case studies, seems to show her own combination of deliberate and accidental learning in the following video clip.
Transcript: Karen
Activity 12: What type of learning?
This formal and informal learning activity will help you to develop your understanding of the difference between formal and informal learning, and the possible advantages and disadvantages of each type of learning. Once again, it features an animated film featuring Tina and her friends.
Comment
Hopefully you were able to identify the different types of learning mentioned by Tina, Alberto, Mike and Ellen when they explained to their friends how they had learned to dance. Don’t worry if it took you several attempts to complete the quiz. As you already know, repeating a quiz can help to strengthen your learning, prompting you to think more deeply about the quiz content.
In the next activity you will be required to think about informal and formal learning in the context of your own learning experiences. You will also learn more about the advantages and disadvantages of different types of learning.
Activity 13: Your learning – Informal or formal?
To help you see how your learning has involved both formal and informal learning, use the matrix that follows to sort the examples of learning you identified in Activity 11. Feel free to add more examples.
The matrix has two axes – informal/formal is the horizontal axis, running left to right, and the vertical axis represents alone/with others, running from top to bottom. This creates four quadrants or boxes:
- Top left: learning informally and alone
- Top right: learning formally and alone
- Bottom left: learning informally with others
- Bottom right: learning formally with others.
Try to find an example of your learning that fits into each quadrant. We have put one example in each box to get you started. As you complete the matrix, try to recall what each experience was like. Did you enjoy the situation and learn well, or not?
Comment
All types of learning have advantages and disadvantages.
Formal learning may have the advantage of offering a structure that can be reassuring to learners. For some people, there is nothing worse than being uncertain about what comes next. Other people find this structure stifling, and relish the opportunity to explore aspects of a topic in their own way and at their own pace.
It is good to have to have learning opportunities that suit our needs. We may want to get a degree that formal learning might bring. At the same point in our lives, we may enjoy developing a hobby through informal learning. It is often surprising how what we learn informally can help us appreciate aspects of formal learning. The opposite can happen, too.
The next section of this course explores two further theories. These theories are:
- communities of practice
- student approaches and strategies.