Life Empowered Institute (LEI) Learning
- Life Empowered Institute (LEI) Learning Center offers online courses to support your life learning in the following areas.
- Personal Financial Courses – “Where Life Planning Meets with Financial Planning”
- Personal Development Courses – Fundamentals to Getting What You Want In Your Life
- Membership Courses – Monthly Online Programs to Enrich Your Journey to Personal Achievement and Success
What Is Transformational Learning?
Jack Mezirow, the founder of transformative learning explains this kind of learning as “the process of effecting change in a frame of reference,” Any learning that occurs within a person’s frame of reference is not considered transformative. Ones’ frame of reference includes habits of mind and point of view. Habits of mind are sustainable, long lasting, “broad, abstract, orienting, habitual ways of thinking, feeling, and acting influenced by assumptions that constitute a set of codes”. In contrast points of view are fluid and can change as “we reflect on either the content or process by which we solve problems and identify the need to modify assumptions.”
This process is learner-centered and requires the learner to be independent and autonomous, and engage in critical and reflective thought, and discourse with others. It is the process where learners become more aware of their position ally; how they see themselves in relation to others and their world as they engage in the social process of learning.
Transformation, according to Mezirow’s original theory can be achieved in four ways, as individuals reinterpret their meaning of the world, and help interpret their future “thinking, beliefs, and actions,”:
Establish a new point of view
Expand an already existing point of view
Transform an existing point of view
Transform a habit of mind – This is rare and unlikely considering habits of mind are relatively unchangeable because they are deep rooted like beliefs.
There has been much controversy and discussion over this theory as many theorist believe it is singular, only focusing on the individual and neglecting to include other important elements such as a focus on spirituality, socio-cultural components, and a focus on society and how it impacts learning experiences. Also, it has been contested whether transformation needs to be drastic or radical, or whether subtle transformations are still valid. Still theorists such as Newman, discount transformative learning all together and wonder if it should simply be considered “good learning.” He asserts that in self-reported accounts of transformative learning, the only common denominator in learning is change.
